Speech Codes

Dems say bad words and Received Opinion is ON IT!

BOLT UPRIGHT: Good evening, I’m Bolt Upright and this is Received Opinion!

[Harpy bleats and devil farts. On the screen behind UPRIGHT: A limited action cartoon loop of Senate Minority Leader CHARLES SCHUMER and House Minority Leader HAKEEM JEFFRIES holding a hippie by the scruff of the neck and washing his mouth out with soap. Caption: KEEP IT CIVIL, KEEP IT CENTRIST!]

It's the eternal Dem dilemma: A Republican President has terrible poll numbers, but polls also show no one likes the way the Democratic Party is opposing him — or, more to the point, failing to oppose him, calling them “weak” and “tepid.” As usual the Party leadership’s solution is to blame the Left.

[Background switches to images from clips mentioned below.]

Democratic legislators calling themselves the New Democrat Coalition are telling the Party to cool their support for immigrants, including those being disappeared by ICE, because, as one member put it, “the American people have lost faith in the Democratic Party when it comes to border security.” Regarding the President’s controversial takeover of Washington, DC, the folks at Vox — or Centrism Central, as we call them here on Received Opinion — warn Democrats not to complain too much because, quote, “crime remains one of [Trump’s] strongest issues, and one of the Democratic Party’s worst.” And Third Way has even published a list of words they say Democrats shouldn’t use, like “privilege,” “food insecurity,” and “involuntary confinement.”

[UPRIGHT strolls to a little table, at which sits a man about 40 years old who looks and dresses pretty much like Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro after a few months on Ozempic.]

And from Third Way, we have with us today their spokesman Harlan Eiffeltour. Good to have you with us, sir.

EIFFELTOUR: My pleasure, sir.

UPRIGHT: So, I assume you have evidence that people won’t vote for a Democrat if he says, for example, “unhoused person” instead of “bum.”

EIFFELTOUR: Ha ha, well, not so much hard numbers, Bolt, but you know, you have to meet people where they are, and it’s just common sense that you have to use language that doesn’t talk down to people.

UPRIGHT: I saw in that essay that Third Way thinks when Democrats say “incarcerated person” they’re signaling to voters that, quote, “the criminal is the victim, the victim is an afterthought.”

EIFFELTOUR: Again, don’t want to get too prescriptive but, yes, graduate-school words and phrases like that definitely signal a stronger interest in the rights of criminals than in the rights of crime victims.

UPRIGHT: So it’s too respectful of people in jail.

EIFFELTOUR: Well, I hate to say it —

UPRIGHT: So maybe Democrats should talk about people who’ve been incarcerated the way Donald Trump does — for example, as animals.

EIFFELTOUR: Ha ha, well, that seems a little —

UPRIGHT: Because that was a word he specifically used in reference to Kilmar Abrego Garcia.

EIFFELTOUR: Oh! Well, that’s a different story.

UPRIGHT: Why? Because he’s been railroaded? Or is it railroaded a graduate-school word?

EIFFELTOUR: Now wait a minute —

UPRIGHT: I didn’t go to graduate school myself. But I know tough guys say “railroaded” in old movies. They say “jailbird,” “screws,” “stool pigeon” —

EIFFELTOUR: Bolt, we’re not saying words you should say, that Democrats should say, we’re saying —

UPRIGHT: You also say Democrats shouldn’t say “deadnaming.” Now, what less offensive term would you use to describe the act of deliberately referring to a trans person by the wrong gender to cause them pain or harm?

EIFFELTOUR: Now, see, this is a perfect example — look how much time and how many words it took you to explain what deadnaming is and why it’s bad.

UPRIGHT: Right. So why not just say “deadnaming”?

EIFFELTOUR: Well, again, the average voter —

UPRIGHT: You don’t think the average voter understands this? Suppose I were to refer to you as a girl? Call you “sweetie pie” and “cupcake,” compliment the way you fill out your clothes?

EIFFELTOUR: [Frostily] Well, those would be offensive things to say in any case.

UPRIGHT: I agree. So why don’t you want Democrats to use a perfectly clear three-syllable word for something that’s pretty much the same thing? Maybe what you really mean is you don’t want Democrats to defend trans people at all. Or the wrongly incarcerated. Or homeless people.

EIFFELTOUR: [Fiddling with his mic, trying to get it off] I, I don’t have to put up, this has been the most hostile —

UPRIGHT: Now don’t worry your pretty little head about it, honey bunch.

[UPRIGHT chucks EIFFEILTOUR under the chin, causing him to flail.]

Coochie-koo. [To the camera.] Now let’s join our Decision Desk!

[Sound of the U.S. Marine Band caught in a rockslide. UPRIGHT goes to the Decision Desk, seated at which are PEONI DOYENNE, wearing an Edward Arsouni beaded mango midi dress with matching beaded overcoat, Scarlett Chase metallic snake Soiree 75 pumps, and a honey blonde pageboy wig; and CHAFE DRAMATURGY, in a navy alpaca wool windowpane glen plaid suit, a denim blue Brunello Cucinelli cashmere turtleneck sweater, and white Keds.]

UPRIGHT: How’s everybody.

DRAMATURGY: Listen, Bolt, I have to say you were unfair to Harlan just now. You know he got me into the Racquet and Tennis Club.

UPRIGHT: Shut up. [To PEONI, flirtatiously] Well, now, whose little boy is this?

DOYENNE: Oh, hush, Bolt, it’s silly season and I felt like changing it up.

UPRIGHT: No complaints here.

DOYENNE: Not to kill the mood, but I have to agree with Chafe about Mr. Eiffeltour. Now, Bolt, what if he decides he’s, what’s the word, genderfluid, and decides you sexually harassed him? Won’t you get “cancelled”?

DRAMATURGY: Ha! Got ‘im, Peoni.

UPRIGHT: Well, Peoni, by the standards of our current era I figure I’d get a year off and then have an enormous comeback where I make more money than ever. Or retire to a farm in New Zealand. Or nothing at all happens because we’re all ruled by a sexual predator and no one gives a damn.

DRAMATURGY: [Nodding] Fair point.

UPRIGHT: Chafe, seriously, why shouldn’t Democrats use the kind of words I was using?

DRAMATURGY: Oh, can I talk now?

UPRIGHT: [Consulting his Seiko] Give you thirty seconds, smart guy.

DRAMATURGY: Well, come on, you know Harlan was talking about “birthing person” and stuff like that.

UPRIGHT: Nobody says “birthing person” and stuff like that.

DRAMATURGY: [Fishing out his iPhone] That’s not true! That’s not true! In a Democratic committee meeting in Iowa in 2019, alternate delegate Serena Galbo said —

UPRIGHT: Your thirty seconds is up.

DRAMATURGY: [Playing with his iPhone] But I almost had it!

UPRIGHT: [To DOYENNE, intimately] How about you, Peoni? You feeling gender-fluid? We can play Cabin Boy.

DOYENNE: [Blushing] Bolt, you scamp! You know the Colonel would never allow it.

UPRIGHT: [Wistfully] He swung and he missed. [To the camera] When we come back, James Carville will — [touches earpiece] Hold on, looks like Snakehead backed out. Ha! No surprise. OK, well, this is live, or at least tape-delayed, so anyone who thinks he can take me, come on down to the studio and we’ll see what you’re made of.

[Audio poison darts. Camera drones up and speeds back and out of the studio, into the side of a tourist bus, and blacks out.]