As someone who calls for such radical policies as the dissolution of that useless behemoth known as the federal Department of Education, as well as legally restoring safety to the most dangerous place in the USA (the mother's womb), the media and culture would call me conservative, not radical. OK, I can live with that. But why are governments like those of Hitler, Mussolini, and Iranian President Ahmadinejad also called either conservative or right-wing? High taxes; severe limits to freedoms of speech, assembly, and the press; gun control; government intrusion into every part of life; nationalization of industries...hardly Reaganesque. Additionally, Hitler and Mussolini were pro-union. And Hitler was pro-abortion. Why are they linked with me as right-wing?
I also object to the symbolic choice of the media to label conservative Republicans "red" and liberal Democrats "blue." In the Revolutionary War, the red-coated British represented much of what liberalism stands for today, and the boys in blue paved the way for those very right-wing documents known as the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. And Red China is at the left end of the spectrum.
Media misnomers are not limited to politics. Cursing or profanity are referred to as mature language. I've heard children use those words. Are those children more mature than their peers? Quite the opposite is true. It is immature language, because the users:
--don't care if they bother people
--don't have the vocabulary to express themselves properly, and
--don't even use profane words according to what their definitions are.
