All the terms that acquired a different meaning over the last 5 years

published Feb 10, 2022, last modified Feb 12, 2022

This compendium is based on actual unironic uses of the terms by perverse academia and lying media. How fast is culture destroyed?

All the terms that acquired a different meaning over the last 5 years
  • science
    • now it means "whatever authorities / journocels / celebrities tell you to believe", no matter how unscientific (according to the prior definition) it may be
  • vaccine
  • anti-vax
  • racist
    • used to mean "odious discrimination against people solely based on race"
    • now it's some sort of evil original sin that, apparently, only white people are capable of, consisting (more or less) on not subordinating oneself to non-white people
  • white supremacist
    • it used to mean "people who believe whites should be supreme"
    • now it just means "people who notice hatred against whites"
  • safety
    • now it includes people who fear others saying obvious truths they disagree with
  • man / woman
    • people with penises can be women now — people with vaginas can be men
  • pregnant
    • the term would always imply woman before, nowadays "men can be pregnant too" (see prior definition)
  • -phobic
    • used to mean "irrational fear"
    • now it simply acts as an insult, often proffered as revenge for making a joke or questioning a shibboleth
  • violence
    • it now includes thoughts, written or said, that others hate and want to proscribe
  • peaceful
    • conversely vis a vis the prior one, this now includes physically violent acts like arson, battery and attempted murder
  •  healthy
    • morbidly obese people are "healthy", according to  "health at every size " activists
  •  insurrection
    • peaceful protests / marches are called "insurrection" now
  • misogyny
    • today it's used  in the sense of "disagreement with a woman" (or, more and more frequently, a man who incorrectly believes himself to be a woman)
  • sexism
    • used to mean "irrational hatred of the other sex" or "odious discrimination against people solely based on sex"
    • today, it's an accusation of evil or sin, that may or may not be vaguely related to sex
    • in the modern definition, women are not capable of sexism — they can only be victims of it — so only men can be accused of sexism
  • two weeks
    • it clearly means either "two years" or "for as long as we can get away with"
  • far right
    • used to be reserved for organized violent groups animated by right-wing beliefs
    • today it generally means anyone to the left of, or slightly to the right of, Bill Clinton
  • conspiracy theorist
    • someone who tells a truth that is generally accepted today, only six months early
  • quarantine
    • formerly, forced isolation of sick people
    • now, forced isolation of even provably healthy people
  • passport
    • now it includes permits to engage in ordinary everyday activities that were arbitrarily prohibited, rather than being limited to permits for international travel
  • censorship
    • now it excludes censorious acts by businesses or individuals, even when those acts are clearly done at the behest of, or in accordance with the extralegal wishes of, a government
  • hate speech
    • this one is a bit of a neologism
    • the term covers many categories of ideas, many of which are truthful, almost none of which are hateful (in the original sense), that certain people revile to see communicated 
  • freedom of speech
    • before, the notion that you are free to communicate ideas, and other are free to listen to you, without fear of retaliation or interference by third parties
    • now, an obsolete practice that protects the communication of "hate speech"
  • trust / safety
    • before, reliability and freedom from danger or injury
    • now, the name of a corporate department in charge of deforming or falsifying (often true) information the corporation intends to suppress, and censoring people communicating said information 
  • fascist
    • before, a person who supports a government under fascistic principles
    • now, anyone who rejects certain left-wing ideas
  • fact-checker
    • before, someone in charge of checking the truth value of factual claims
    • now, someone who routinely distorts or suppresses (often true) factual claims

How about others you might know?  Tell us!


In Newspeak it was seldom possible to follow a heretical thought further than the perception that it was heretical: beyond that point the necessary words were nonexistent.

— George Orwell, appendix: the principles of Newspeak