The 'Double-Meaning' Games
A few days ago my little cousin and I were watching television. All of a sudden he sprouted me a question on “what is sex?” while an ad went on. The aunty who was beside us in sofa gave him a warm stare. I know you are puzzled why not a cold stare because of the word. She slowly made him understand the word mustn’t be used in a negative sense but in a positive manner and sent him away.
The little kid who was still not satisfied asked, "how?" She explained in simple terms that it just refers to the gender. And my cousin sat quitely.
If it was anyone of us we would have hushed the child and told that it isn’t a word to be used anywhere in public. Then I asked her calmly why she gave such an explanation to the kid. Calmly she asked me to take a book on the shelf named “PSYCHOLOGY OF WOMEN”. I was Puzzled why the psychology comes into play here. I opened the book, the first topic read the difference between ‘sex’ and ‘gender’. Out of curiosity I began reading and it defined as follows;
Sex is the biological difference between a man and a woman whereas the gender refers the state of activities they perform whether it is masculine or feminine.
This gives us a clear insight on how today’s generation has taken up words general meaning into a normative form of the verb connotation. The simple taglines are now turning into “double meaning words”. We have to think what each word would mean and diagnose on where and how to use. The saying “think twice before speak” now becomes applicable on how, where, what and when to use such words with crystallized made up meanings of words.
Balls.
The children are playing with football, basketball, baseball, tennis ball, cricket ball and the plastic balls there. Now don’t raise your eyebrows up. This refers to the play ball. Why is the word made up so critical in meaning? I could give many such instances where today the generation of gadgets is making the vocabulary so hard to use for all around the previous generation. When an elderly tries to learn English when he hasn’t learned before how are you going to react when he uses the regular meaning of any common word to frame up what he speaks?
In the case when we beget children how are we going to teach them what means what. A for Apple and B for Bluetooth? I read a short poem for kids somewhere and here I translate that;
"Play online o little kid
Don’t go offline my little kid
Early morning on facebook
All the evening full click on Instagram
Click likes to enrich your friends
And comments to make them annoyed
Keep sharing the post what you see
And a status before you sleep"
Let not this happen as the days go from wishes to weird wishes the globe is evolving but killing the beautiful vocabulary in every language. Social media may be a pathway to benefits but let not destroy the little goodness left in the world.
