What are weasel words

Johnjo asks:
A. Weasel words are deliberately misleading or conveniently ambiguous words, mostly used by politicians and officials, but found pretty much everywhere.

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Q. Why a weasel
A. Weasels are particularly well-known for being cowardly and cunning. They can literally 'weasel' their way out of a tight corner with their lithe, little bodies. They are famous for sneaking into the hen yard to steal eggs and suck the contents out, leaving the egg intact. It's not until you actually pick the egg up that you realise that what looks like a normal, nutritious egg is, in fact, empty and useless.

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Q. Where did the term 'weasel words' come from
A. It was popularised by Theodore Roosevelt in 1916 when he used it in a speech to criticise President Wilson. Roosevelt said, 'You can have universal training or you can have voluntary training, but when you use the word 'voluntary' to qualify the word 'universal', you are using a weasel word: it has sucked all the meaning out of 'universal'. The two words flatly contradict each other.'

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Q. Was he first person to use 'weasel words'
A. No. Roosevelt was probably inspired by a story written by Stewart Chaplin called The Stained Glass Political Platform, which was published in the Century Magazine in 1900. It features the sentence, 'Why, weasel words are words that suck the life out of the words next to them, just as a weasel sucks the egg and leaves the shell.'

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Q. So, comments such as: 'That dress looks good...on you...' or 'That's not a bad attempt...for an amateur' are weasel words
A. Yes, any statement which can be ambiguous or is used to disguise the truth or your true feelings is weasel words. Weasel words are often used in advertising. Food labelling, too, is full of them: 'traditional' and 'natural', for example, are meaningless when used to describe food.

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Q. And politics...
A. Wouldn't - possibly couldn't - function without them. Politicians are particularly adept at using weasel words to obscure or skirt an issue. Examples are 'modernisation' (used to describe destruction of traditions) and 'efficiency savings' (mass redundancies).

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By Sheena Miller
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