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Dan and David
Jan. 19, 2005

 

They're our words, dammit!

Marketers, politicians and other short-sighted, self-interested, sticky-fingered people have been stealing our words. Not only do they take them for commercial purposes, but they misuse them entirely. They're Word Pirates and we're going to take back what's rightfully ours.

For instance...

For instance, the word "pirate" itself has been taken over by the Big Content companies. They mean "anyone who shares files." Real pirates murdered, raped and stole. They didn't share music, rightly or wrongly.

For instance, "intellectual property" refers to ideas. Ideas aren't property. Not only one person can "own" them. It's a bad metaphor leading to worse laws.

For instance, "hotel guest" pretends that people who pay money to stay in a building are somehow guests.

What can we do about it?

We can refuse to accept these translations into inhuman language.

We can use the words to mean what they did before the pirates looted 'em.

We can list and discuss pirated words here.

Take Back a Word or Phrase

Word or phrase being pirated (Required) (No quote marks, please)
The story: What the word really means, why it's been pirated...(Required)
Your name (optional)
Your URL or email address (optional)

Glossary of Pirated Words
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z * All

Thu, 15 Mar 2007

Republican

diet

Democrat

Sun, 26 Dec 2004

incest

Thu, 23 Dec 2004

bon voyage

wagging the dpg

Mon, 20 Dec 2004

Inspired by

Sun, 19 Dec 2004

thingy

Fri, 17 Dec 2004

newspaper

kkjsdz ksd ukgs k sd k

Thu, 16 Dec 2004

gideon

Wed, 15 Dec 2004

five by five

argh, me scurvy

welcome to our class

enter

Tue, 14 Dec 2004

surf

Mon, 13 Dec 2004

gank

outage

Sun, 12 Dec 2004

how fun

at that point in time

vetting

fireworks

Sat, 11 Dec 2004

social security

whats up

Penultimate

Believe in

Light Year

Disabled Persons

Miracle

Opportunity

cup

Fri, 10 Dec 2004

Associate

computer

library patron

Stupid

Thats Cool

fruit

tamale

War on Terror

shama lama ding dong