283 - Language in Relationships
Labels and language
Language is more powerful and nuanced than many of us realize. From choosing labels to choosing not to use any labels and more, language has the unique ability to connect people in different ways, as well as the ability to drive them apart.
Labels can be important to some people, but to others they may be less important or they may not want to use them for a variety or reasons. Typically, in relationships, we see labeling for:
Sexual orientation and gender.
Hierarchy.
Relationship labeling.
Type of relationship.
It’s vital to ask both yourself and your partners what each label means and determine if you’re comfortable using them to refer to yourselves.
Primacy
The Primacy Effect, or a psychological term referring to someone’s ability to recall initial information instead of information that’s later learned, is important to take into consideration as well. It’s a cognitive bias where you’re much more likely to remember the beginning of a list of information rather than the middle or the end. As such, first impressions are extremely important, since the first impression is most likely to pave the way you see the person for the duration of your relationship with them. Overcoming negative primacy is possible of course, but it takes a long time and explains why things like racial or general stereotypes are so powerful, since they’re ingrained in us from an early age.
Primacy has instilled bias/prejudice in our society through things like the media and news outlets, police interrogation, politicians, and more.
Making and breaking with words
Subconsciously, words affect the way you view your partner and your relationships, and some words will carry more of an emotional impact for different people. Establishing which words, subjects, or phrases might be triggering or off limits to bring up with a partner can be a good way to avoid breaking a relationship with them.
Get to know family history, challenging past moments, and tense points that are recurring for you and your partner. Learn social history too to avoid microaggressions based on gender, race, etc.
Don’t weaponize your partner’s triggers. Never use it against them.
Don’t use words like “always” or “never,” which are rarely factual and usually are met with push back.
Lift up your partner, both privately and publicly, and be respectful of them around others.
Focus on giving your partner compliments instead of criticism. If you must criticize, do it respectfully and gently.
Learn the best way to soothe your partner when they’re hurting or triggered, and don’t blame them for what they’re feeling.
Remove toxic words and phrases from your vocabulary, especially when fighting with your partner.
Reclamation and intention
There will be times in your life when someone asks you to change the language you use to describe something. The best ways to implement this are:
Don’t react right away; some requests will be easier for you than others, and taking some time to process might help you accept that.
Believe and accept that the language you were using hurt someone, and changing it will improve your relationship with them.
Research better alternatives. There are tons of resources on the internet; for example, this is a great comprehensive list of ableist words and some alternatives to use instead.
Practice and pass on to others.
As for reclamation, some words are being used by those for whom the pejorative term was initially intended, and they’re reclaiming them as a way to empower themselves. Many of these words are still only acceptable when used by the group of people who reclaimed it and are still derogatory when used by others. Understanding the historical context of the word is critical. According to linguist Robin Brontsema, reclaiming words can:
Change the meaning of the word from negative to positive,
Neutralize the word by denying it to those who want to use it to oppress or cause harm, and
Stigma exploitation where the word is used to remind us that a group was/is subjected to unjust treatment.
As a last note: we want to reinforce the point that criticism which comes across as an attack is far less likely to actually change someone’s mind. Additionally, doing something like changing speech habits and words would be more encouraging if it came from a place of self-improvement rather than a place of simply trying not to make a mistake.
Image credit: https://www.woodenearth.com/blogs/wooden-blog
Transcript
This document may contain small transcription errors. If you find one please let us know at info@multiamory.com and we will fix it ASAP.
Jase: On this episode of the multiamory podcast, we're talking about the power of words in relationships and beyond. Language is an incredibly powerful tool that can lift people up and bring them together or it can push people apart and tear them down. In today's episode, we're talking about language and many of the ways that it can have an impact on our lives. Everything from how it affects our impressions of people, how it can predict whether our relationships are going to last and be happy, as well as some ways that our language can be hurtful and some ways of thinking about changing our language in a positive way to make the world a better place.
Emily: I would like to start out with this wonderful quote by Ijeoma Oluo, who is the author of So You Want to Talk About Race, which is an amazing book that I have been reading. I just finished it. This quote is about race. It's about talking about race and how important it is to do so. The quote is, "Words matter, and I'm not just saying that because they are my job. Words help us interpret our world and can be used to change the way in which we think and act. Words are always at the heart of all our problems and the beginning of all our solutions." That's very deep and true because words can tear people down, but they also are like the start of change and the start of making things happen, hopefully for the better.
Dedeker: Without getting too philosophical here, but it's like our language are just like these tiny little packets of information that are just a combination of sounds, but they have so much meaning applied to them and pick up all this meaning along the way. When I say it that way, it makes me think of some kind of weird sci-fi technology.
Jase: Perhaps language came from ancient aliens and it is a sci-fi technology.
Emily: I'm sure there are people out there believe that, yes.
Jase: If you couldn't hear it in the audio, I was doing the ancient aliens hand gesture while I said that. Just for the listeners to get the full picture. Again, this is not quite on the topic we're talking about today, but there have been lots of studies about the way that our language, like the grammar of our actual language that we speak, not just the words we choose to use, which is what this episode's about, but actually like what language we're born into changes the way we think about things.
Some people theorize it makes things like programmers are more often from certain countries because of potentially the way their language is structured. May cause people to think through things differently in a way that might lend itself to that or not. It's a super fascinating field of all the ways that language affects us, but today we're more just on word choice, right?
Dedeker: Yes, I've also read some studies and some theories about the way that your particular language's grammar is laid out and the way that you read that grammar or whether you read up to down or left or right or right to left, sometimes has an influence on art as well as far as composition and flow of art.
Emily: You can say that. It's cool.
