Comparing Jefferson’s Understanding of Metaphor to the Modern Understanding of Metaphor in the Law (By Julie A. Oseid)
A metaphor is defined as “the application of a word or phrase to an object or concept it does not literally denote, suggesting comparison to that object or concept.”8 The Greek etymology of metaphor is “carrying over” or “to stand for.”9 Metaphors permeate our language. Metaphors are not simply rhetorical devices but are fundamental to the way we think.10 George Lakoff and Mark Johnson note, “[W]e define our reality in terms of metaphors and then proceed to act on the basis of the metaphors.”11 Our human language itself is a set of metaphors, and we understand with the help of that language.12 Cognitive theory describes metaphor as “a way of thinking and knowing, the method by which we structure and reason, and it is fundamental, not ornamental.”13 Metaphor, as a critical way of thinking, is just as important to lawyers as it is to others. Legal metaphors are “indispensable pieces of the legal culture, not merely tolerated, but needed.”14
To Jefferson, “a metaphor stood for something it did not state, carrying over the meaning of one word or phrase to the meaning of something else.”15 The “wall of separation” metaphor follows the normal metaphoric comparison between something concrete and a more abstract idea.16 This section reviews Jefferson’s classical education, his understanding of the use of metaphor, and how Jefferson’s understanding of metaphor compares to our current understanding.
SOURCE: http://www.alwd.org/lcr/archives/fall-2010/oseid/
The Power of Metaphor: Thomas Jefferson’s
“Wall of Separation between
Church & State”
In an Univision interview, leading Hispanic reporter Jorge Ramos confronted Rep. Steve King (R-IA) over remarks in 2012 where the congressman likened immigrants to dogs. King refused to apologize, even as Ramos told him “many people would find that offensive and racist.”
Video of King’s 2012 town hall shows him saying America has the “pick of the litter,” and should pick the “friskier” immigrants, “not the one that’s over there sleeping on the corner.”
But King denies that he ever made the comparison. Interrupting Ramos throughout the interview to make that point, King said,
“I told you if you watch that video you would know that was a speech celebrating legal immigrants.”
Here is an excerpt of the testy exchange:
RAMOS: So from your point of view, you actually did not compare immigrants to dogs?
KING: I said that speech was about the vigor of legal immigration. It was a very complimentary speech and no I did not do that.
RAMOS : I don’t think many people found that complementary. [Crosstalk]. You know it is not complimentary to compare a group of immigrants to animals. Watch the full video at ABC Univision.
King has compared immigrants to animals more than once, including the time he suggested an electrified border fence because “we do this with livestock all the time.”
During the same interview, the leading opponent to immigration reform also remarked that what happens to DREAMers and undocumented immigrants is not his “responsibility.” “American citizens and legal Americans do not have a moral obligation to solve the problem of the 11 million people that are here unlawfully,” he said. Rep. King serves in the Immigration & Border Security subcommittee of the U.S. House’s Judiciary Committee.
Did Cuccinelli compare immigration policy
to exterminating rats?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/05/ken-cuccinelli-rats_n_4218172.html
Dozens of immigrant rights activists in Virginia marched on Monday to the campaign office of Republican gubernatorial candidate Ken Cuccinelli, carrying real and plastic rats to protests past comments he made in which they say he compared immigrants to rats.
Carrying a cage with three real rats and a box with about 200 plastic rats, the activists marched to Cuccinelli’s campaign office in Sterling, Va., where they dropped off the rats. They also carried signs with various messages, such as “We are human“ and “We’re not rats.“
The protest, organized by the advocacy group NOVA ¡Presente!, came on the same day Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) campaigned with Cuccinelli in the final day of the Virginia governor’s race. The gubernatorial election will be held on Tuesday.
---
Cuccinelli: Well, I saw the same rat story about D.C. that y’all have been talking about. What you may not know is that last year, in its finite wisdom, the D.C. City Council passed a new law, or a triumph of animal rights over human health, where those pest control people you suggested they bring in aren’t allowed to kill the rats. They have to relocate the rats and not only that — that’s actually not the worst part — they cannot break up the families of the rats. Now, as actual experts in pest control will tell you, if you don’t move an animal at least 25 miles, it’ll come back. And so what’s the solution to that? Well, cross a river.
Host: Send ‘em over to Virginia, that’s right.
Cuccinelli: Guess why I care about that sort of thing?
Host: I bet.
Cuccinelli: Anyway, it is worse than our immigration policy — you can’t break up rat families.
Or raccoons or all the rest and you can’t even kill them. It’s unbelievable.
----------------------------------------
IMMIGRATION
Confronted by Univision Reporter, Rep. Steve King Says Comparison
of Immigrants to Dogs Was a Compliment
By Rebecca Leber posted from ThinkProgress on Jul 21, 2013 at 11:53 am
Rep. Steve King (R-IA)
----------------------------------------
MEANWHILE ANOTHER REPUB . . .
