WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.339 What if I told you that a spelling mistake could 00:00:02.339 --> 00:00:05.519 be more dangerous than a well -written argument? 00:00:05.940 --> 00:00:08.160 I mean, usually when you're scrolling through 00:00:08.160 --> 00:00:11.539 a news feed and spot a glaring typo, your instinct 00:00:11.539 --> 00:00:13.480 is just to roll your eyes, right? Yeah, exactly. 00:00:13.640 --> 00:00:15.439 You assume somebody just forgot to run spell 00:00:15.439 --> 00:00:17.460 check, or I don't know, they were typing too 00:00:17.460 --> 00:00:20.579 fast. Right. But today, we are looking at typos 00:00:20.579 --> 00:00:23.219 that aren't mistakes at all. They are carefully 00:00:23.219 --> 00:00:26.300 engineered, highly targeted linguistic weapons. 00:00:26.699 --> 00:00:28.699 Welcome to today's deep dive. I'm thrilled you're 00:00:28.699 --> 00:00:30.940 here with us because we are decoding the secret 00:00:30.940 --> 00:00:33.280 language of the Internet and political discourse. 00:00:33.820 --> 00:00:36.939 We tend to think of spelling as this rigid, boring 00:00:36.939 --> 00:00:39.159 set of rules you learn in grade school. Right. 00:00:39.479 --> 00:00:41.119 But when you break those rules deliberately, 00:00:41.119 --> 00:00:44.060 you can bypass someone's logical defenses entirely. 00:00:44.560 --> 00:00:47.179 Just a single misplaced letter can carry this 00:00:47.179 --> 00:00:50.259 massive payload of meaning. And our source material 00:00:50.259 --> 00:00:54.179 today explores this wild, aggressive, and honestly 00:00:54.179 --> 00:00:56.859 sometimes hilarious world of satiric misspelling. 00:00:57.020 --> 00:00:59.500 Yeah, the text defines this as the intentional 00:00:59.500 --> 00:01:02.920 misspelling of a word, a phrase, or a name specifically 00:01:02.920 --> 00:01:05.159 for rhetorical effect. So how do people actually 00:01:05.159 --> 00:01:07.530 pull this off? Well, the sources outline a few 00:01:07.530 --> 00:01:10.150 distinct mechanisms. Sometimes they use intentional 00:01:10.150 --> 00:01:13.670 malapropism, or they might rely on analogy, which 00:01:13.670 --> 00:01:16.090 is a fascinating linguistic tool. Wait, let me 00:01:16.090 --> 00:01:17.129 pause you right there, because I want to make 00:01:17.129 --> 00:01:18.829 sure I have these terms straight before we get 00:01:18.829 --> 00:01:21.890 into the we's. Oh, sure. Analogy. Is that when 00:01:21.890 --> 00:01:24.810 you purposefully break a grammar rule because 00:01:24.810 --> 00:01:27.329 the incorrect version actually hits harder? That 00:01:27.329 --> 00:01:30.109 is exactly it. Think of the classic sports phrase, 00:01:30.489 --> 00:01:34.340 we was robbed. Oh, yeah. It's grammatically incorrect, 00:01:34.599 --> 00:01:37.980 but that broken grammar conveys raw, unfiltered 00:01:37.980 --> 00:01:40.780 emotion far better than standard English ever 00:01:40.780 --> 00:01:43.620 could. Makes total sense. And intentional malpropism 00:01:43.620 --> 00:01:47.040 is similar, but it involves swapping in a completely 00:01:47.040 --> 00:01:49.239 different yet similar sounding word to change 00:01:49.239 --> 00:01:52.980 the meaning entirely, like saying erection instead 00:01:52.980 --> 00:01:56.159 of election to mock a political process. Right. 00:01:56.400 --> 00:01:58.540 But the most common mechanism in our sources 00:01:58.540 --> 00:02:00.519 and that we're going to focus heavily on today 00:02:00.519 --> 00:02:03.260 is simply replacing one letter or symbol for 00:02:03.260 --> 00:02:05.260 another. Yeah, the single character swap. But 00:02:05.260 --> 00:02:07.040 real quick, before we jump into those examples, 00:02:07.260 --> 00:02:09.379 I need to make a crystal clear disclaimer to 00:02:09.379 --> 00:02:11.639 you listening. Very important, yes. Our source 00:02:11.639 --> 00:02:14.819 material covers highly charged, highly aggressive 00:02:14.819 --> 00:02:17.939 political writing. It targets politicians and 00:02:17.939 --> 00:02:20.879 ideologies across the entire spectrum. Left, 00:02:20.879 --> 00:02:23.819 right, everyone gets hit. Exactly. So I want 00:02:23.819 --> 00:02:27.240 to be 100 % clear that we are not taking sides 00:02:27.240 --> 00:02:29.939 here. We are not endorsing any of the viewpoints, 00:02:30.039 --> 00:02:31.960 the attacks, or the politics we discussed today. 