Dedeker: Yes, that was really interesting. Let's start at the personal level and talk about just like language as it applies to us personally, as it applies in our romantic relationships and other types of relationships as well. I think we get a lot of questions about labeling relationships all the time. What I mean by that is when do I apply the monogamous label? When can I officially apply the polyamorous label?
Emily: Or the boyfriend or girlfriend label?
Dedeker: Yes, that too.
Jase: Or when can I call myself solo-poly or relationship anarchists.
Dedeker: Exactly or does this count as monogamous or not? Can I use this label? Do I count as a relationship anarchist or--
Emily: Am I swinger?
Dedeker: Yes, I love the label of swinger. I hate the label of swinger. I don't do any labels whatsoever, stuff like that. The relationship labeling-- Emily, did you write you're going steady?
Emily: I did write going steady which is hilarious. I feel like my grandmother definitely asked me that about my first boyfriend back in the day. "Are you all going steady?" I was, yes.
Dedeker: Now we have the label of exclusive.
Emily: Yes, exclusive. You're right.
Dedeker: Or questions of like, should I use the term boyfriend or girlfriend or should I say partner or should I say date mate or should I say friends with benefits?
Emily: Date mate? I haven't heard that.
Dedeker: Yes, date mate kind of feel like someone you go on dates with. That's all I can tell you. I've never used the term.
Jase: Cool, it seems more like it'd be like a brand of lube or something, date mate.
Dedeker: Date mate.
Emily: Or that too, I like that.
Jase: Or condoms, I don't know, something.
Dedeker: What if it's a specialized caddy or like a little basket that you carry your dates and you eat them as a snack.
Jase: I see, like fruits dates.
Emily: dates.
Jase: Okay.
Emily: Medjool dates with some peanut butter. I highly recommend that everyone, but anyways.
Dedeker: Okay. Anyway, but there's more. I think we also get into the weeds of people asking about like using the labels of primary and secondary and what those labels might mean and all the connotations and expectations attached to them same with, if I label you as my comment partner or just my friend with benefits or things like that. Then of course, the long ongoing conversation about labels related to identity, especially sexual orientation and gender, and watching the way that our labels for different identities have changed over time as well and how there's now, I think because of the internet, a big proliferation of new labels. I feel like I'm learning a new one all the time. I was introduced to the term quoiromantic.
Emily: What is that?
Dedeker: Well, let me spell it for you. Q-U-O-I-R-O-M-A-N-T-I-C, quoiromantic.
Jase: Quoiromantic, like French?
Dedeker: Quoiromantic.
Jase: What does it mean?
Dedeker: This is sometimes considered part of the Ace Spectrum of like asexual, demisexual, demiromantic, aromantic, things like that that the quoiromantic or quoiromantic experience may include--
Emily: Something little romantic?
Dedeker: No, more of being unsure what romantic attraction even is for you.
Jase: It is more like quoiromance.
Dedeker: Yes, or finding the concept of romance to be inaccessible or just kind of disidentifying in some way with that concept.
Jase: Wow, fascinating.
Dedeker: Which I found it, I was like, "What is this?" Then I found that an alternative for this term is also wad romantic as well.
Emily: It's interesting because I definitely-- I think we talked about this in a previous episode a little bit, but like when can one label oneself as a thing and I know I personally had a hard time for many, many years labeling myself as bisexual, even though now I'm like, "Aha, yes, that's what I am?"
Dedeker: But once you've earned enough bisexual points and cashed them in on your bisexual loyalty club card--
Emily: Maybe that's it. I had to put those points down in cash them in with the bisexual board directors.
Jase: Yes, it's much easier now that you can track your points online and cash them and you used to have to keep physical tickets and mail them in, it was a real pain.
Dedeker: You used to have to mail them or-- Sorry, mail them in and they'd would weigh them like the ticket thing to see how many tickets you had.
Jase: Oh my gosh. Here is the deal, there's this thing about labels and we've talked about labels a bit before about for some people finding a label that fits them is very freeing and for other people finally letting go of labels is very freeing, but to look at it as far as language goes, part of the reason why this is important is because like Dedeker was saying earlier that language is this thing that words or phrases go along and they collect other meanings or feelings or connotations or things that get attached to them.
This has happened throughout history, literally for thousands of years that we even now have words that we think of as two different words that used to mean exactly the same thing, but because of certain contexts, because of the languages they came from or the areas where they were used, they developed totally different meanings.
When we look at labels, that same thing applies and I think that's why it's so important when you're thinking about these labels to have a conversation with your partner or your friend or to really think for yourself, what does this label mean to me? What does it mean to you? What do I experience this label meaning to other people? Is this serving me or not and what connotations might be coming with it?
Emily: What does society think about it and what therefore I feel about it because of those societal expectations.
Jase: Yes. Even if that's like, I really like this label, but there's some negative connotations to that. Even being aware of that though can help you then if you use that term, like relationship anarchist, for example, is one that I identify with relationship anarchy, but I rarely use that label to identify myself anymore because I feel like it's picked up a lot more negative and manipulative connotations over the years.
I just tend to not go with that one right away and talk about it more as a concept rather than being that. If I do bring it up in a certain context, I at least know, okay people might have these connotations if they've heard the word at all, so I can expect that and then try to address those things right away. I think that's why these labels are so important. Not just do you want them or not, but they're important because they do have meaning whether you like it or not.
Emily: Okay. Along those lines, we're going to continue on with language and labeling and first impressions because first impressions are the beginning thing that you get. Sometimes if somebody comes up and says, Hey, I am X, that's the first impression that you have of them and therefore, all of your like subsequent interactions with them are going to be colored by that first impression. Did you two know about this thing called the primacy effect?
