Words, Words, Words: The Lexicon of Struggle

Those of you who know me know I love words: little ones and big ones, plain and fancy. One of the things I particularly enjoy about words is that they can say so much more than they would seem to on the surface. For instance, using fifo for Fidel Castro. I like using this one because it diminishes him, makes him laughable, like the tin pot dictator he has been. Perhaps the greatest cruelty of what has befallen Cuba is that it has happened at the hands of a buffoon, as if some vile sentient force was having a laugh at the expense of a whole people.

Now that I think about it, some scholar were he or she so inclined could probably link the whole homicidal clown thing to the Trickster archetype, especially by including other such notables as Idi Amin and John Wayne Gacy. Of course, all three lend themselves better to the Gnostic notion of the demi urge whom they would seem to have served.

I have settled on using Castrism to denote the melange of Marxism, totalitarianism, and opportunism that make up the ruling ethos. I like it because it sounds like a disease. I can't get those Levitra ads with their warnings of Priapism out of my mind. Poor old King Priam. It's an association I find particularly fitting, as apparently Priam was also an aged ruler with a hard on.

Castroite, which sounds unnatural, stilted, has a lot going for it. As an adjective, it has a dense, rocky, impenetrable ring to it, aside from the obvious similarity to Kryptonite. A Castroite, the noun, reminds me of those early UFO movies, like They Came From Beyond Space.
"Sir, we must do something, or the Castroites will destroy the world as we know it."

Lately, I've taken to using Raulian as a way of differentiating his policies or lack thereof. Face it Raulista doesn't have the same ring as Fidelista. And after a certain point, the use of Spanish really becomes an affectation unless you are writing for a Spanish audience.

Yes, sir, as I used to tell my students, words can be fun.