00:02:31.979 --> 00:02:34.819 Right. We are here strictly and impartially as 00:02:34.819 --> 00:02:38.120 linguistic observers just reporting on the tactics 00:02:38.120 --> 00:02:40.669 documented in the text. We're looking at the 00:02:40.669 --> 00:02:42.949 mechanics of the language, not validating the 00:02:42.949 --> 00:02:45.349 rhetoric itself. It's a crucial boundary to set, 00:02:45.569 --> 00:02:48.150 because while weaponized typos feel like a very 00:02:48.150 --> 00:02:51.189 modern byproduct of social media, the historical 00:02:51.189 --> 00:02:53.509 timeline in our text shows that the roots of 00:02:53.509 --> 00:02:56.669 this practice run incredibly deep. And they start 00:02:56.669 --> 00:02:59.210 in a very dark place. Okay, let's unpack this. 00:02:59.810 --> 00:03:02.909 The text points to the letter K as the most prominent 00:03:02.909 --> 00:03:04.930 heavy -hitting example of a single character 00:03:04.930 --> 00:03:07.580 being used as a weapon. Where does that actually 00:03:07.580 --> 00:03:10.060 begin? Well, the history of this specific letter 00:03:10.060 --> 00:03:12.280 swap goes all the way back to the mid to late 00:03:12.280 --> 00:03:15.099 19th century. It originated with the Ku Klux 00:03:15.099 --> 00:03:18.340 Klan. Yeah, they had a well -documented internal 00:03:18.340 --> 00:03:21.939 practice of replacing the letter C with K in 00:03:21.939 --> 00:03:24.259 their naming conventions and titles, and the 00:03:24.259 --> 00:03:27.360 source actually notes that this deliberate misspelling 00:03:27.360 --> 00:03:30.180 practice continues within the group's ranks even 00:03:30.180 --> 00:03:32.830 today. It's just unsettling to realize that's 00:03:32.830 --> 00:03:35.490 the origin point. But what I found wild in the 00:03:35.490 --> 00:03:38.889 reading is how that specific letter swap gets 00:03:38.889 --> 00:03:40.909 completely re -appropriated over the decades. 00:03:41.129 --> 00:03:42.990 Oh, absolutely. It gets flipped. Yeah, it gets 00:03:42.990 --> 00:03:45.830 aimed at entirely different targets. The 1960s 00:03:45.830 --> 00:03:48.229 and early 70s in the U .S. is where we see a 00:03:48.229 --> 00:03:50.509 massive shift. You had radical youth movements 00:03:50.509 --> 00:03:52.949 like the Yippies who started spelling America 00:03:52.949 --> 00:03:57.530 with a K -A -M -E -R -I -K -A. Right. And according 00:03:57.530 --> 00:04:00.189 to the Oxford Dictionary cited in our text, that 00:04:00.189 --> 00:04:03.009 choice was a deliberate pointed allusion to the 00:04:03.009 --> 00:04:05.250 Russian and German spellings of the word. So 00:04:05.250 --> 00:04:07.210 they were basically using a foreign spelling 00:04:07.210 --> 00:04:09.449 to imply that the United States was sliding into 00:04:09.449 --> 00:04:12.569 authoritarianism. Precisely. It's like like graffiting 00:04:12.569 --> 00:04:14.810 a mustache on a political billboard. It's this 00:04:14.810 --> 00:04:17.649 tiny single stroke alteration that completely 00:04:17.649 --> 00:04:19.689 defaces the original image in the mind of the 00:04:19.689 --> 00:04:22.110 reader. That is a perfect way to visualize it. 00:04:22.370 --> 00:04:25.069 And this phenomenon jumps borders too. Really? 00:04:25.310 --> 00:04:28.790 Yeah. The text outlines how anarchist and squatter 00:04:28.790 --> 00:04:32.089 movements in Europe, specifically across Italian, 00:04:32.170 --> 00:04:35.189 Spanish, Catalan, and Portuguese languages, use 00:04:35.189 --> 00:04:38.430 the word ocupa with a K rather than the standard 00:04:38.430 --> 00:04:42.430 ocupo with a C. Oh wow. The K basically became 00:04:42.430 --> 00:04:45.370 a universal typographic signal for rebellion. 