Dedeker: No, but it sounds like a great hit sci-fi novel.
Emily: That I would have read back in the nineties or the early two thousands. I love it. The primacy effect is a psychological term. It refers to a person's ability to recall initial information better than information that's given to them later. It's like this cognitive bias, where, for example, if you're given a really long list of information and then you're asked to recall that, you can recall the things first on the list way better than the things that were later or at the end of the list. First impression, first thing is the one that comes to mind most easily.
Jase: There is just for those of you who want to nerd out about this like I do, there is another effect called the recency effect, which is about things you've heard most recently. With that list thing, that's why the stuff in the middle of the list is the stuff you forget, it's all the events that happened in the middle of a movie that are easier to forget than the way it ended in the way it started.
Dedeker: It's funny you bring it back to the entertainment because one of my earliest earliest lessons doing theater when I was just a tiny little baby child, was the director of a play that I was in and saying, people kind of remember the middle of the play, but the thing they're going to remember the most is the beginning of the end. We really got to stick the opening and stick the landing on this one new collection of children.
Jase: I've heard the same thing with practicing music, if you're practicing a piece on the piano. It's make sure that you nail the beginning and you nail the ending, try to do the rest of it, but those are the ones that matter the most.
Emily: There you go.
Dedeker: Okay. Let's talk about why this matters, not just in theater and piano, but in our daily lives. This is one of the reasons why first impressions are really so important, especially when your first impression of someone is given to you by somebody else. For example, a friend that you have introduces you to another person and before the intro even takes place, your friend primes you by saying, yes, this person that we're meeting, they have a tendency to exaggerate the truth. This person, I think they're a little bit of a narcissist.
Whatever language they use or label they use, that impression is going to stick with you when you meet them, you are going to be primed and they are going to call it the subsequent experiences that you have with them afterwards. Now those examples were like negative, but it also shows up with positive examples as well.
Emily: Yes, exactly. If somebody were instead to tell you like, oh, there's this new person that you met, I love them. They're so cool. They're so kind and generous then your subsequent interactions with them, if they happen to be having a bad day or say something rude, you may give them the benefit of the doubt more because again, your first interaction with them or your first impression with them that was given to you even by another person was one that was positive. That's interesting. You might excuse away their bad behavior and that's just based on that first impression that was made.
Jase: Right. Then to bring this back to the labels that we're talking about, the labels do that for you. Even if you're not going in and saying, this person is good in this way or bad in this other way, if it's like, hey, this is my friend who's a polyamorists. That maybe not be a great example or they say, hey, this is my boyfriend, so and so. Already that's given you some connotations, it's given you some information about things you're going to look for, and that might not be universal across all people.
Someone might hear a boyfriend and go, "Arg" or someone might hear boyfriend and go, "Oh wow, I'm probably going to like this person because my friend likes them" more so than if they just said my friend or a guy I'm interested in or whatever it is. Just just being aware of this.
Then related to this, is that it's not impossible to overcome negative primacy. It's not like first impressions are stuck forever, but I think some people will try to say that, that like once you get a first impression, that's it, you're stuck. I don't believe that that's true. However, it is hard to overcome them. It takes time, it takes a flexibility from the person perceiving.
This is why, again, to go back to labels, things like the ways we talk about people in terms of stereotypes that go along with certain labels, whether those are about race or about gender or about their appearance or their profession or their types of relationships or their sexual identity, there's so many that those stereotypes that come along with that prime us with these things just as if you had said, hey, this person has these traits. It's baked into those things.
Then the last thing I want to throw in here about this, that I know I mentioned a while back on the show, but this thing called the Pygmalion effect or the Rosenthal effect or the observer expectancy effect are all different terms for a similar thing.
That's that your thoughts about someone-- like something you've been told about someone else will not only affect the way you perceive them and make you more likely to pick up on things that support that idea and less likely to notice things that don't, but that actually in tests, a lot of these specifically have been done with school children, is that your expectations of them will also affect what they do and how they do, because of these very subtle ways in which your expectations are affecting the person that you're observing.
That again, it can be overcome, but it's harder. It takes more work. When you go in with these stereotypes or these assumptions about people, not only are you going to be more likely to notice certain things about them, but it actually has the potential to make them more likely to do those things that you think they're going to do because in this subtle way they're reading your cues and things like that, and it's going to make them do that. Super fascinating stuff.
Dedeker: Yes. This cognitive bias of primacy of course extends so far beyond just how we deal with each other on a one-to-one personal level. We're also all living within this much bigger system where primacy has been going on for a long time. For instance, we've really been primed by our media and news outlets, especially when it comes to how we look at people who are different from us or people who are a different race from us or people who are different sexuality from us.
A really common example is that historically, any time there's been news coverage of police brutality or a police shooting, it's even as simple as the first picture that you're going to see of the victim, especially with the victim as a person of color is probably going to be grainy, they're probably going to pull a mugshot if that person has a record. They're going to pull just something that makes them not look great and put that up next to the police officers, usually the white police officer's perfect police portrait where he's tailored and clean and clean cut and in front of the American flag. Even that is enough to start to prime you. The words that they tend to use in these situations also primes you as well.
Same thing with companies that have been running marketing campaigns for a long, long time and have been involved in our culture for a long, long time that influences the items that we buy and the places that we choose to spend our money, the relationships that we have with politicians that we support or the people that we elect. This primacy cognitive bias touches so many aspects of our society.
Emily: All right, now we're going to switch gears a little bit and talk about the Gottman's again, because we love those Gottman's, they're cool.
Dedeker: I would have a beer with them I guess.
Jase: I would love to ask some certain pointed questions too with that beer.
