Month: February 2009

“suicide bomber”

Euphemisms

I often hear this phrase.

Problem:
The phrase draws attention to the perpetrator instead of to the victims.

Explanation:
Sorry about two blog posts in a row related to suicides, but I feel very compelled to write about this second topic.

To me, the phrase “suicide bomber” is a euphemism.

For the sake of better communication, it is best to avoid euphemisms.

The noun “euphemism” means the substitution of a vague or mild expression for one that people consider to be blunt or offensive.

The blunt meaning of “suicide bomber” is “a person who committed suicide by killing himself/herself with a bomb with the intent to kill other people — usually as many other people as possible — in the explosion”.

The problem that I have with the phrase “suicide bomber” is that it plays on the natural sympathy of readers and listeners who see or hear the word “suicide” instead of the natural antipathy of readers and listeners who see or hear the word “bomber”.

People see or read “suicide bomber” and focus on the word “suicide” as much as or more than they focus on the word “bomber”.

Unconsciously, their brains tend to say to them

  • “Oh, poor guy! He committed suicide! I wonder what was wrong with him or his condition.”

instead of

  • “That bastard! He bombed that market and killed a bunch of people! I am glad that he is dead.”

I truly believe that terrorist organizations have promoted the phrase “suicide bomber” as a marketing technique.

The phrase “suicide bomber” draws attention to a terrorist organization’s people and its goals.

If you tack on “homicide” to this phrase to get “suicide/homicide bomber”, then you reveal that the person not only killed himself or herself but also intentionally killed others.

But I prefer to take this to the next step by using “homicide bomber” — so as to draw attention away from the terrorist and his/her organization or cause and toward the victims.

The result is that the reader or listener then focuses on the crime and its victims instead of on the “poor, suicidal criminal”.

Sure, “suicide bomber” tells you that the bomber killed himself or herself intentionally during the bombing, and “homicide bomber” does not tell you whether the bomber used a roadside bomb or died, too, but the word “homicide” definitely tells you that the bomber killed others.

Being curious, I searched Google for each of the following (with the quotation marks, to avoid variations) and got about the indicated numbers of matches:

  • “suicide bomber” — 2,160,000 matches
  • “homicide bomber” — 32,400 matches

This tells me that Web authors have used “suicide bomber” versus “homicide bomber” by a ratio of 66.7-to-1, which depresses me but must dazzle the marketing geniuses in terrorist organizations.

Solution:
“homicide bomber”

“ECONOMY SUICIDE LINK”

Hyphens

I saw this headline two mornings ago on CNN.

Problem:
A slash or more words are missing.

Explanation:
The headline appeared in a banner beneath the journalist during a news story on the Cable News Network television channel.

My immediate reaction: “Huh?”

Because so many Americans use the noun “economy” instead of “economical” as an adjective, my first impression was that the story was about economical suicides.

I said to myself, “Economical suicides? Huh?”

I then saw the word “LINK” and initially wondered to WHAT economical suicides were links.

I doubt that the headline writer was trying to be provocative by creating some sort of confusing headline.

Instead, I believe that the headline writer was trying to say in as few words as possible that there was a possible link between the U.S. economy and the suicide rate.

The problem with this “as few words as possible” approach is that it can often lead to confusing instead of concise headlines.

Assuming that the headline system at a TV network such as CNN automatically adjusts the font size to make the characters fit the width of the banner, there truly was not a good reason to write something as cryptic as “ECONOMY SUICIDE LINK”.

I would not use a hyphen between “ECONOMY” and “SUICIDE” because many people still would see that as some sort of reference to economical suicides.

The solution to this confusion comes, in my opinion, from a slash or a few more words.

The reason that I recommend a slash instead of a hyphen is:

  • A slash connects two words but tells the reader to treat the two words as separate concepts, activities, or entities.
  • A hyphen connects two words and tells the reader that the first word modifies the second word.

The news story was about the connection between separate activities — the U.S. economy and suicides — NOT about using “ECONOMY” to modify “SUICIDE”.

Solution:
“ECONOMY/SUICIDE LINK”
or
“LINK BETWEEN ECONOMY AND SUICIDE (RATES)”

More about the hyphenation book

Hyphens

Here is an example of a common mistake covered by the hyphenation book that I am finalizing.

A common hyphenation mistake is omitting the hyphen in the name of a fraction when the fraction is used as an adjective.

For example, “His one fourth investment returned more than he expected.” — with no hyphen in “one fourth” — is a mistake.

The solution for this example is “His one-fourth investment returned more than he expected.” — in which we have replaced the space between “one” and “fourth” with a hyphen.

The solution relates to the fact that one writes a fraction numerically as a single entity (e.g., “1/4”).

Including a hyphen lets one write a fraction’s name, too, as a single entity, and one must have a single entity to modify a noun.

If you remember that the name of a fraction has to be written — with a hyphen — as a single entity when acting as an adjective to modify a noun, just as the fraction is written numerically — with a slash (“/”) — as a single entity, then you will not make this common hyphenation mistake.

If you like this explanation, then you should like the remainder of the book.

Please keep checking this blog for the official announcement about the publication of the book.

Thanks!

UPDATE: My How to Use Hyphens book is now available in softcover and several eBook editions. Learn more here!