00:04:45.850 --> 00:04:48.689 It blended English loanwords with the European 00:04:48.689 --> 00:04:51.209 punk movement's aesthetic. That's fascinating. 00:04:51.430 --> 00:04:53.490 But if we bring it back to American discourse, 00:04:53.910 --> 00:04:56.569 the use of the K evolved into something much 00:04:56.569 --> 00:04:59.310 more aggressive, the Triple K. Yeah, I saw that 00:04:59.310 --> 00:05:01.670 in the notes. Activists started inserting three 00:05:01.670 --> 00:05:03.889 Ks into words. I didn't realize how far back 00:05:03.889 --> 00:05:06.029 that went, though. The earliest known Oxford 00:05:06.029 --> 00:05:08.410 English Dictionary record of it is from July 00:05:08.410 --> 00:05:11.949 1970. An African -American magazine called Black 00:05:11.949 --> 00:05:14.709 World published the spelling America with three 00:05:14.709 --> 00:05:17.610 Ks. Wow. The tactic is explicitly designed to 00:05:17.610 --> 00:05:20.329 accuse the target of underlying racism or systemic 00:05:20.329 --> 00:05:22.870 oppression by tying them directly to the Klan. 00:05:23.009 --> 00:05:25.600 And then that spelling just into mainstream pop 00:05:25.600 --> 00:05:28.420 culture in the 90s. The text mentions Ice Cube's 00:05:28.420 --> 00:05:31.779 1990 album, America's Most Wanted, and Tupac 00:05:31.779 --> 00:05:35.259 using a variation of it on a track in 1996. Yeah, 00:05:35.360 --> 00:05:38.379 Tupac's track was two of America's Most Wanted, 00:05:38.600 --> 00:05:41.620 which, side note, also uses the satiric I is 00:05:41.620 --> 00:05:44.040 spelling. Oh, right. But the tactic is just highly 00:05:44.040 --> 00:05:45.879 adaptable. It gets aimed at both sides of the 00:05:45.879 --> 00:05:48.279 aisle. The U .S. Democratic Party gets hit with 00:05:48.279 --> 00:05:51.930 Democrat. The GOP with Republican. Even economic 00:05:51.930 --> 00:05:54.410 systems like K capitalism. And it gets used against 00:05:54.410 --> 00:05:57.129 specific individuals too, right? Yeah. The source 00:05:57.129 --> 00:05:59.209 highlights the spelling of David Duke's last 00:05:59.209 --> 00:06:03.410 name. as D -U -K -K -K. The text notes he is 00:06:03.410 --> 00:06:05.850 a former grand wizard of the Klan, a political 00:06:05.850 --> 00:06:08.569 candidate, and an anti -Semitic conspiracy theorist. 00:06:08.829 --> 00:06:10.930 So in that specific instance, the misspelling 00:06:10.930 --> 00:06:13.269 is used to permanently attach his own historical 00:06:13.269 --> 00:06:15.470 affiliations to his name every single time he 00:06:15.470 --> 00:06:17.170 is mentioned in print. Exactly. It's a brand 00:06:17.170 --> 00:06:19.230 he can't wash off. Which leads us right into 00:06:19.230 --> 00:06:21.509 the other major category of single -character 00:06:21.509 --> 00:06:25.170 weaponization, currency symbols. Ah, yes. Using 00:06:25.170 --> 00:06:28.110 a dollar sign, a euro symbol, or a pound sign 00:06:28.110 --> 00:06:31.069 instead of an S, E, or LM. It is the ultimate 00:06:31.069 --> 00:06:34.889 typographic shortcut to accuse someone of plutocracy, 00:06:35.230 --> 00:06:38.250 greed, or corruption. Right. You see politicians 00:06:38.250 --> 00:06:40.410 targeted like spelling Bush with a dollar sign 00:06:40.410 --> 00:06:43.129 or writing Kangri with two dollar signs. And 00:06:43.129 --> 00:06:45.370 corporations are constantly hit. Microhoofed, 00:06:45.550 --> 00:06:47.670 in need, in need, in need. Even geographical 00:06:47.670 --> 00:06:50.750 targets, writing Europe with a euro symbol or 00:06:50.750 --> 00:06:52.970 United Tates with a dollar sign. Oh, and there 00:06:52.970 --> 00:06:56.470 was that UK campaign boycotting ESSO over the 00:06:56.470 --> 00:06:59.329 Kyoto Protocol. They spelled it E -dollar -dollar 00:06:59.329 --> 00:07:02.209 -oh. Yep. It's everywhere. I have to jump in 00:07:02.209 --> 00:07:03.350 here, though. I was looking through the source 00:07:03.350 --> 00:07:05.110 material and tripped over one of the examples 00:07:05.110 --> 00:07:08.449 that mentions the pop singer Keha. Right. She 