Dedeker: Okay. Yes. I would have a pointed beer driven conversation with the Gottman's. Anyway, the way that this relates to words is specifically about words of contempt, which is something that they have studied extensively within the context of relationships.
Emily: Yes. They say that contempt, which a lot of toxic language can come out of contempt-- they say that it is the single biggest predictor of divorce out there. If the Gottman's observe a couple that have a lot of contempt or a lot of toxic language used in their relationship, then that's a huge red flag and probably a big sign that these two are in big trouble.
Dedeker: Yes. Contempt is part of the body of the four horsemen of the relationship apocalypse with which we have referenced many times on the show. If you're not familiar with it, if you just Google Gottman four horseman, you'll find plenty of blog posts, plenty of articles about their research on this. Contempt specifically can show up in relationships in many forms.
Often, it is literally related to the words that you use with your partner. It's things like mean or dismissive language that is used for the purpose of harming your partner, things like name calling, things like mimicking your partner or mocking them in a particular way or mocking the way that they said something. This is the thing where like the mimicking is tricky because often when I see it show up, it doesn't show up as in someone on prompted decides to just like mimic their partner and make fun of them.
Often it comes when one partner's repeating back what they heard the other partner say within a particular context that they'll put on a voice or put on just a little bit of a change in effect that maybe doesn't come across as straight up harsh mimicking or mocking, but it is still an expression of contempt.
Emily: Especially when it's done with the partner sitting right there next to them because I've seen this a lot going out with friends and I definitely have some friends who their language that they use with one another is fairly contemptuous and fairly biting and fairly unkind and ruthless with one another. You may get these like sarcastic mimicky moments between the two of them. It's pretty uncomfortable actually.
Dedeker: Yes. Sarcasm is another expression of contempt as well as hostile humor that happens at the expense of your partner. I know there's always someone out there who makes the claim, yes, but this is just the humor that my partner and I have. This is how we joke with each other. We razz each other and I'm not inclined to 100% disbelieve that. I do believe there are couples out there where that is part of their humor and part of their play with each other.
When that play happens, in order for it to be supported and not truly be harmful to each other, behind it needs to be a really secure attachment and really solid relationship and a lot of moments of also tenderness and care and repair so that you're able to go out on a limb and poke your partner and the two of you can poke each other in a playful way that isn't causing damage. I feel like most of the time though someone's having less fun of a time than the other person is when hostile or sarcastic humor is the base of the humor in the relationship.
Jase: Yes. On the subject of contempt, not even just in our relationships, but even generally feeling contempt for other people has been shown to be terrible for your physical well-being. There's been various research studies over the years that have shown that those who are in contemptuous relationships like their romantic relationships are contemptuous are more likely to develop infectious diseases and have other physical and emotional challenges than people who are in healthy relationships.
As far as saying, yes, I'm going to have more emotional issues when I'm in a contemptuous relationship than a healthy one is like, yes, obviously of course, but the fact that it even affects your physical. So interesting.
Emily: Absolutely.
Dedeker: Let's talk about ways to reduce contempt in your relationship. Something that I talk to my clients a lot about something that Gottman's write a lot about is this idea of negative sentiment override versus positive sentiment override. These essentially refer to mental habits. Your habitual perceptions about what your partner says or does.
As in, you can build up enough negative story and narrative about your partner that can be based in truth. It's not like you're just totally making it up out of nowhere, which means that then if your partner goes on to do or say something neutral or positive to you, you filter it through this expectation that what they actually mean is negative. They actually have an agenda. They're actually trying to say something to hurt me in that way.
The flip side of this is positive sentiment override, where essentially, you have more resources in order to be able to give your partner the benefit of the doubt. It doesn't mean you let your partner just do whatever, say whatever, but it means you have enough of this positive-- I'm trying to think of another word for sentiment.
Jase: Positive associations feelings?
Dedeker: Yes, positive association feelings, secureness.
Emily: Seeks the benefit of the doubt and yes, even if, I don't know, like the other day for example, I was calling out to my partner because I was leaving and then he didn't respond. I was like, did he just not hear me or was he deliberately ignoring me? Those are the two separate things. It's the negative sentiment override might be, okay, he was ignoring me. How dare he? He clearly doesn't care about me. The positive is like, oh shit, well, the air filter is on and it's really loud, he probably just didn't hear me.
Dedeker: Right. That can really shift depending on not only the history of the whole relationship, but it could also be the history of what happened between the two of you that week or that day. That these aren't necessarily like fixed, stuck permanent mental states, but they can shift and change over time. It is really important to be aware of that, of what's going on as far as how is your brain primed to interpret your partner's words at any given time?
Another thing to help reduce contempt or use of contemptuous words is to be proactive about the two of you talking about good times or happy times the two of you enjoy together. I feel like it's always a butt of a joke of talking about someone coming over and showing you all their vacation photos and stuff like that.
I'll be honest. I don't really want to see that shit. In your relationship, I think there is something really nice to taking time to sit down and look at like, oh yes, this trip that we took together two years ago or oh, hey, this particular day. I think technology makes it a lot easier to do now where it's like every service in the world wants to be like, you want to know what you were doing four years ago today? Sometimes it's great.
Emily: Sometimes it's terrible.
Dedeker: There is literally like a physiological effect and a bonding effect in reliving and letting your nervous systems relive those good or happy times together as well. That helps prime you to be more likely to fall into that positive sentiment override and both give and receive positive language and non-contemptuous language to each other.
Emily: Another way to get rid of contempt in your relationship is have stress reducing conversations with one another. This is another Gottman thing. It essentially boils down to having talks with your partner where they are able to vent to you for maybe 15 minutes or something. You ask good questions about, okay, what's happening and how can I help you, but you don't necessarily have to give them advice if they don't want it. This is a great opportunity to use the triforce of communication.
