House of Eratosthenes

It’s embarrassing to watch your nation’s leader on the teevee set giving a speech, and see beneath his moving lips a caption informing the viewers something like “‘ISIL’ is also known as ‘ISIS’.”

There are, occasionally, some valid reasons for calling things something different from what “everybody else” is calling them. I do that quite often myself — always, to the best I can recall, explaining my purpose in doing so. I recall the George W. Bush White House did this too:

Q: At the same time that conservative Republicans are sharply criticizing this President for his Mideast policy, which they describe as being too tough on Israel, you, the President, others in this White House have adopted a term called homicide bombings instead of suicide bombings. Is that a coincidence, or is this an attempt to pacify his political base that’s criticizing him?

MR. FLEISCHER: David, I don’t think pacification comes from lexicon. I think people support the President —

Q: Then why change the term, why adopt this —

MR. FLEISCHER: I think people support the President because of the principles that he has so strongly stood for in the war against terrorism and in his actions here in the Middle East.

But the reason I started to use that term is because it’s a more accurate description. These are not suicide bombings. These are not people who just kill themselves. These are people who deliberately go to murder others, with no regard to the values of their own life. These are murderers…It’s not suicide, it’s murder.

Perhaps President Obama has a reason for using the term “ISIL.” He didn’t, and to my knowledge hasn’t, explained what that is; instead He’s been leaving it to others to speculate.

People who communicate, and in doing so invest a great deal of their concern in exuding competence, typically don’t adopt their own terminologies and then leave those aberrations entirely unexplained while they use them over & over again. It looks daffy. Communication, after all, is the one human endeavor in which excellence is inextricably linked to doing things the same way others are doing them. Also, if you want to make people think differently simply by bludgeoning them over & over again with the thoughts you want them to think, it’s a good first step to explain the rationale. It’s clear the Obama administration doesn’t see any value in so explaining.

Either that, or their boss is nuts. Mentally unstable. Unfit for the job. One’s mind goes into overdrive as one ponders how our press would treat a Republican president doing the same thing.

Yeah, you can take this as a shout-out. Anybody know of an incident or exchange in which the Obama administration has explained this unique nomenclature? I’m sure it’s got to do with them being much smarter and sophisticated than those who use the better-recognized name of “ISIS.” But it’s bothersome that they appear far more determined to proliferate the ISIL acronym, than to explain their reasoning in choosing it. It makes them look like a joke (H/T Instapundit):

“Knock knock.”

“Who’s there?”

“ISIL.”

“ISIL who?”

“ISIL have no idea what to do about this $#!+.”

My guess is the same, old, tired one it always is: Smart People ™ think better, deeper mindthoughts than you, so of course they need their own unique nomenclature for things. The only Americans who call soccer “football,” for instance, are Very, Very Smart. Because that other game is for redneck hicks. Cosmopolitans like them must differentiate, so for them, the NFL plays “American football.” Because, Smart.

Dumbasses like us use “ISIS” because it rolls off the tongue, is a recognizable word, and the acronym accurately describes both what they want (“Islamic State”) and where they are (“Iraq and Syria”). ISIL, though… I’m informed that means “Islamic State of Iraq in the Levant.” Which is where now? How can Iraq be in the Levant, whatever that is?

See, I’m an idiot. All Smart People can tell you exactly where the Levant is, and give you a capsule summary of its history back to the Trojan War, I’m sure. Because, Smart.
- Severian | 09/11/2014 @ 07:12
Perhaps because “Levant” sounds better than “I totally f#^*$d up in Syria?”
- P_Ang | 09/11/2014 @ 09:27
<>

Your statement from above is true regarding intelligent, critically thinking people.

The problem is that about half the country (probably more) are quite willing to be incredibly lazy at cognition. Obama simply uses the tried and true techniques from Saul Alinsky’s “Rules for Radicals.” Always be extremely vague and use language that is so ambiguous that the listener can project into it whatever makes them feel good and believe whatever they want to believe.

Remember that ISIS and ISIL are meaningless in the very territories where the very entities operate. These labels were invented for consumption by the West.
- Moshe Ben-David | 09/11/2014 @ 09:38
…and then you starts in telling us slack jaws that “ISIL” does not “represent Islam”. At which point I turn the channel, lost me right there.

Then I turn it back…and he’s talking about how good the economy is doing. WTF!?!

But, at the end of the day hopefully he…make that The Pentagon…has a plan and executes it to kill all them scumbags whatever their fucking called…ISIS, ISIL…Islamlamadingdong.
- tim | 09/11/2014 @ 13:17
I’d add that it probably annoys the crap out of Islamic State to be called after an ancient infidel goddess. Which is another reason I prefer ISIS.
- Rich Fader | 09/11/2014 @ 18:40
I think POTUS is acting like this is a high school debate: the first one to speak gets to start defining terms (afaik there’s been no speech from ISIS other than the stuff in the beheading videos, and they don’t set any ‘here’s who we are’ type pronouncements). So POTUS is attempting to define the argument on his terms. ISIS/ISIL won’t care about this – if they really wanted to play the PR game, the guy that beheaded Sotloff would have been wearing a Kobe Bryant Lakers jersey in the video.

If POTUS actually believes that ISIS is not Islamic, then Congress should take him up on the idea. If he wants Congress to authorize war (or kinetic action or whatever else they’re trying to call it, see point one above), then the bill to authorize the activity should include the following: “All ordinance to be dropped on the Islamic State shall be smeared with bacon grease before the plane takes off.” If he truly believes his own rhetoric, he should have no problem with this.

As for MBD’s comment that people are lazy at cognition, I think it’s also of a function of info coming in. An overabundance of information leads to a deficit of attention.
- Wamphyr | 09/13/2014 @ 09:10
[…] is the Kind We Don’t Need and Don’t Want JoAnna Cameron Memo For File CLXXXIX “ISIL” How Liberals Use Technology “The Left is Not Liberal” “Utter Incomprehension of […]
- House of Eratosthenes | 09/16/2014 @ 06:09

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“ISIL”Thursday, September 11th, 2014

“ISIL”
Thursday, September 11th, 2014