00:07:08.449 --> 00:07:10.610 famously put a dollar sign in her name when she 00:07:10.610 --> 00:07:14.009 first debuted. But, I mean, how is a pop star 00:07:14.009 --> 00:07:16.910 doing that the same as activists attacking a 00:07:16.910 --> 00:07:18.870 multi -billion dollar corporation? Well, this 00:07:18.870 --> 00:07:21.290 raises an important question about intent. When 00:07:21.290 --> 00:07:23.509 activists use the dollar sign against Microsoft, 00:07:23.750 --> 00:07:26.029 they are applying an external label to shame 00:07:26.029 --> 00:07:29.170 the target. It's an accusation of greed. But 00:07:29.170 --> 00:07:32.930 Kiha's use was internal and ironic. The text 00:07:32.930 --> 00:07:35.209 actually notes she adopted the symbol while she 00:07:35.209 --> 00:07:38.170 was financially struggling. She claimed the symbol 00:07:38.170 --> 00:07:41.189 of wealth precisely because she lacked it. Oh, 00:07:41.230 --> 00:07:43.870 that's interesting. Yeah. So it's satirical aspiration 00:07:43.870 --> 00:07:48.269 versus satirical condemnation. But the underlying 00:07:48.269 --> 00:07:51.290 mechanism, the actual reason why it works, is 00:07:51.290 --> 00:07:54.129 identical. Because it's completely visual. Exactly. 00:07:54.670 --> 00:07:58.069 These symbols bypass logical debate. If you want 00:07:58.069 --> 00:08:00.449 to accuse a politician of being bought by corporate 00:08:00.449 --> 00:08:03.029 lobbyists, you could write this sprawling, deeply 00:08:03.029 --> 00:08:05.129 researched essay. Nobody's reading that. Right. 00:08:05.389 --> 00:08:07.730 But if you just spell Congress with dollar signs, 00:08:08.149 --> 00:08:10.189 you don't need the essay. You have instantly 00:08:10.189 --> 00:08:12.709 attached an emotional accusation to the visual 00:08:12.709 --> 00:08:14.709 identity of the word itself. Here's where it 00:08:14.709 --> 00:08:17.120 gets really interesting, though. Because sometimes 00:08:17.120 --> 00:08:19.259 you don't even need to replace a letter or use 00:08:19.259 --> 00:08:22.040 a currency symbol at all. No, you don't. You 00:08:22.040 --> 00:08:24.420 can keep the exact standard spelling of the word, 00:08:24.560 --> 00:08:27.899 but just tweak the formatting. The word -in -word 00:08:27.899 --> 00:08:31.779 pun. It relies entirely on a fortuitous coincidence 00:08:31.779 --> 00:08:35.039 in the language, where a smaller insulting word 00:08:35.039 --> 00:08:37.580 just happens to be nesting inside a larger one. 00:08:37.769 --> 00:08:41.009 Activists just use internal capitalization, parentheses, 00:08:41.269 --> 00:08:44.289 or slashes to force your eye to see the hidden 00:08:44.289 --> 00:08:46.590 insult. And the political examples from the U 00:08:46.590 --> 00:08:50.049 .S. are incredibly clever. After the controversial 00:08:50.049 --> 00:08:53.389 2000 election, critics of George W. Bush started 00:08:53.389 --> 00:08:55.809 formatting the word president with a lowercase 00:08:55.809 --> 00:08:58.669 P and a capital R president. The implication 00:08:58.669 --> 00:09:00.909 being he was just a resident of the White House, 00:09:01.289 --> 00:09:03.929 not the legitimate leader. And they did the exact 00:09:03.929 --> 00:09:05.850 same thing to Bill Clinton during his impeachment. 00:09:06.129 --> 00:09:08.750 You see it applied to legislation as well. Opponents 00:09:08.750 --> 00:09:11.429 of the USA PATRIOT Act would recase it as the 00:09:11.429 --> 00:09:15.230 USA PATRIOT Act, or they'd put the PAT in parentheses. 00:09:15.330 --> 00:09:17.169 It's like a linguistic countermeasure. It really 00:09:17.169 --> 00:09:19.629 is. The original acronym was obviously designed 00:09:19.629 --> 00:09:22.370 to wrap the legislation in a flag of implied 00:09:22.370 --> 00:09:25.909 patriotism. By visually isolating the word riot, 00:09:26.250 --> 00:09:28.370 critics immediately strip that patriotism away. 00:09:28.570 --> 00:09:31.289 And it's not just politics. Feminist theologian 00:09:31.289 --> 00:09:34.029 Mary Daly used slashes to critique patriarchy. 