On greater sharing of language between Americans

Here is a link on ThinkProgress to a conversation between BillO and his "ombudsperson" named Dhue, unless he's fired her for not putting out and then he may have, by now, hired Huey or Luey.
Their theory...too many "haters" are contacting the ombudsperson about facts! Facts that are incorrect! Bill cheers for the "regular viewers" to write in and tell him how right he is instead. And there we have for all to see the Fox News definition of acountability, and I'd dare say the conservative definition as the current resident of the white house appointed the same sort of ombudsperson at CPB.

Of course, the problem is simply that the definition of ombudsperson accepted by the English-speaking world differs dramatically from the definition amongst the neocon faithful. It is a very common aspect of cult behavior; Creating "cult-speak" that the non-initiated find baffling and vacuous. The problem with communication seems to be that the neocon faithful are unaware that their definition of ombudsperson differs from the rest of the English-speaking world. When people are speaking a similar, but significantly different language, trouble almost certainly ensues. Really, it is a recipe for disaster that is being repeated day after day between liberals and conservatives.

At some point, it must be acknowledged that we speak 2 related dialects of a language called English but we certainly don't speak the same language. The first step to improving communication is understanding that we speak different languages and beginning the arduous task of creating a Liberal English-Conservative English dictionary and train translators to work, first and foremost in the congress. Then a translator should add subtitles in Liberal English on Fox News. I theorize that once enough data on this new dialect is collected, we will find that it differs significantly from any dialect of English currently spoken. I suspect we will realize in the future that watching a minimum amount of Fox News was a unnecessary requisite for fully understanding the dialect. Unfortunately, this activity also seems to erase the knowledge of standard English/Liberal English. Therefore, it becomes impossible for someone to expose themselves to the requisite time to fluency and still be able to relate the new meanings back to other speakers of standard English. This complicates the path to translation greatly. In my experience, which I know is merely anecdotal evidence to begin theorizing and not data, speakers of conservative English are unaware that they were ever educated in standard English. Bill O'Reilly and Ms. Dhue are good examples. They seem completely suprised that announcing an ombudsman would initiate any emails concerning the inaccurate facts promoted by the show.Yet anyone who was aware of the standard English definition of ombudsperson would expect exactly that. This amnesia for the previous dialect is very interesting and does not seem to be common in language groups were multiple dialect knowledge is needed for functioning. Many Chinese, for example are fluent in Mandarin (putonghua or the "official" language) despite the fact that most of them speak a different dialect at home. (I wonder if it has to do with their being more distinct differences between Chinese dialects or that this new English dialect is disseminated in such a way that tricks the mind into believing this was always the definition of ombudsperson. Obviously, a large number of people not fluent in the language of this cult, made the assumption that he was using the word in the standard way, unaware of what ombudsperson means in this cults vocabulary.

The process of creating this dictionary is going to take long hours of reading exchanges between people on Fox News (merely because it is that richest source of this new dialect) deducing the intended meaning of their speech and trying to check via other shared words if we have made the correct deduction. Of course, the time to fluency would have to be carefully avoided or the person would be entirely convinced that the cult-speak was standard English.

To try to help, at least in this instance where it is clear the difference in dialect left both sides suprised, I wrote the following email to Ms. Dhue. I hope it will be a first step towards Americans being able to communicate with each other and solve problems together.

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I read with great amusement the conversation between you and BillO about your job as ombudsperson.

The problem can be easily solved. You have taken the title of ombudsperson, which suggests that your job is to check the false "facts" endorsed by Mr. O'Reilly on his show. Therefore, people who speak English are naturally going to assume that you wish to be made aware of the multitude of falsehoods that are promoted every day on Bill's shows. Of course, the "regular people" to whom he refers don't understand that calling them "regular people" is a well known way to promote falsehood by making people feel a part of the "in crowd". If what a person says is true they have no reason to suggest (without any data of course-unless of course you can supply the itinerary for his trip to meet all the "regular" people who watch his show and confirm their unanimous endorsement) that all "regular people" (definition please) agree with the falsehood, i.e. the statement at odds with reality.

The position you and Bill described today would be more accurately called "Defender of the Faith". Obviously, if the Catholic church publically announced a content related ombudsman, they would get all sorts of mail pointing out that most of their assertions have no basis in reality. And on the third day he rose again? How is an ombudsman going to check the facts on that? It is simply an article of faith, as is most of the content of the show that your title suggests you hold accountable to the truth. I'm sure they wouldn't wish to deal with that mail and thus they don't have an ombudsman, they have a defender of the faith. (I know they've tried to change the name but not with much public ado.)

Of course, those writing to the defender of the faith that Mr. O'Reilly promotes would be the letters you are looking for. The "regular people" who watch the show and believe will tell Bill how great he is, how right he is, how valuable his work to convert the masses to neocon fascism has been. I hope that you see the difference clearly...ombudsman checks statements against facts...defender of the faith checks statements against an irrational belief system and finds "truth" when the statement matches the belief system regardless of its relationship to reality. You and Bill very clearly made that distinction today.

If defender of the faith is distasteful, I have suggested another option in the subject line...OmBill'sperson would get what you tried to communicate today across. You could also consider the rather clumsy OminBill'sPocketperson. It doesn't roll off the tongue but it would have a relationship to his past conduct that many of us would watch the show just to hear him say!

Oh! Judging from the aging of Bill's demographic, my medical opinion would be that a majority of them are not regular. Maybe his website could add a BillOLax to help him be talking to more regular people when he promotes this faith based system. May I suggest a picture of Bill with is face distorted in a mighty grunt for the packaging?

I think that as long as you retain the title of ombudsperson, English speaking people's will assume you check facts and send you reams of emails each day that merely represents how far from reality the views expressed on the show are. If you don't want reality based emails and you want the emails from the "regular people", which I assume means other members of the neocon fascist faith group, then a simple change to a more accurate title would, I'm sure get all of that nasty reality out of your inbox!

I'm glad I could help with this problem that is obviously troubling both of you.

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I hope we can start the process of reconciliation. My next thought goes to the realization that these cult members are reading the constitution in conservative English. God knows what that sounds like when translated to standard English. Maybe there is a need for a national standard English that everyone must know. Children may be being taught at home that the constitution was written in this new dialect. The fact that this dialect is of recent vintage and could not be the language of the founders needs to be disseminated as well.