the distinctions between Left and Right political beliefs are contrived and are designed to categorize into groups the non-thinking man. You know, sorta like but not like when we join together as Americans to oppose those wish us dead.

It's not just left and right (or Left and Right). Don't you see that all ideologies, especially those acquired shortly after birth, and which remain with us mainly un-examined can be a short-circuiting of reason. In fact, they are the opposite of rational argument. But one's own ideologies are usually not so classified. I have a philosophy of life, you have an ideology un-examined and patently false. Orwell's "thoughtcrime" (which you no doubt identify with some US laws on hate crimes) are an extreme form of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. That language controls thought is a nice lengthy topic to discuss on a words-related board, but why do I have the sneaky suspicion that what you really want to discuss is Politicks (intentionally thus spelled with lofty capital letter and archaic 'k' attached to raise its level to a classical argument).

What are laws, if not something to control the people who constitute Society. "What do you mean I cannot strange some fool in a parking lot because she parked across two spaces? Stop trying to control me. You're not the boss of me!" You can argue that a law is unjust, but not on the grounds that it is trying to control you or anybody else. (Although the latter is usually not so much worried about.)

Oh, and for the record, Orwell was a fine writer, and although I liked his non-fiction better (i.e., Down and Out in Paris and London and Homage to Catalonia), he knew diddly-squat about language or how it works.


Ceci n'est pas un seing.