THE VIDEO SHELF · euphemism and soft language
George Carlin on Soft Language
A George Carlin stand-up bit from Doin' It Again about soft language and euphemism, showing how softened words hide uncomfortable facts. It touches on topics like shell shock and aging.
Why HN readers recommended it
Cited whenever euphemisms appear in corporate, product or news language, as the classic comedic critique.
This is a summary from the source dataset, not an endorsement by Hacker News or the video creator.
Video & recommendation details
- Creator / channel
- CappyNJ
- Topic
- euphemism and soft language
- Format
- comedy
- Level
- general
- HN recommenders in dataset
- 2
- HN mentions in dataset
- 6
- Recommendation years in dataset
- 2013–2024
These counts and years describe the included Hacker News records; they are not YouTube views or the video’s publication date.
From the original HN conversations
Excerpts from the recorded comments. Follow each source for the full comment and surrounding discussion.
For starters, we could all stop calling them car "accidents"... The language we use has a direct affect on the emotions we feel while talking about subjects such as this. Softening our language takes the humanity out of life. I refer you to George Carlin …
chill1 on Hacker News · 2013-10
In California woman ticketed for wearing Google Glass while drivingHumble suggestion: the author should watch George Carlin's skit on "soft language"[1] and reflect. A mature individual can contribute to a company he or she didn't start and still feel a sense of responsibility and ownership without being coddled by language that pretends employees aren't …
7Figures2Commas on Hacker News · 2014-12
In “Employee” and other words that make me cringe
Summaries, classifications and recommendation records are from the HackerTube source dataset. Read about this library and its limitations.