doublespeak

language deliberately constructed to disguise or distort its actual meaning, doublespeak is most often associated with governmental, military, religious, and corporate institutions and their deliberate use of euphemism, ambiguity, distortion, misdirection, and outright untruths to disguise unpleasantness or to sell something to the citizenry that would be unacceptable in its naked form. For example, firing of employees may be "downsizing," and "outsourcing" may mean the avoidance of unions or benefits. "Vocabulary propaganda is much more subtle and effective than content propaganda.... Content propaganda misinforms about issues, but vocabulary propaganda interferes with the ability to think or talk about issues in a way that can lead to understanding" (Richard K. Moore, New Dawn magazine). Moore says words like "market" and "competitive" have been promoted to "unquestioned axioms of the universe." Analyze your words for subtle doublespeak. See also military language, political language.