PROPAGANDA / A CRAFT BIBLE · CHAPTER 05
Chapter 05 / 16
Words, Euphemism, and Loaded Language
Word choice sets the feeling before the sentence finishes. Euphemism softens; loaded words sharpen.
Choose each repeated word for the feeling it carries, and swap the plain word for one that hides or heightens what you mean.
Why it works
Words carry a verdict before the audience notices
Victor Klemperer, watching the language of the Third Reich, saw that propaganda works less through big speeches than through small words repeated until they feel normal. A word used often enough stops being noticed and starts being believed. The audience takes in the verdict inside the word without ever weighing it.
George Orwell showed in 1946 that euphemism lets a speaker name a thing without calling up its picture. "Pacification" names the bombing of a village without the village. William Lutz sorted this into four kinds of doublespeak: euphemism that softens, jargon that shuts outsiders out, inflated language that puffs the ordinary up, and gobbledygook that buries meaning in bulk. Dysphemism does the reverse, choosing the harsh word to make a thing sound worse than the plain one would.
Raymond Williams showed that the biggest words, like freedom, democracy, and community, carry no single agreed meaning. Because the meaning is contested, you can fill the word with yours and let the audience hear their own. The word feels shared while it does your work.
When to use it
Choose words before you write, not after
- A word will repeat across the whole message. Choose it for its feeling first and its accuracy second.
- You need to name something the audience would reject if named plainly. Use a euphemism that removes the picture.
- You want the audience to recoil from the target. Use a dysphemism, the harshest fair word you have.
- You want a big word to do work. Pick a contested one the audience already loves and let them supply the meaning.
How to do it
Build the word choices
- List every word you will repeat. For each, write what it makes the audience feel, not only what it means.
- For anything the audience would refuse if stated plainly, write the euphemism: the softer word that names it without its picture.
- For the target, write the dysphemism: the harshest word you can defend, repeated until it sticks to them.
- Pick one or two big contested words for your side, and use them so that opposing you means opposing the word.
- Cut jargon unless you want to shut people out. Keep it only where sounding expert helps and outsiders should feel excluded.
- Say each line aloud in the audience’s voice. If a word sounds like an outsider’s, replace it with theirs.
What it captures
What word choice captures
Word choice captures the audience’s verdict before they reason. A euphemism captures acceptance of a thing they would refuse if it were named plainly. A dysphemism captures their disgust and fixes it to the target. A contested big word captures their approval while you keep the meaning. Repetition then captures belief through familiarity, which the next chapter covers.
Read the studies