Father Paul Marx was right on the button when thirty years ago he started openly warning us that verbal engineering always precedes social engineering.We see it constantly with the warming up of changes of terms and references, most especially to life, faith and family matters. One manipulation of meaning that really irks me is ‘partner’.
It seems that almost everyone in society has accepted the word ‘partner’ to refer to any kind of sharing of peoples in any way, and most especially in sexual terms.The Oxford dictionary refers to husband and wife as ‘partners’ and so do I. I simply refuse to engage in any conversation using the term ‘partner’, except in business terms and also that of the institution of marriage. I always refer to:
The father of your baby, your boyfriend or girlfriend, or in the case of same sex liaisons I would always refer to your friend.We can easily see how through TV, the media and the cinema and, well just about every institute in the land, that we have been sold a new meaning of the word ‘partner’ and now we live with the consequences. I am all for the traditional family and we need to group together and make our voice heard for the sake of the future of our children and grandchildren.