Again, it's just being there for your partner, letting them vent, letting them talk through their day and really listening. Employing very active listening skills as opposed to just asking the generic questions of oh, how was your day? Fine. Instead, it really gives each other the opportunity to dig deep and discuss something maybe that's been challenging for you and to really know that your partner is there for you.
Dedeker: If people want to find out more about the stress reducing conversation formula, they can go to Multiamory episode 267.
Emily: Oh yes. We talked about that fairly recently. Cool. Also take five minutes to tell each other how much you appreciate each other. This is really important just in general. We do scrums, our own radars between the three of us for our company and at the end, we always do an appreciation round. That's lovely because if it's been contemptuous in any way, or there's been challenging conversation, it's nice to go back and appreciate how much you do care about that person.
Also, finally, instill an overall sense of fondness and positivity for one another. This is maybe easier said than done in certain relationships or maybe certain times within a relationship. If you can do all of the things that we've just discussed, hopefully, it will start to instill that overall sense of fondness and positivity for one another and that positive sentiment override.
Dedeker: Another thing that Gottman's are big on is this idea of building a culture of fondness and appreciation. I'm really big into this idea of every relationship we make is like its own little micro culture that we're constantly building anew and learning to adjust to. Yes, I do think that there can be relationships where contemptuous language and contemptuous words are part of the culture that relationship, unfortunately, but it's become more normal. It's become more easy. It's become something that happens more frequently and you can do the opposite. You can build a culture of sharing a lot of words of positivity or words of appreciation or words of fondness or admiration, but it does require work to build that. It's not something that for very few people--
Emily: And to maintain it.
Dedeker: Yes, and to maintain it. I find for very few people, very few people come prepackaged with that.
Jase: I want to say that telling each other how much you appreciate each other is something that I've found has really helped a lot in my own relationship with Dedeker. That that's something that we try to do fairly often. Not even as a formalized thing, but just we'll surprise each other with it randomly, of like, hey, I love this thing about you or I think this is so cool that you are this way or that you can do this thing or that this thing, even if it's just some random little thing.
It really does a lot to build that positive sentiment override and reset yourself back to feeling more positive at least about that relationship especially during times when one or both of us are feeling burned out or stressed or something about work or in our lives more generally.
Emily: I've always thought that the two of you were really good at doing that. Well done.
Dedeker: Oh geez. It's helped because I'm definitely a classic example of one of those people that really didn't come with this baked into my cake already. I didn't really like get any real strong examples of cultures of appreciation and stuff, at least not in my family of origin and in most of my adult relationships. It's nice that in my more recent adult life and by recent, I would say the last five or six years or so--
Emily: The whole time you've been with Jase, yes.
Dedeker: It's not just with Jase. It's with other people also, but it helps. In conclusion with all of this, over time words and the culture of words in your relationship can make or break your connection. Words can change the subconscious view that you or your partner has on your relationship. Remember that certain words can carry more emotional impact to one person than they do to another.
Some examples of this, if you were ridiculed by one of your parents about your work ethic or told that you were lazy, your partner might casually tease you about you procrastinating and about how it takes you a long time to finish a task, and that might feel just more cutting and more upsetting than your partner probably originally intended it to feel.
Jase: Poof, yes, this one hits home both in terms of things I've found for myself where I'll get much more upset by a comment, like something that the two of you will say or that someone will say about me that I'll get-- We've all talked about it before. We talked about this regularly, but something where I'm just like, hey, I know that that thing you said was not objectively mean or bad or anything, but, gosh, I had this reaction to it and here's why I think that might be.
Then similarly being on the other side of having a partner react, like if I'm upset, having them react to something I said in a way that feels way disproportionate to what I said, and then later in talking about it, Dedeker and I have also had some of these experiences-- then later in talking about it, realizing that certain words to them are very much associated with being so bad. Things are awful right now, if those words are being used, whereas for others, they might be no big deal. This has come up, not just with Dedeker, but in other relationships too specifically things like the fuck word. That one, for some people--
Emily: You mean fuck?
Jase: Yes, the fuck word.
Emily: The fuck word, okay.
Jase: That one can be-- For some people it's like, "Whatever, I say that all the time and all my friends tell each other to fuck off and whatever, and it's fine," but for other people that's like, "Ooh, that's hurtful and that's a thing you got to be careful with using." Or another one that's come up in relationships of mine is, shut up. In my family, shut up is no big deal. We tell each other to shut up. It's no big thing, but I've had partners where saying that even ingest is super hurtful because in their family, that was the thing you were not allowed to say and you could never say, so stuff like that.
Just being aware of how these affect each other. The way to do that is to get to know your family history, share these stories as they come up if you have to, but maybe even beforehand, just talk about, hey, it could be a fun topic of conversation of like, hey, what was the language like for you growing up and in your previous relationships and friendships versus mine?
It could be interesting. You might find some funny slang terms that one of you used in your family that the other didn't know about, I don’t know. Just that that becoming aware of that and being respectful of that, whether that comes from a place of trauma, from pain of actual acute trauma or more accumulated trauma, from micro-aggressions of race or gender or sexual orientation or relationship style or something or if it's something they were raised to think, whatever it is, just be aware of it and learn it to help you communicate better with each other.
Emily: As we love to say, do not weaponize this shit and this is something that I think goes back a little bit to the contempt talk that we just had, that if you do weaponize this shit, that can be incredibly harmful and hurtful to your relationship because you truly know now, okay, I'm not supposed to say this thing because I know that my partner has a history with it being hurtful and harmful to them. It makes it that much worse if you do kind of use it against them in a moment that maybe the two of you are tense. Be sure to not weaponize that shit.
