A while back I wrote a blog about replacing the phrase “Escaped Slave” with “self Emancipated”.
Although the former may represent that a person took steps to change their condition, no matter how hard they worked to do it and no matter the danger they faced as they escaped bondage, they are saddled with the word “slave”. They cannot escape that.
Although it may seem like a positive acknowledgement of a part of a person’s history, it has the unintended effect of holding that person to slavery as if the former state is the major or only measurable part of who they were or will forever be no matter what they did with their lives; no matter what greatness they might have achieved.
It becomes the prefix to whatever that person may have accomplished for the rest of their lives. They may have escaped the condition, but not the word.
“Self emancipated” implies a positive action taken to get away from the previous state, while not having the title “slave” dragged behind them from the escape on like a ball and chain forever attached to them.
It allows the person to move forward. It denotes a positive action without a word attached that pulls them back.
When a person loses something, they are often at fault. They are careless, or inattentive, or forgetful. They can be judged as just plain stupid. No matter what is lost, the person who lost usually bears some responsibility or is considered to.
Stealing something is the action of one person upon another usually without their permission. The theft is often practiced and planned out. It is not accidental, and it is the action of the thief, not the victim.
When people are killed in a mass shooting we lament the lives lost as if the loss was because of inattention, forgetfulness, or carelessness.
But, these people did not lose anything. Something was actively taken from them.
They are not lives lost.
They are lives stolen.
How we phrase things influences how they are perceived, consciously or otherwise.