00:09:34.370 --> 00:09:37.549 She'd write gynecology, stagnation, or even therapist. 00:09:37.750 --> 00:09:40.070 Yeah, those are powerful visual disruptions. 00:09:40.370 --> 00:09:41.970 I saw some foreign examples in the notes that 00:09:41.970 --> 00:09:44.110 I didn't quite grasp at first glance, though. 00:09:44.450 --> 00:09:46.210 Something about the French word for conservative. 00:09:46.350 --> 00:09:50.590 Ah, yes. So in French... The prefix con is a 00:09:50.590 --> 00:09:52.730 highly insulting word that essentially means 00:09:52.730 --> 00:09:56.009 moron or idiot. Oh, OK. So critics of the conservative 00:09:56.009 --> 00:09:58.690 party will write the word conservateur with a 00:09:58.690 --> 00:10:02.570 hyphen conservateur or put the con in parentheses. 00:10:02.970 --> 00:10:05.409 And the text points out this makes the American 00:10:05.409 --> 00:10:09.149 English term neocon a very convenient, ready 00:10:09.149 --> 00:10:11.610 -made pun when it's used in France. That's brilliant. 00:10:11.970 --> 00:10:13.970 The text also mentions a Philippine senator, 00:10:14.289 --> 00:10:17.440 Ramon Bong Ravilla, Jr. He was facing allegations 00:10:17.440 --> 00:10:20.179 of pocketing pork barrel funds, and netizens 00:10:20.179 --> 00:10:23.220 started calling him Mandarambong. Right, because 00:10:23.220 --> 00:10:25.840 they capitalized his nickname, Bu -Yu -Ong, right 00:10:25.840 --> 00:10:28.279 inside the Filipino word for plunderer. It's 00:10:28.279 --> 00:10:31.320 a devastatingly perfect visual pun. Wow. Similarly, 00:10:31.440 --> 00:10:34.860 in Brazil, critics dubbed Jea Bolsonaro, Bolso 00:10:34.860 --> 00:10:37.299 Nero, splitting his name to link him to the Roman 00:10:37.299 --> 00:10:40.200 Emperor Nero who watched Rome burn. Yikes. Yeah, 00:10:40.200 --> 00:10:42.039 this was a direct critique of his handling of 00:10:42.039 --> 00:10:44.259 the 2019 Amazon wildfires and his indifference 00:10:44.259 --> 00:10:47.000 to the COVID -19 pandemic. But let me play devil's 00:10:47.000 --> 00:10:49.440 advocate for a second here. Go for it. Does this 00:10:49.440 --> 00:10:52.019 formatting trick actually change anyone's mind? 00:10:52.399 --> 00:10:54.919 Like, if I'm a diehard supporter of a politician 00:10:54.919 --> 00:10:57.659 and I see a tweet where their name is written 00:10:57.659 --> 00:11:00.259 with a lowercase letter, I'm not going to suddenly 00:11:00.259 --> 00:11:02.679 abandon my political beliefs. It feels like an 00:11:02.679 --> 00:11:05.700 echo chamber. Well, if we connect this to the 00:11:05.700 --> 00:11:08.419 bigger picture of how movements organize, you're 00:11:08.419 --> 00:11:11.649 right. These puns are rarely designed to persuade 00:11:11.649 --> 00:11:14.070 the opposition. They function as a shibboleth. 00:11:14.169 --> 00:11:17.149 Like a secret password. Precisely. They are a 00:11:17.149 --> 00:11:20.149 linguistic signal used by activists to find each 00:11:20.149 --> 00:11:23.029 other in a crowded digital space. It allows people 00:11:23.029 --> 00:11:26.070 to instantly communicate shared values and shared 00:11:26.070 --> 00:11:28.830 outrage. Oh, I see. It's shorthand. It strengthens 00:11:28.830 --> 00:11:30.950 community identity among those who already agree 00:11:30.950 --> 00:11:33.049 with the critique. It proves you are part of 00:11:33.049 --> 00:11:35.250 the in -group. So if formatting is the secret 00:11:35.250 --> 00:11:38.149 handshake for grassroots activists, what happens 00:11:38.149 --> 00:11:40.509 when a massive institution gets in on the joke. 00:11:41.309 --> 00:11:43.090 Because our source material shows that professional 00:11:43.090 --> 00:11:45.610 journalists and giant activist networks have 00:11:45.610 --> 00:11:47.570 essentially institutionalized these tactics. 