Dedeker: Also resist using words like always or never with your partners. This is a pretty good general rule all around. Using always or never is rarely ever factual. It generally will set up your partner to be trying to immediately be on the defensive and find times when always or never wasn't true if you're talking about that particular behavior. That's one that feels like easy to me. That feels like the easy, low hanging fruit. Just take out always or never easy, but I will say has not been easy for me in the past. I get it.
Another thing related to using our words to build this culture of appreciation that involves using your words to make sure that you lift your partner up not only in private, but in public as well. This doesn't have to be weird. I think about that episode, the IT Crowd where Jen hires Moss to be her boyfriend and he just stands at the party all night, talking about her. Amazing bionic arm and how she's just like a tennis ace and we have amazing sex.
It doesn't have to be like that, but it can be really little things, really little things, including things like being respectful of your partner, just when others are around and not using your words to cut them down or interrupt them or razzing them or putting them down when around other people or at home either. It's good to avoid that at home too.
Emily: Focus on complimenting your partner instead of criticizing them. Sometimes criticism is helpful, but if you do it in a kind and respectful way. We did have an episode on criticism fairly recently. It was 232. We talked about criticism or how to doom your relationship.
Jase: Then in a few episodes ago, we talked about it again on the other side.
Emily: Yes, exactly. Look up both of those episodes if you're wondering about criticism and maybe how to do it in a better fashion or how to like take it better, both of those things, but when in doubt, especially if your partner is being vulnerable with you, try to compliment them or try to lift them up in a way, any way that you can.
Jase: Yes, then another thing that's important to learn is how to sooth your partner when they have been triggered or activated by something that either you said or that someone else has said in their hurting. That's to resist the urge to either try to explain it away or to blame them for how they're feeling, but instead to just listen and respond kindly and use the triforce of communication to understand what they need right then and allow them to communicate that to you and give that to them.
Emily: Finally, when you're fighting with your partner, if you're in the middle of an argument, do not use toxic words or phrases like comparing your partner to a past person that you had a relationship with or if you're in a polyamorous relationship comparing your partner to their metamour. That's no good or threatening to leave a relationship if you're not going to leave.
If you do it in an ultimatumy type way or just a shitty fashion weaponizing it, not cool. Not okay. Again, like we said earlier, name-calling, gas-lighting, things like that. Don't do it, be respectful. We've talked about better ways to fight as well. How to like be good arguer on our episodes as well. Go back to some of those episodes to discuss and look at this more in depth.
Dedeker: Now we're going to be moving on to talking about intentional language choices and about changing your language if someone has asked you to, but before we do that, we're going to take a quick break to talk about our sponsors for this week's episode.
Jase: In the final
portion of this episode, we want to talk about intentionally changing your language or asking other people to change their language or adjust their language. I want to start off with a story. Once upon a time, I was explaining the Triforce of communication to a couple. They're both friends of mine, a man and a woman who are in a relationship together. I noticed that they were having a communication problem where I was watching them talk and she was clearly, seemed to me clearly, coming for a Triforce two. He was jumping to giving her advice when what she really wanted was commiseration and sympathy.
Dedeker: Classic.
Jase: I had talked to them before about the Triforce, just mentioned it. I was just like, “Hey, remember that Triforce thing? I think this is an example of that going on here." It got into this conversation. Something that I found was that as I was explaining it, saying things like, “Well, she's coming for Triforce two so it's bad to give advice. You shouldn't give advice and what you should give is this other thing. It's just support and whatever,” he ended up coming up with all sorts of interesting and potentially valid and creative reasons why actually, he should be able to respond to how he wants to and maybe that for him, there's a need he needs from giving the advice.
Just all sorts of stuff, really interesting ways of defending the fact that he was doing that and not really listening to the point of what the conversation was about. I realized that partway through that conversation, that it was because the way I was talking about it and the way I was presenting it was in this, "If she comes wanting this and you say the other thing, that's wrong or that's bad," or, "You should only ever say this other thing." Was using this very declarative and almost accusatory language, even though that wasn't what I meant it to come across as. It put him in a state of, “Now I've got to justify why I had been doing that.”
When I realized that, it helped me go, "Oh my gosh. You know what? I realize I've been talking about this wrong. What I mean more is that this is a tool you can use, and that if she comes to you and is wanting support, and if you want to help her, this is a tool for knowing better how to give that to her. If you want to talk about something that's for you, then yes, what you're saying makes sense." It’s this question of it's not about it's objectively wrong but it's who is this for? Are you trying to communicate in a way that's helpful and uplifting for her, or are you just trying to communicate in a way that, I guess, you want to or that you feel like you need to at that moment or something?
Dedeker: Yes. I think there's something really interesting. When you first told this story, the thing that stood out to me was that distinction of when it comes to changing your approach to someone and to the words that you use with someone. Really needing to check in with yourself of are you willing to do this because you know it's going to help the situation, or do you have a different agenda of asserting yourself in the situation? That's probably going to change the way that you respond to being asked to change your language or change your communication approach.
I think this applies not only to times when a partner maybe asks us to change our communication to something that's gentler or softer or more appropriate to what they need at the time or things like that. I think it also applies to if someone's asking us to change the language that we use around particularly using terms that maybe are harmful to them, like ableist language or sexist language or things like that. We thought that we'd spend a little bit of time talking about just some actionable things to do in particular, when someone has asked you to change your language.
I think most of this applies to the latter situation of someone specifically said, “Hey, that particular term is hurtful to me. Can you maybe change that and do something else?” This is also something good to consider when you're dealing with a partner as well. I think the first and most important thing is to not react right away with your first reaction. That's been a recurring refrain that we've talked about many times on the show.
