Over the past two or three years, words that once held specific meaning have been “appropriated” by ideologies, interest groups, or even just ignorant websites and misused — misused to such an extent people seem to be forgetting “that word doesn’t mean what you think it means;” at least, it didn’t.

One of the first was the Latin suffix –phobia, which was eventually used as a tool by the homosexual advocacy movement to brand its opponents “homophobes.”  The fact their opponents didn’t have a phobia about homosexuality was irrelevant.  A “phobia” brings with it a negative connotation, and the name-calling had the intended effect:  Opponents of the imposition of the homosexual agenda were forced to defend themselves; the argument changed to one of labels rather than positions.  Pastor Greg Laurie recently addressed the semantics, saying “homophobe” was a useless term:

I hate the word ‘homophobic because I can just as easily come back and say ‘well, you’re biblophobic to say I’m homophobic.

Others have latched onto the semantic trend, resulting Read more