00:11:47.929 --> 00:11:50.409 What's fascinating here is how editorial choices 00:11:50.409 --> 00:11:53.470 by established publications can actually legitimize 00:11:53.470 --> 00:11:55.830 a misspelling. They take a fleeting joke and 00:11:55.830 --> 00:11:58.029 turn it into a permanent brand. The example that 00:11:58.029 --> 00:12:00.330 had me laughing out loud was from the British 00:12:00.330 --> 00:12:03.350 political satire magazine Private Eye. Oh, it's 00:12:03.350 --> 00:12:05.990 Clash. They refused to call the newspaper The 00:12:05.990 --> 00:12:08.889 Guardian by its actual name. They call it the 00:12:08.889 --> 00:12:11.990 Graniad. It's just a jumbled anagram. And that 00:12:11.990 --> 00:12:14.950 stems entirely from the Guardian's historical 00:12:14.950 --> 00:12:18.269 reputation for printing terrible typographical 00:12:18.269 --> 00:12:21.570 errors. Right. It's a meta -joke. They are mocking 00:12:21.570 --> 00:12:25.509 a legacy of typos with a deliberate standardized 00:12:25.509 --> 00:12:28.529 typo of their own. But Private Eye plays rougher 00:12:28.529 --> 00:12:31.629 than just anagrams. The Carter -Ruck Saga. This 00:12:31.629 --> 00:12:34.090 is unbelievable. It really is. Carter -Ruck is 00:12:34.090 --> 00:12:38.350 a very prominent, very serious UK law firm. And 00:12:38.350 --> 00:12:40.309 Private Eye started insulting them in print by 00:12:40.309 --> 00:12:42.269 taking the R in their name and replacing it with 00:12:42.269 --> 00:12:45.330 an F. Carter -fun. Yes. So the law firm obviously 00:12:45.330 --> 00:12:47.710 gets furious. A public magazine is doing this 00:12:47.710 --> 00:12:49.690 to them. I kept wondering while reading this, 00:12:49.909 --> 00:12:52.529 how did they not get sued into oblivion? Carter 00:12:52.529 --> 00:12:55.090 -Ruck formally demands that the magazine cease 00:12:55.090 --> 00:12:59.230 and desist. And the magazine complies. Sort of. 00:12:59.370 --> 00:13:01.950 Yeah, they practice malicious compliance. They 00:13:01.950 --> 00:13:04.389 agreed to stop using that specific misspelling 00:13:04.389 --> 00:13:07.389 and instead change the first word as well. So 00:13:07.389 --> 00:13:09.690 they officially started referring to the distinguished 00:13:09.690 --> 00:13:13.350 law firm as fart or fuck. It's just spectacular 00:13:13.350 --> 00:13:16.029 trolling. It perfectly illustrates how an attempt 00:13:16.029 --> 00:13:18.649 by a powerful institution to enforce linguistic 00:13:18.649 --> 00:13:21.610 rules can completely backfire. It just invites 00:13:21.610 --> 00:13:24.149 an even more absurd rebellious response. You 00:13:24.149 --> 00:13:26.990 see a similarly rebellious tactic with acronyms. 00:13:27.389 --> 00:13:29.750 This is when a group takes an existing acronym 00:13:29.750 --> 00:13:32.169 and maliciously replaces one of the component 00:13:32.169 --> 00:13:35.110 words to completely invert the meaning. The text 00:13:35.110 --> 00:13:38.330 gives the example of the NSA. Opponents of their 00:13:38.330 --> 00:13:40.230 surveillance programs rebranded the National 00:13:40.230 --> 00:13:42.149 Security Agency as the National Surveillance 00:13:42.149 --> 00:13:44.809 Agency or even the National Socialist Agency 00:13:44.809 --> 00:13:47.330 to frame them as a dystopian threat. The tech 00:13:47.330 --> 00:13:49.750 world uses this constantly. Richard Stallman 00:13:49.750 --> 00:13:52.429 and the Free Software Foundation took DRM, which 00:13:52.429 --> 00:13:54.690 stands for digital rights management, and redefined 00:13:54.690 --> 00:13:57.330 it as digital restrictions management. They wanted 00:13:57.330 --> 00:14:00.149 to highlight how the software actively restricts 00:14:00.149 --> 00:14:03.389 users from sharing music or burning CDs. It's 00:14:03.389 --> 00:14:06.049 like reverse engineering a rival sports car. 00:14:06.269 --> 00:14:08.570 just so you can replace the engine with a whoopee 00:14:08.570 --> 00:14:12.100 cushion. You are taking the opponent's own structural 00:14:12.100 --> 00:14:14.240 framework, their own acronym that they spent 00:14:14.240 --> 00:14:16.960 millions of dollars promoting, and using it to 00:14:16.960 --> 00:14:19.340 broadcast your opposing message. Exactly. You 00:14:19.340 --> 00:14:21.559 occupy their linguistic