The New York Times was never able, so far as I can recall, to refer to enhanced interrogation techniques by the more direct term torture. This was, of course, regrettable, because the word torture conveys the reality more directly and accurately than the euphemism. However, the Times’ avoidance of the T word was somewhat understandable, though not forgivable, since we must assume the Times wanted to avoid admitting that we torture, and, lest we forget, the Times had some responsibility for legitimating the war in which torture became official government policy. Torture is something that other people do, and so the newspaper of record (and most other newspapers too) took shelter behind a euphemism. To my mind our use of the phrase “enhanced interrogation techniques” was reminiscent of the use of the term “ethnic cleansing” by the Serbs (or was it the Croatians) after the fall of Yugoslavia. Amazingly enough, the Western press fell into line then too, and used the term in place of the more accurate, and more informative word genocide.
Okay, we have now arrived at the point where I will make my point. In this morning’s Times we learn that there’s a lot of human trafficking taking place in Bangladesh and other Asian countries. There’s another term for human trafficking that conveys the reality far more clearly (and isn’t conveying information what newspapers are supposed to be about) than the words the Times chose to use. The term is slave trade. Now really, was that so hard. It’s not like the Times need to cover for the U.S. in this instance. After all, we’re not engaged in the slave trade anymore. It would be interesting to know why the Times feels the need to sugar coat this activity, even a little bit.
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