Jase: We just talked about that and the criticism and upset.
Emily: Take a breath, yes.
Dedeker: Take a breath, take a break. I know that when it comes to specifically language and being asked to change language, at least in my personal experience, some of those requests are going to be easier for you than others, depending on your history, depending on just who you are, depending on your beliefs. There's some requests where it's like, “Oh, yes, super easy. I didn't even know that was a thing. No problem.” Then, someone else may say, “Hey, actually, can you not use this particular word?” That may rub you the wrong way much more so, maybe because you're like, “Oh, well, I've used that word to identify myself in the past. Therefore, I have the right to use it," or whatever it is.
Jase: It could be like in the example I gave with the Triforce story of-- Especially if it's given to you in a tone with accusation. Even if you didn't know that that word had some connotation or some meaning for people, but if you're told that you, then, are being ableist by using it, it can make you more likely to react defensively because you feel this need to justify why you would because, "I'm not that thing. I didn't mean it."
That's the good moment for that don't react right away and just-- If we're the one giving that criticism, if we can phrase it in a way that's more positive and not just like, “Hey, that thing you said is objectively bad,” I think that's helpful for getting people to change. Even if someone comes to you with, “Hey, that was bad,” take that breath and realize, “Okay, regardless of how they communicate it to me, it's still true. It's still true that they feel that way.”
Dedeker: Another good thing to follow is if someone comes to you, whether this is your partner, or a friend, or someone online, or whatever, if someone comes to you and is vulnerable enough to share the fact that, “Hey, this particular way that you communicated or this word that you used hurt my feelings,” maybe they will go ahead and offer up, “It hurt my feelings because I have this particular history with that word and that's why.” Maybe they won't offer why. Maybe they'll just say that hurt, that caused harm. Believe it. I don't know how else to elaborate that, just believe that.
Sure, there's manipulative people out there. Of course, if you're in a toxic relationship, there's a chance that someone could be trying to manipulate you. Chances are it's just going to be easier to believe someone when they say that this particular word has caused them harm and therefore, please can you pick a different word? Just believe it and accept it.
Emily: After this interaction happens, I know for myself personally, if I've ever been in the situation, it's a really good idea to go and research, maybe learn a little bit about why that particular word is toxic or not okay to use or maybe harmful to that particular person for whatever reason, beyond just talking to them about their own personal experience with it if it is more of an ableist term or sexist, even racist, language, things like that. There's a huge amount of resources out there, and I think the resources are just growing and growing on a yearly basis. You can definitely just Google it and look it up.
I found a great resource out there. There are many other resources but this is just one particular one that we found from autistichoya.com. It’s on ableist language, ableist words in terms to avoid. There's also a list of things that you can say instead. Perhaps just you said a thing that was ableist and then said you want to say something else. It gives you a long comprehensive list of those ableist terms and then of alternatives to use instead.
Jase: Along with explanations of why. It’s not just, “Hey, you can't say this," but, “Oh, hey, here's some history about the word or here's some meanings you might not have realized.” My favorite thing about this list, though, is that it does have another list of, “Hey, here's some other words you could use instead.” I think sometimes, people get caught up in the, “Oh, there's more and more words-”
Emily: I say this all the time.
Jase: -or “There's more and more words I can't say. I can't even talk anymore," because often, we do present it as just, “You can't say all these,” rather than saying, “Well, what can you say? What are things that are good to say?” They've got a list here. I really enjoy the idea of approaching it from a place of improving your own vocabulary, if that's something you're capable of doing, of becoming more expressive with your language.
Maybe a way to do it is instead of thinking, “Oh my gosh. Overnight, I have to completely change everything that I say,” maybe each day or each week, pick another one to say, “You know what? All right, I'm going to start replacing saying the word stupid with something else. I'm going to get more creative.” Maybe you could go to this list and you'll see things like asinine or buck wild or callous or crappy. Pick some other things and go, “Okay, I'm going to try substituting those, see how they feel.” I personally know, over the last year or so, I've really taken to saying buck wild a lot-
Emily: It’s a big word.
Jase: -instead of saying that something's crazy, of just like, "That is buck wild," because it almost better captures what I'm trying to say, which is, "I'm having trouble even wrapping my head around that thing that just happened."
Emily: I think that that's incredibly important to change your habits because many of us get into habitual language patterns, then we don't even think about it, we just say it. I know that happens for me a lot. It does take a lot of practice to instead of saying crazy, say buck wild and put it into any conversation where that word might come up. Honestly, for example, crazy. It comes up in so many different ways. If you're not talking about a thing is crazy or a person was acting crazy, take that out of the equation entirely and find one of these other words to change your vocabulary up.
Jase: It can be really fun.
Emily: Totally.
Jase: I think, similarly, if you try to take swearing out of your vocabulary and replace it with--
Emily: That's not going to happen. No, I'm kidding. I'll do what I can.
Jase: Having fun with it. Replacing it with silly anachronisms.
Emily: Shakespearean language. Some of the stuff that he used to say.
Jase: It can be fun. This can be a fun thing rather than a source of stress of like, "Oh, I'm so focused on what I can't say." It's like, "Let me focus on fun new things that I can say."
Emily: Then pass it on to others. Jase, I'm going to use that now. I'm going to use buck wild. Thanks. That's great. That's a perfect example of passing it on to another person. Practice makes perfect. I think it's important for people to think about their language. Take a moment and think. It's good.