real estate. So we've 00:14:21.559 --> 00:14:23.879 got high -level political journalism and tech 00:14:23.879 --> 00:14:26.399 rights activists doing this. But if you spent 00:14:26.399 --> 00:14:29.000 any time online, you know the internet took this 00:14:29.000 --> 00:14:31.320 phonetic manipulation and turned it into utter 00:14:31.320 --> 00:14:34.360 chaos. Oh, complete chaos. The same tools used 00:14:34.360 --> 00:14:36.539 to attack governments are used online to create 00:14:36.539 --> 00:14:39.070 absurd memes. And the source material actually 00:14:39.070 --> 00:14:41.389 traces the roots of this internet humor back 00:14:41.389 --> 00:14:45.529 to a surprising cultural precursor, a classic 00:14:45.529 --> 00:14:48.230 Monty Python sketch. The Travel Agent sketch. 00:14:48.789 --> 00:14:51.330 Yes. Eric Idle plays a character who has a speech 00:14:51.330 --> 00:14:53.970 affliction where he pronounces the letter C as 00:14:53.970 --> 00:14:56.549 a B. He says, Blassified instead of Classified. 00:14:57.049 --> 00:14:59.070 And Michael Palin suggests he just spell words 00:14:59.070 --> 00:15:03.370 with a K instead of a C. Idle is amazed, realizes 00:15:03.370 --> 00:15:06.090 he can pronounce it Classified, and delivers 00:15:06.090 --> 00:15:09.500 the punchline, What a silly bunt. It's pure comedic 00:15:09.500 --> 00:15:12.679 absurdity based entirely on substituting consonants. 00:15:13.120 --> 00:15:15.899 And that exact kind of phonetic play became the 00:15:15.899 --> 00:15:18.539 absolute foundation of early digital meme culture. 00:15:18.740 --> 00:15:21.799 Like the mid -2000s LOL cats. Images of cats 00:15:21.799 --> 00:15:25.200 with captions like, I can has cheeseburger. Or, 00:15:25.340 --> 00:15:27.600 kidda. The blogger Anila Dash called it kitty 00:15:27.600 --> 00:15:30.220 pigeon. like intentionally fractured grammar. 00:15:30.519 --> 00:15:32.500 Yeah, and that evolved into what linguists call 00:15:32.500 --> 00:15:34.480 doggolingo. This is where you see words like 00:15:34.480 --> 00:15:37.519 doggo, pupper, burb for bird, and snek for snake. 00:15:37.740 --> 00:15:39.440 But what I find fascinating about doggolingo 00:15:39.440 --> 00:15:41.340 is that it actually forces you to change the 00:15:41.340 --> 00:15:42.980 pronunciation of the word in your head. Yes, 00:15:43.179 --> 00:15:44.720 exactly. It's not just a visual trick on the 00:15:44.720 --> 00:15:46.759 page. It demands an entirely different internal 00:15:46.759 --> 00:15:49.720 voice. Which brings us to perhaps the most baffling 00:15:49.720 --> 00:15:52.740 complex evolution of satiric misspelling on the 00:15:52.740 --> 00:15:56.750 modern internet, the bee emoji. the red negative 00:15:56.750 --> 00:15:59.210 squared letter B. We started out just representing 00:15:59.210 --> 00:16:02.309 the B blood type, right? Right. The text explains 00:16:02.309 --> 00:16:04.590 its journey into an internet meme originated 00:16:04.590 --> 00:16:07.149 with the Bloods Gang, who would replace the letter 00:16:07.149 --> 00:16:10.169 C with the letter B. Oh. That practice made its 00:16:10.169 --> 00:16:12.409 way online and the internet stripped it of its 00:16:12.409 --> 00:16:15.129 original context, turning it into a massive meme 00:16:15.129 --> 00:16:18.490 where the B emoji simply replaces hard consonants. 00:16:18.850 --> 00:16:21.230 It shows up in things like blugs with the emoji 00:16:21.230 --> 00:16:24.840 or Better for Peter Griffin. And the text makes 00:16:24.840 --> 00:16:27.620 a point to note that it is often used to spell 00:16:27.620 --> 00:16:31.299 out racial slurs, pointing out the heavy criticism 00:16:31.299 --> 00:16:34.659 non -black internet users face for using this 00:16:34.659 --> 00:16:38.389 emoji trick to bypass cultural taboos. It's like 00:16:38.389 --> 00:16:40.610 they think the emoji acts as a shield against 00:16:40.610 --> 00:16:42.889 the reality of the word. It's a stark example 00:16:42.889 --> 00:16:45.029 of how digital linguistics can blur the line 00:16:45.029 --> 00:16:47.809 between irony, absurdity, and genuine offense. 