The other side of amazing

I was talking about how people are amazing in an earlier post. Well, there's the flip side to this.

Recently there was a problem with some Android apps where some developers (I shouldn't call them developers, normal developers are good people, let's call these people the nasties), they had developed apps that were malicious like the computer viruses. If you installed those apps they could gain control of your phone and even access your personal information. So, when Google found out, they used a remote kill switch to delete these malicious apps from all users' phones. Now, I think that was a good thing and no scare was caused.
But, listen to what Peter Pachal from PCMag.com had to say about it, and I am quoting from the Metro newspaper. "But going into my phone and erasing software - no matter how bad it may be - strikes me as a vaguely Orwellian thing to do."

That's like saying, "Thank you very much, Mr. Fireman, for rescuing my wife from the burning building, but I'd rather a strange man didn't touch my wife."

[If you are wondering what Orwellian means - Click here.]

The Mot Juste

While working in Germany I learnt that the word for "shit" in German is "Scheiße" pronounced "sha-izay". But of course, it's a dirty word so people don't say it, especially not in the work-environment. So they say "shit" because that's not a dirty word, not in the German language. I have seen similar practices in other places other languages.

Translation is not the only subterfuge. There are replacements for the dirty words in the same language too. When I first went to US and started watching the TV shows, I was appalled by the language. My favorite type of TV shows are comedy sitcoms and they are mostly based on a family situation or friends and families. I was shaken out of my socks watching a young girl use words like "screw" in her father's presence! Believe me, I opened the dictionary and checked to see if there was any other meaning. No, it is the word that means "sexual intercourse".

The difference between "screw you" and "fuck you" is only that one can be used on the national television and the other has to be replaced by a beep.

There is a whole system of such replacements words that covers profanities, blasphemies, aggression and sometimes just plain nothing. For example, I'd really like someone to explain to me what is gained by replacing "ass" with "arse" when both are pointing to the same part of our anatomy.

My point is when everybody around us knows what the word we speak really stands for, what is the sense of this whole shocked-look-hand-on-the-mouth kind of righteousness.

Both sets of words mean exactly the same thing, convey the same meaning and yet...

I think Man must be the only animal in the animal kingdom who has two faces!