I would say it's mostly politics hiding under the guise of intentional imprecision.
For most of the English-speaking world, concentration camp brings back imagery of Nazi death camps. The literal definition is basically any camp where people are concentrated based on some characteristic or behaviour, but that's not how the word has been used up to 2016. Terms like detainment camp or detainment facility were the usual terms for these places.
Post-2016 a segment of the Western world is convinced that the US is currently under a Hitler-esque government, so they are quite happy to use the term concentration camp precisely because it brings back imagery of Nazi death camps. They can point to the dictionary and say that it's not inaccurate which is absolutely true, it's just a more imprecise word than the one's we've used in the past. That imprecision is intentional and beneficial to their worldview: it's not lying and it brings back that emotional imagery from WW2.
A similar example was when I saw the headline "Trump uses chemical weapons on Mexican border". "Surely the UN will condemn this" I thought, but upon opening the article it turns out the chemical weapon in question was tear gas. So the headline was not a lie, but it was also intentionally imprecise. "Chemical weapon" brings up images of horrible deaths and maybe the movie the Rock, but not of tear gas. Most people would specify "tear gas" and not "chemical weapons" precisely to avoid that confusion and emotional imagery, but not when you want to forward an agenda.
And just to be clear I'm not saying that the agenda is necessarily that you agree or disagree with Trump. That agenda could simply be that you need to generate emotional outrage to get more traffic.
Please stop. You may be critical towards the current American immigration policy, as am I, but it is disingenuous to call this a concentration camp. There is no systematic killing of children inside American immigration facilities, and by comparing with Nazi concentration camps you make a mockery out of holocaust.
I understand that calling it a concentration camp is just a way of getting the necessary outrage to get something done via comparison to the Nazis but it cheapens the lives lost in the Holocaust. Why not internment camp?
We have a precedent in the internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII, which most Americans agree was disgusting. Not only that, the Supreme Court overturned Korematsu vs US in 2017 as part of Trump vs Hawaii. To me, internment camp dredges up exactly the type of thing we don't want happening again.
5 comments
[ 2.2 ms ] story [ 20.5 ms ] threadFor most of the English-speaking world, concentration camp brings back imagery of Nazi death camps. The literal definition is basically any camp where people are concentrated based on some characteristic or behaviour, but that's not how the word has been used up to 2016. Terms like detainment camp or detainment facility were the usual terms for these places.
Post-2016 a segment of the Western world is convinced that the US is currently under a Hitler-esque government, so they are quite happy to use the term concentration camp precisely because it brings back imagery of Nazi death camps. They can point to the dictionary and say that it's not inaccurate which is absolutely true, it's just a more imprecise word than the one's we've used in the past. That imprecision is intentional and beneficial to their worldview: it's not lying and it brings back that emotional imagery from WW2.
A similar example was when I saw the headline "Trump uses chemical weapons on Mexican border". "Surely the UN will condemn this" I thought, but upon opening the article it turns out the chemical weapon in question was tear gas. So the headline was not a lie, but it was also intentionally imprecise. "Chemical weapon" brings up images of horrible deaths and maybe the movie the Rock, but not of tear gas. Most people would specify "tear gas" and not "chemical weapons" precisely to avoid that confusion and emotional imagery, but not when you want to forward an agenda.
And just to be clear I'm not saying that the agenda is necessarily that you agree or disagree with Trump. That agenda could simply be that you need to generate emotional outrage to get more traffic.