00:16:47.889 --> 00:16:50.169 So what does this all mean? Because what really 00:16:50.169 --> 00:16:52.169 melted my brain reading this section was how 00:16:52.169 --> 00:16:54.629 grammatically complex the bee emoji joke became 00:16:54.629 --> 00:16:57.340 over time. Oh, the rules are intense. Yeah. The 00:16:57.340 --> 00:17:00.000 text notes that post 2017, the meme developed 00:17:00.000 --> 00:17:02.399 incredibly strict rules. It doesn't just replace 00:17:02.399 --> 00:17:05.720 any letter anymore. It replaces any starting 00:17:05.720 --> 00:17:09.279 consonant or an implosive consonant like B, P, 00:17:09.299 --> 00:17:13.279 T, D, G, or K, but specifically only in the beginning 00:17:13.279 --> 00:17:16.099 of the stressed syllable. I mean, how does a 00:17:16.099 --> 00:17:19.099 goofy blood type emoji get its own set of rigid 00:17:19.099 --> 00:17:22.740 phonetic laws? Because communities crave structure. 00:17:23.140 --> 00:17:25.579 These memes aren't just bad spelling. They are 00:17:25.579 --> 00:17:28.819 highly structured, rule -based community dialects. 00:17:29.240 --> 00:17:31.660 When you introduce a complex rule, like only 00:17:31.660 --> 00:17:34.420 replacing plosive consonants in a stressed syllable, 00:17:34.900 --> 00:17:37.140 you create a barrier to entry. It's exactly like 00:17:37.140 --> 00:17:39.160 Pig Latin on the playground. Yes. To an adult 00:17:39.160 --> 00:17:41.839 walking by, Pig Latin sounds like absolute chaotic 00:17:41.839 --> 00:17:44.420 nonsense. But to the kids in the circle, it is 00:17:44.420 --> 00:17:47.180 a rigorous test. If you mess up the rule, you 00:17:47.180 --> 00:17:48.980 prove you aren't really part of the group. That 00:17:48.980 --> 00:17:50.740 is the perfect analogy. You prove you belong 00:17:50.740 --> 00:17:53.519 by executing the absurdity flawlessly. It is 00:17:53.519 --> 00:17:55.619 the ultimate digital evolution of the shibboleth 00:17:55.619 --> 00:17:57.819 we discussed earlier. The precision required 00:17:57.819 --> 00:18:00.220 to spell things wrong correctly is a testament 00:18:00.220 --> 00:18:02.680 to human ingenuity. I love that. The precision 00:18:02.680 --> 00:18:04.700 to spell things wrong correctly. So if you are 00:18:04.700 --> 00:18:06.279 listening to this right now, why should you care 00:18:06.279 --> 00:18:08.730 about any of this? Well, recognizing these tactics 00:18:08.730 --> 00:18:12.170 makes you an active, critical consumer of information. 00:18:12.410 --> 00:18:15.250 Exactly. The next time you see a typo in a headline, 00:18:15.730 --> 00:18:18.630 a weirdly capitalized tweet, or a random emoji 00:18:18.630 --> 00:18:21.049 shoves into a word, you'll know it might not 00:18:21.049 --> 00:18:23.569 be a mistake. It might be a deeply encoded piece 00:18:23.569 --> 00:18:26.730 of political rhetoric or a digital secret handshake. 00:18:27.130 --> 00:18:29.890 Language is never truly neutral. Every keystroke 00:18:29.890 --> 00:18:32.349 is a choice, and every choice carries weight. 00:18:32.990 --> 00:18:35.190 So I want to leave you with a final thought to 00:18:35.190 --> 00:18:38.180 mull over. We are rapidly moving into a future 00:18:38.180 --> 00:18:41.640 where AI and highly sophisticated spell checkers 00:18:41.640 --> 00:18:44.019 aggressively autocorrect all of our writing. 00:18:44.039 --> 00:18:46.859 Right? They want to force us into perfect, standardized, 00:18:47.079 --> 00:18:50.279 frictionless English. In that world, will satiric 00:18:50.279 --> 00:18:52.319 misspelling become the ultimate, exclusively 00:18:52.319 --> 00:18:55.259 human rebellion? Wow. Will deliberately spelling 00:18:55.259 --> 00:18:57.799 things wrong be the only way left to prove to 00:18:57.799 --> 00:18:59.819 the person reading your message that you aren't 00:18:59.819 --> 00:19:02.460 a machine? Think about it. Thanks for taking 00:19:02.460 --> 00:19:04.299 this deep dive with us, and we'll catch you next 00:19:04.299 --> 00:19:04.480 time.