zlacker

> Orwellian does not just mean changing terms or using euphemisms. It is about terms that make the expression of undesirable thoughts actually impossible. Do any of the scare-quoted terms do this? I can't see any.

Per [1]:

    "Orwellian" is an adjective describing a situation, idea, or societal condition that George Orwell identified as being destructive to the welfare of a free and open society. It denotes an attitude and a brutal policy of draconian control by propaganda, surveillance, disinformation, denial of truth (doublethink), and manipulation of the past [...]

The label in this context doesn't seem unreasonable to me.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orwellian

>>naaski+(OP)
In the context of authoritarian states and surveillance technology that definition matches. But this is specifically about language and jargon. Even if we decide that my definition is nonsense, it is clear that using terms like "escalation" internally isn't "a brutal policy of draconian control by propaganda."

>>UncleM+a41
> Even if we decide that my definition is nonsense, it is clear that using terms like "escalation" internally isn't "a brutal policy of draconian control by propaganda."

Sure, innocuous sounding words like "rendition" would never be reappropriated as code for something more sinister, right?

Seems to me that innocuous sounding jargon actually makes Orwellian doublethink much easier to swallow. Like a frog in a slowly heated pot of water, you get exposed to and acclimatize to progressively more problematic uses of power until you simultaneously believe that you are a patriot upholding citizen's rights while routinely violating them.

I'm not really sure why you think this process can't happen in a private company.