Virgil Peck, Kansas GOP legislator, advocates
shooting 'illegal' immigrants like 'feral hogs'
BY ALIYAH SHAHID / DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
TUESDAY, MARCH 15, 2011, 7:58 AM
A Republican legislator in Kansas is taking major heat from some after suggesting that illegal immigrants be shot like wild hogs by gunmen in helicopters. State Rep. Virgil Peck (R-Tyro) made the explosive remarks Monday during a debate on how best to control 500 feral swine in Kansas.
"Looks like to me, if shooting these immigrating feral hogs works, maybe we have found a (solution) to our illegal immigration problem," he said, according to The Wichita Eagle. The Republican leader made the comment during a discussion by the state's House Appropriations Committee.
Later the Republican leader was unapologetic. "I was just speaking like a southeast Kansas person," he told the Lawrence Journal World, adding that his constituents are upset with the state and federal response to illegal immigration. Rep. Peck, who has served since 2005, said he expects no further controversy over his remarks.
"I think it's over," he said.
Many Republicans seem to promote what can only be called parasitic capitalism or cut-throat capitalism that only cares about the 1%. They also say things showing they want to punish people for being poor. They seem to be experts at deferring other people’s dreams - dreams deferred as Langston Hughes called them.
Voting is like driving. Choose D to go forward and R to go backwards.
Inside many people are two dogs. One is mean and evil. The other is gentle and good. The two dogs fight all the time. Which dog wins? The one you feed the most. Republicans seem to mostly feed the wrong dog and act surprised when people call them dishonest, hateful, bullies.
We need to diversify our energy portfolio. WE CAN'T PUT ALL OF OUR EGGS IN ONE BASKET -- ON MOSTLY GASOLINE, KEROSENE AND DIRTY COAL.
Wait until we get climate refugees by the 1000s in coastal areas like Hampton Roads, Virginia. Senator: Given the stakes from your selective denial of science,what do want your legacy to be? What do you want future generations to know about what you did to fix this major problem? Do you want them to know you stood with the merchants of doubt instead of standing on the side of llfe?
Do you want them to know you and today's Republican Party turned your back on the health and lives of future Virginians?
When it comes to catastrophic climate change, Virginia's Hampton Roads is the canary in the coal mine.
If you wait for the car to be off the cliff to put on the brakes, it'll be too late. Our planet’s -- our home’s -- life support systems are at stake. (Green America)
Are we being a penny wise and pound foolish? A carrot or a stick. . . On catastrophic climate change, Is Science just beyond the grasp of Republican leaders?
#EarthDay2015
Join the Coffee Party Movement
For a change of pace, a little HUMOR . . .
From MAD Magazine's June 2015 edition's
satire on AMERICAN SNIPPER (movie)
INDIANA'S LEGISLATIVE TRAINWRECK?
In 2013, analysts (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [IPCC]) crunched numbers on the main culprit in catastrophic climate change -- CARBON.
They concluded that the amount of climate-harming CARBON contained in fossil fuel reserves, including dirty coal, that could be used now
(without any new drilling that would increase the number) at close to 3,000 Gigatons (previously estimated at 2795 Gigatons).
To give you an idea of the impact that burning all of that would have on humanity, climate(-life-freedom) advocate Bill McKibben put it in terms of a person's health, life and ability to enjoy freedom. If all that CARBON -- ready to be extracted and burned -- WERE BEER, then 565 Gigatons of it roughly would equal the legal beer-drinking limit. (It's about how much some people can drink and still make it home safely, approx 6 beers.) But if we burn all the Gigatons of CARBON down there, that's three 12-packs ready for you to drink by yourself -- all in one evening.
If you think that that's enough beer to kill you, you're probably right, AND that's enough climate-harming carbon to wipe humanity off the planet
in a kind of mass extinction of life & creation probably worse than the one that wiped out the dinosaurs from earth. To stay within the beer-drinking legal limit, we have to keep 80% of all that carbon in the ground and use our amazing imagination and collective effort to find ways to generate energy without destroying the planet for future generations, which would be irresponsible at best.
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/09/27/2681861/15-things-ipcc-report/
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/global-warmings-terrifying-new-math-20120719
April 2015 - Indiana Enacts License-to-Discriminate Law
(with AR and GA steps behind)
http://smallbusiness.chron.com/examples-metaphors-advertising-10422.html
http://www.buzzfeed.com/alivelez/meet-the-brilliant-mississippi-teacher-who-used-a-sock-to-te#.ggAy0NJKY
http://mashable.com/2015/05/04/bill-nye-holograms-emoji/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SMVGo0o2DM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xF-CX9mAHPo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uoSBVNUO2LU&list=PLuBl35eUITR28IGTmMd9MyP9XMuoEXukF
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvxN8dPfPss
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p30zkNQJYdw
Not everything that shines is gold . . . Smoke & Mirrors
It's like being a little bit pregnant.