I did want to have a quick note on language reclamation because I think this is very important right now in this political and cultural moment in time that we have. Language reclamation is a thing that a lot of people in various communities use. The pejorative or derogatory terms that are out there, and there are many, sometimes, they're being reclaimed by the group of people for whom they were originally intended. I want to make it clear that generally, it's only okay for the people who have reclaimed that word to use that word. The big example is it's not okay for white people to say the N-word, whereas it's okay for African American people who have reclaimed that word to use it.
When looking at language reclamation or language in general, I think one really has to examine the historical context of a word and think about the negative ways, the really hurtful, harmful ways in which a word has been used by groups of people over time. Along those lines, reclamation and language reclamation-- I think there are reasons why people out there are doing it and why people are interested in doing it and why it is a thing now. Linguist Robin Brontsema wrote a whole long paper on reclaiming words. She talked about the reasons as to why people out there are reclaiming words and why it's important. There are three distinct reasons why people are doing it.
Dedeker: I thought that these three reasons were really interesting. I thought that they put this together in a really cool way. They talked about the fact that reclaiming words and reclaiming language first of all changes the meaning of the word from pejorative to positive for the particular community that that word has been used against. It's also possible to essentially exploit the stigma of the word itself. Therefore, the word now acts as a reminder of the history of this word and the history of the fact that this particular group of people has been subjected to unjust treatment, which I think is really interesting.
As well as that, it serves to neutralize a word by denying it to those who want to use it to oppress or harm. That one really got me thinking because I started thinking about the word slut, which is another example of reclaimed language. There's been a big movement to reclaim that word by feminists, by people in the sex-positive community, and stuff like that. It's not really a word I've ever personally, individually reclaimed for myself or applied to myself.
Emily: A lot of people we know have.
Dedeker: A lot of people do, definitely. However, this particular reason that this linguist cites about this is a way of neutralizing the word and denying it to people who want to use it for bad, for evil. It makes me think about literally every time I do any interview on any remotely approaching the mainstream media source like a magazine or a show or anything like that, of course, in the comment section, it's going to be a bunch of people saying, "Slut, slut, slut, slut."
It's at a point now where it's not like I'm reading that and being like, "Oh, they're complimenting me. That's great." I know that they're intending to use it to cause harm, but it doesn't because for me, that word feels it's been neutralized in the community that I'm in. Also, for me, it feels like, "Can you not come up with anything more clever than that? Of all things that you think is going to harm me, this is not one of them. This is not on the list of words that is going to harm me."
I don't want that to say that if a word has been reclaimed, that anyone can use it without harm, necessarily. It can still be used with harm but that was a really interesting way of thinking about neutralizing the charge of the people who would normally want to use it for harm.
Jase: Again, as a defense from the community that it's used against, as a defense against that word rather than saying, "Yes, now it's okay for everyone to say it."
Emily: No. That's not what we're saying.
Jase: I think, actually, queer is a really good example of a word that's been so thoroughly neutralized to the point where I would say that is a word that anyone can say. I know you were debating in your head earlier whether that's true or not. When we talk about things like the queer community, or queer spaces, or queer people, whereas queer originally was used to mean strange, to mean what queer means, which is to say that they're strange.
It's been not only reclaimed but also given other meaning, that queer then has been given this meaning of, "Hey, this is this bigger term that can catch a lot of things that saying gay doesn't encompass, or saying trans doesn't quite encompass, or saying whatever relationship anarchist or polyamorous doesn't quite encompass." Maybe this is a word that-- Again, its boundaries change a little bit depending on who's defining it, but that it's been so thoroughly neutralized that it almost sounds comical to imagine someone using queer as an insult because of how much it's used as a normal term now. Maybe I'm biased because I'm in that community.
Emily: It is this huge, overarching community. If someone was like, "Queer," to me as a derogatory insult, I'd just be like, "Yes."
Dedeker: "Correct."
Jase: "Right."
Emily: "And?"
Jase: That's what I think's so interesting about this. Whereas on the other hand, within the gay male community, there's for a long time been a movement for reclaiming the word fag. That's still not okay for someone who's not a gay man himself to say. There's a spectrum here. It's not you do it and then it's done. Maybe certain words will never get there. It's interesting to look at that and how that can affect the way language is even used now.
We wanted to wrap up this episode by encouraging with all of this. Language is something that, as we said at the beginning, is incredibly powerful. It can both cause a lot of hurt but it can also really help and lift us up and be the beginning of the solution to our problems as well. That's so cool. When talking about language, it can become very overwhelming because it's something we use constantly, every day, all day to communicate. Whether that's writing online, whether it's speaking to people in our normal life, whether it's at work, whether it's in our personal lives, we're using language all the time. It can feel a little bit overwhelming.
We wanted to try to encourage everyone to look at it, if possible for you, as a way to enrich yourself and grow yourself and, even in little ways, offer more care to the people around you by being a little bit more careful about our words. Look, I even used wordplay in the way I said that.
Emily: Well done.
Dedeker: Good job.
Jase: So meta.
We want to encourage everyone to think about that and to try to look at language improvement and change in ourselves, whether that's in our relationships, or in the types of words that we use, or in, hopefully, removing contempt from the way we talk about anyone but especially our partners, that to look at it as this really positive and incredibly powerful thing that you could be doing even a little bit at a time.
Emily: We're going to jump into a bonus episode for our Patrons. We're going to talk about political correctness and specifically PC culture, which raises some hackles of some people sometimes. We're going to get into some statistics about it, how the words PC culture themselves have taken on specific meaning, and a little bit more about that.
Jase: Words that talk about language have taken on a meaning of their own, but then we can talk about it on a language podcast. This is so meta.
Emily: Exactly. I know. It's super meta.
Dedeker: Wait. Did we suddenly turn into a language podcast?