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      The Doublespeak of Everyday Things

      I still haven’t learned to call “Directory Assistance” when I need a telephone number that’s not in the telephone book. I want to call information. But then I still use a toothbrush, and not an “oral hygiene appliance” or a “home plaque removal instrument.” In our everyday lives we encounter more and more doublespeak like these examples.

      Plain thermometers have become “digital fever computers,” while the bathroom scale has become an “ultra-thin microelectric weight sensor.” The modern bathroom doesn’t have a bathtub, sink, and toilet, it has a “body cleaning system,” a “pedestal lavatory,” and a “water closet tub.” Should your “water closet tub” become clogged, you can always use a “hydro blastforce cup” (or plunger) to clear it.

      Pacific Gas & Electric Company doesn’t send you a monthly bill these days, now it sends you “Energy Documents.” Hallmark doesn’t sell greeting cards, but “social expression products,” while Sony sells blank videotapes that come in the “Extra Standard Superior Grade.” Videotape stores will sell you “previously viewed videos” or used videotapes. You don’t buy ink, you buy “writing fluid.” A calendar is now a “personal manual data base,” while a clock is a “personal analog temporal displacement monitor” and a used wristwatch is a “pre-owned vintage watch classic, an estate quality timepiece.” Seiko sells “Personal Time Control Centers” not wristwatches. What was once a vacuum cleaner is now Hoover’s “Dimension 1000 Electronic Cleaning machine with quadraflex agitator.”

      Automobile junkyards have become “auto dismantlers and recyclers,” and they sell “predismantled previously owned parts.” Secondhand or used furniture stores now sell “second-choice furnishings.” Spoiled fruits and vegetables are now “distressed produce,” while discount stores have become “valued oriented” stores. When you buy popcorn at the Strand movie theater in Madison, Wisconsin, you go to the “Patron Assistance Center,” not the refreshment or candy stand. And if you want to exercise, you can always go, not to the gym, but to the “fitness center.”

      A company advertises that you can place your order by “electronic information transfer.” What they really mean is that you can telephone your order to them. Undertakers, some of whom now call themselves “perpetual rest consultants,” will sell you an “underground condominium” or cemetery lot, or an “eternal condominium” or mausoleum. Graves, by the way, are never dug but are “prepared” by those specializing in “internment excavation.” You can even make “pre-need arrangements.”

      Beware of the Polls

      Statistical doublespeak is a particularly effective form of doublespeak, since statistics are not likely to be closely scrutinized. Moreover, we tend to think that numbers are more concrete, more “real” than mere words. Quantify something and you give it a precision, a reality it did not have before.

      We live in an age where people love numbers. Computer printouts are “reality.” You identify yourself with your Social Security number; your American Express, MasterCard, or Visa number; your driver’s license number; your telephone number (with area code first); your zip code. Three out of four doctors recommend something, we are told; a recent poll reveals 52.3 percent are opposed; Nielsen gives the new television program a 9.2; the movie grossed $122 million.

      Baseball produces not just athletic contests but an infinity of statistics, which all true fans love to quote endlessly. Crowds at football and basketball games chant, “We’re number one!” while the Dow Jones index measures daily our economic health and well-being. Millions of people legally (and illegally) play the daily number. Millions of pocket calculators are sold every year. The list could go on to include the body count of Vietnam and the numbers of nuclear warheads and intercontinental ballistic missiles cited as the measure of national security.

      The computer scientist, the mathematician, the statistician, and the accountant all deal with “reality,” while the poet, the writer, the wordsmith deal with, well, just words. You may find, however, that the world of numbers is not as accurate as you think it is, especially the world of the public opinion poll.

      If you believe in public opinion polls, I’ve got a bridge you might like to buy. Depending upon which poll you believed just before the New Hampshire primary in February 1988, you would have known that Robert Dole would beat George Bush 35 percent to 27 (Gallup); or Dole would win 32 percent to Bush’s 28 percent (Boston Globe); or that Dole and Bush were even at 32 percent each (ABC-Washington Post); or Bush would win 32 percent to Dole’s 30 (WBZ-TV); or Bush would win 34 percent to Dole’s 30 percent (CBS-New York Times). Of course, George Bush won the actual vote 38 percent to 29 percent.

      Things weren’t much better on the Democratic side, either. While most primary polls were correct in identifying Michael Dukakis as the winner, the margin of victory varied from 47 percent to 38 percent. Dukakis won with 36 percent of the vote. For second place, though, the polls really missed the call. Two had Paul Simon ahead of Richard Gephardt for second place, while a third had the two tied and the others had Simon behind by a thin margin. In the actual vote, Simon finished third with 17 percent of the vote, while Gephardt finished second with 20 percent. No one predicted Gephardt’s 20 percent of the vote, not even the surveys of voters leaving the polling places after they had voted. This last point should not be overlooked, for it reminds us that no poll is worth anything unless people tell the pollster the truth. Since no pollster can ever know whether or not people are telling the truth, how can we ever be sure of any poll?

      Things didn’t improve during the presidential campaign either. In August, 1988, before the Republican National Convention, seven polls gave seven different answers to the question of who was ahead. The CBS-New York Times poll had Dukakis leading Bush 50 percent to 33 percent, while a poll taken by KRC Communications/Research had Dukakis ahead only 45 percent to 44 percent. When the ABC News poll came out with Bush ahead 49 percent to 46 percent, many people in the polling business discounted the results. ABC promptly took another poll three days later which showed Dukakis ahead 55 percent to 40 percent. That was more like it, said the other professional poll takers.

      Even as presented, such polls are deceptive. Any poll has a margin of error inherent in it, but pollsters don’t discuss that margin very much. They like their polls to have an air of precision and certainty about them. The KRC polls just mentioned had a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percent. This means that, in the first poll KRC took Dukakis really had anywhere from 49 to 41 percent, while Bush had anywhere from 48 to 40 percent. In other words, Dukakis could have been ahead 49 to 40 percent, or Bush could have been ahead 48 to 41 percent. The poll didn’t tell you anything.

      Polls have become important commodities to be sold. Television news programs and newspapers use polls to show that they have the inside information, thus boosting their ratings and their circulation. Also, the more dramatic or unexpected the results of a poll, the better the chances the poll will be featured prominently on the evening news program. In addition to all this hype and use of polls as news, politicians, corporations, special- interest groups, and others have vested interests in the results of particular polls. Such people and groups have been known to design and conduct polls that will produce the results they want. In other words, polls can be and are a source of a lot of doublespeak.

      How do you read a poll? Actually, it’s not all that hard, but the problem is that most poll results don’t give you enough information to tell whether the poll is worth anything. In order to evaluate the results of a poll, you

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