You're mixing apples and oranges.
It's like peeling an onion.
There's something fishy about that.
A "wall" of separation between church and government (state)
(Thomas Jefferson)
METAPHORS USED TO MARGINALIZE,
TO DEHUMANIZE, TO PUT DOWN PEOPLE
(. . . often for political gain. It's easier to raise fear against, to discriminate and hate non-people than real people "like us")
Bill Gates Uses ZOMBIES to Explain Computer Programming
April 2015 - Days after Hillary's announcement
Kansas Republican State Rep. Virgil Peck suggested on Monday that illegal immigrants be shot like wild hogs. The Republican leader serves as Caucus Chairman of the state legislature's Republican Majority.
MUDgates . . . mud flooding, corrupting political system
The so-called "self-made" man
In the business world, there’s “no free lunch.” In the real world, there's no such thing as a “self-made man.”
You essentially claim that in the baseball game of life, you hit a triple and without any help. What you don't realize is that you were born on 3rd base unlike some of the young people who may never go to college because of people in power like you who in the business of ensuring only the rich and priviledged have opportunity to get ahead.
FRAME WITH METAPHORS WHENEVER POSSIBLE
–>Technically, you may find in this page metaphors, similes, analogies, and other figures of speech.<–
Metaphors can strengthen our message and framing. (Lakoff)
--------------------
We've tried Republican foreign policy and we weren't impressed. George Bush's reckless foreign policy
is like a bull in a china shop. We need thoughtful, inspiring and effective leadership instead.
--------------------
In January 2013, Washington was preparing for another vote to raise the debt ceiling and some Republicans
were threatening to shut down the government if they didn't get their way and see major cuts to earned benefits,
programs mainly benefiting the working poor, the middle class and women.
Dan Gross wrote a great METAPHOR appearing in NEWSWEEK and The Daily Beast.
"It’s as if Republican House members are 2-year-olds who have to exert a certain amount of energy –- running around, throwing tantrums –- before they can be managed through necessary nighttime routines.
Parents understand that their 2-year-old may have to scream for an hour before going to bed at night.
But primal screams can be dangerous and intolerable for the financial markets and for the economy."
"We are NOT a deadbeat nation," said President Obama about the same situation.
-------------------
Billionaires get tax breaks big enough to fly a private jet through and fly to the Cayman Islands and back.
(These tax cuts for the rich worsen our federal debt, don't create jobs and increase already high inequality in this country.)
--------------------
We need to address corporate loopholes large enough for a truck to run through them.
In The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy found three individuals who wanted to find a brain, a heart and courage. Dorothy had the courage to charter new territory and lead the three to Emerald City to find the wizard. Put yourself in Dorothy’s red shoes: You need the courage to try a new approach, to adopt all these concepts of cognitive science and strategic communications, and make a difference. For a moment, put aside helping people find a brain, and focus on helping people find a heart. You’ll can do that through values framing. The Wizard of Oz contained many metaphors reflecting the political realities of the 1890s including debate over the gold standard. Similarly, your messages should also include many lively metaphors appealing to a listener’s senses.
--------------------
--------------------
--------------------
Should schools warn students about the dangers of driving a sporty fast car when you turn 55 or 65? Schools could say: At that age, the driver is likely to drive that Corvette or Porche at normal, below-speed-limit speed because he’ll likely be more mature and aware of the risks. So, buying that fast car at that age seems like a waste of money and possibly dangerous because an older person’s reflexes are not as sharp. Now, Why do you think so many middle-aged men buy such sporty, fast cars? It’s because of the power of knowing they COULD drive it very fast if they wanted to. But they don’t.
Now, think of a teenager who’s been through an effective, thorough reproductive health education. S/he knows everything. S/he knows about their bodies, how babies are made, the serious threats of unprotected sex, and the importance of waiting until you start making positive, healthy, more mature decisions on a consistent basis (perhaps waiting until you don’t depend on your parents anymore or as much.) S/he even knows about foreplay and how to increase pleasure on both ends during sex.
Knowledge is power! AND THIS IS A FRAME WE NEED TO ACTIVATE ON PEOPLE TO BE EFFECTIVE IN THE LONG RUN. Just like the 50-year-old man who buys a fast Corvette and drives it at or below speed limit, the teen who now knows everything about reproductive health is empowered. S/he doesn’t need to hide behind a park bush to do some exploring. The teen’s not motivated to try the “forbidden fruit.” It’s all out in the open, and it’s no longer a parental secret or a family taboo.
