Sunday, February 3, 2008

HOW TO USE PITHY SAYING TO BELITTLE YOUR RIVAL?



Do you know the popular expression "a quiche-eater"? It means a person far removed from practice and concerned only with academic matters, unwilling to "get their hands dirty"; a man who is effeminate or who lacks some putative masculine virtue. The source of the term quiche-eater was a bestselling humorous book "Real Men Don't Eat Quiche", by Bruce Feirstein, published in 1982. And why? Because a quiche is considered to be a "womanly" dish like other Carbohydrate dishes (сasserole, pasta etc.).

More example for the use of catch-words.
Arthur J. Finkelstein (a United States Republican Party PR professional) is credited with helping to make "liberal" a dirty word in the late 1980s and 1990s by using messages like this, intended to damage Jack Reed's image:
"That's liberal. That's Jack Reed. That's wrong. Call liberal Jack Reed and tell him his record on welfare is just too liberal for you."

Using negative buzzwords is an effective PR move to humiliate your rival.

4 comments:

  1. Jacob, let me see. You suggest using this saying "a quiche-eater", don't you?

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  2. PR person, you see, this is just an instance. Like many others examples. Like Finkelstein is using the term 'liberal'. You just gather the examples and then use them.

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  3. Jacob, the word 'liberal' is just a word, is it not? Why do you call it a 'PITHY SAYING'?

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  4. mike,
    OK, 'liberal' is just a word, you are right. Still I mean all the issue of 'catch words', 'winged words' etc.
    In this case, Arthur J. Finkelstein is trying to transform the usual word 'liberal' to some dirty word meaning 'wrong'. Whether he succeeded or not, is another question.

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