You can't say that

In 1972, a young comedian developed a 12-minute monologue that propelled him to fame. George Carlin’s “7 Words you can’t say on television” became an overnight sensation. In a time before cell phones, cable TV or the Internet, millions searched to discover the seven words you couldn’t say.

53 years later we are experiencing a ban of another sort. As many as 350 words have been banned from being written or spoken, but this prohibition is coming from our government. Trump spokesmen deny that the banned words come from the President, but you are naïve if you don’t recognize that the banned words result from the flood of executive orders about the male and female sex, DEI, climate change, immigration, the courts, diseases, water or air pollution or whatever is the executive order du jour.

Words that were perfectly fine for us to use on January 19^th are, after the inauguration, no longer permitted. Do they really believe we are so dumb as to buy this crap?

The edicts have sifted down to the lowest levels of government, academia, and other agencies. Employees of our own University of North Carolina system report that they have been instructed not to use certain words. Failure to honor the ban makes an organization subject to being targeted and punished by Fearless Leader. Their employees are afraid of losing their jobs. We all should be afraid of the attempted loss of our freedoms.

George Orwell is, no doubt, laughing in his grave. His imaginary “Big Brother” from the book 1984 has come alive in ’25.

We won’t take your time listing all 350+ words but you will not be surprised to learn some include buzzwords like abortion, affordable homes, air pollution, anti-racism, assigned female (or male) at birth, bioenergy, bisexual, carbon emissions, climate accountability and change, commercial sex worker, DEI, disadvantaged, discrimination, diversity and inclusion, gay, global warming, groundwater pollution, and, of course, The Gulf of Mexico. Our cherry-picked list just scrolls through the letter G.

Some banned words are almost comical, including autism, bias, Black, Covid-19, female, gender, hate, Hispanic, immigrants, people, injustice, LGBTQ, measles, men, mental health, political, housing, privilege, pronouns, race, science based, sex, stereotype, trauma, underprivileged, vaccines, water quality and on and on.

If you want to see one of the lists of the banned words, click on: https://pen.org/banned-words-list/

Did you ever think you would see the day in this country when we would have lists among the 400,000+ words in our language that we were restricted from using? They aren’t profane or blasphemous, just words certain people don’t like. It is the blatant trampling of The First Amendment, nothing less than censorship and intimidation.

There are elected people who pretend to be leaders but, like ostriches, have their heads buried in the sand. If they can’t see it or hear it, then it doesn’t exist. These are gutless wonders who don’t have the courage to say, “You can’t do that in this country.”

But when those we elect don’t have the courage to take stands against violations of our basic freedoms and justice, what can we do? We certainly can’t wait until the 2026 elections. By then it might be too late.

In recent weeks there have been protests and rallies in just about every nook and cranny of North Carolina. Their numbers are growing every week. Participants are joining millions more across the country in “Hands Off” and even “empty chair” rallies, where empty chairs represent elected officials unwilling to show up to hear the people. But if enough of us make enough noise and protest frequently enough, you can believe it will be noticed. And it has been!

Trump has acknowledged the protests, dismissing the growing movement by saying Democrats are stirring things up, the protestors are being paid, the fake media is making the protest movement look larger than it is, and other tripe. But understand this: Trump is watching and the protests are getting under his skin.

It deserves recognition that there are marked similarities between today’s protests and demonstrations that took place 250 years ago. North Carolina was a leader in calling out violations of peoples’ rights and demanding justice. Our colonists joined others across the nation who were fed up and unwilling to take it anymore. They fired “the shot heard round the world.”

Are we on the cusp of another revolution?

Peaceful protesting proves powerful.

George Carlin only had 7 words in his list of words banned on television, all profane. All but two are still blacklisted. Trump’s list is 350 and growing, words that offend him and his MAGA crowd, but just about every one of which can be said in mixed company or on TV.

Unless or until he successfully repeals the First Amendment our response to his attempts to ban these words must be: We can say that. And we will!

Tom Campbell is a Hall of Fame North Carolina broadcaster and columnist who has covered North Carolina public policy issues since 1965.  Contact him at tomcamp@carolinabroadcasting.com