Now, just look at the statistics on teen pregnancy of schools offering a thorough repro health ed versus those offering an abstinence-only curriculum. The facts speak for themselves. Knowledge is power. Ignorance is not.
--------------------
--------------------
--------------------
--------------------
“WAR ON TERROR”
The initial response of the Bush administration to the assault of September 11, 2001 was to frame the acts of terror as crime. This framing was replaced within hours by a war metaphor, yielding the “War on Terror“. The difference between these two framings is in the implied response. Crime connotes bringing criminals to justice, putting them on trial and sentencing them, whereas as war implies enemy territory, military action, war powers for government, and an anything-goes mentality (or, whatever-it-takes).
“BAD APPLE”
The “bad apple” frame, as in the proverb “one bad apple spoils the barrel”. This frame implies that removing one underachieving or corrupt official from an institution — like the inept head of FEMA (emergency response for Katrina) during the Bush admin — will solve a given problem; an opposing frame presents the same problem as systematic or structural to the institution itself—a source of infectious and spreading rot. It was used to define former FEMA administrator Michael Brown
after his poor performance in handling Katrina.
“TAX RELIEF“
As Lakoff notes, “On the day that George W. Bush took office, the words “tax relief” started coming out of the White House.” Bush’s White House began a campaign for tax cuts for the rich by repeating the words “tax relief” as often as possible and by as many people as possible, which took the focus away frames used during the Clinton years of “tax responsibilities,” “tax investments,” and “public resources used for the greater (common) good, which implies social responsibility.” “Tax relief” entails a concept of taxes putting strain or burden on the citizen (neglecting any benefits resulting from tax investments), and, in a way, it frames taxes as a physical ailment such as a headache or constipation.
“SOCIAL SECURITY”
The term “Social security“ implies that the program can be relied on to provide security for society. Social Security is a sacred promise from one generation to another.
VALUES MATTER
Strategic Morally Grounded Communication
Training & RESEARCH
About the Republican way of thinking, I can think of one metaphor. When a bad earthquake hits a tall building in downtown LA, you want a foundation that's strong by being more supple, nimble and resilient. You just don't want a foundation that's overly rigid, unchanging, or too dogmatic-like, because that will be the building that makes the news for becoming brittle and braking in the violent shaking. (It's similar to having the right conditions for starting a business, but if your daughter or wife is suffering a serious illness and you don't have affordable and moral health insurance, you may not be able to start a business and thrive.)
The film Titanic as a metaphor for catastrophic climate change
Picture this pivotal scene: the few minutes of stunned shock that ensue after the collision with the iceberg. A couple of the crew people understand the upcoming catastrophe, and the man who designed the ship gets it, but, by and large, people are in a state of denial.
They think it’s an innocuous interlude and they’ll soon be back cozy in their warm beds.
That’s exactly where we are as a planet.
We’ve hit the iceberg: water is rushing in. Most of us would rather not believe it, because … well, because it’s just too awful.
How have we hit the iceberg? Let me count the ways. Thirty-two straight years of warming. Arctic Sea in the thrall of a thaw.
Methane chimneys bubbling up from the deep.
SOURCE: http://www.indianalivinggreen.com/doom-bloom-movie-metaphors-about-climate-change/
METAPHORS OFTEN USED IN POLITICS
It's like being a little bit pregnant.
You're mixing apples and oranges.
Peeling an onion
SOMETIMES WE CAN LEARN FROM POETRY OR OTHER LITERATURE:
“Life is like an onion; you peel it off one layer at a time, and sometimes you weep.”
― Carl Sandburg
---
November 16, 2012
Peeling the Onion of Conservative Delusion -- By Ed Kilgore (summary)
Ed Kilgore is a contributing writer to the Washington Monthly. He is managing editor for The Democratic Strategist and a senior fellow at the Progressive Policy Institute. Find him on Twitter: @ed_kilgore.
Analyzing the 2012 Republican electoral defeat is like peeling an onion, essentially, with each new layer bringing right-wingers closer to making changes
that seem essential to meet the needs to today's mainstream electorate.
The outer-most layer is simple denial, which means claims that the results were purely the product of ephemeral developments from candidate mistakes to inferior GOTV technology.
The next layer represents the tweak approach, which means either addressing particular issues remote from core conservative ideology
or adjusting messaging to remove the most abrasive elements.
Then, at a somewhat deeper layer of seriousness, we have conservatives arguing a big change in messaging on economic issues that does not necessarily involve changes
in actual issues-positioning (like an argument that Republicans need to show how conservative policies benefit everyone.
However, you can make vague attempts to appeal to the middle class, but if the base isn't along for the ride, you're betting on a losing horse).
At the very center of the onion are the handful of conservatives who believe the GOP needs to make serious, substantive concessions to public opinion,
particularly on the core issues of the economy and the role of government.
---------------------------------------