The 📖 Words

— A —

• Accident Something that happens by chance — until we bring up cause and blame.
• Accountable The requirement to answer for one's actions. Or at least the expectation.
• Addiction When we feed our body what it wants beyond the point of what it needs — drugs, money, power, or anything.
• Agenda A list of things we want done. The priorities we share and the ones we hide.
• AI A fancy calculator that mirrors us incomprehensibly. Artificial intelligence. Not actual.
• Algorithm The rules that define how you and your data are processed, classified, and directed. (see also Media)
• American Dream The promise that effort equals outcome — more myth than mechanism.
• Anarchy Order without permission.
• Apartheid A legal system of racial segregation where the minority rules — South Africa's word, but the structure appears elsewhere and is not limited to race.
• Authoritarian Government by command rather than consent. The permanent temptation of power.

— B —

• Belief Conviction without proof — faith, trust, or opinion — often used interchangeably.
• Bias Everyone has it — only other people are accused of it.
• Body Self, vessel, political battleground, or crime scene.
• Border A line on a map, a security concept, or a human rights crisis.
• BRICS The most significant geopolitical realignment most people can't define — and it's still aligning.
• Bully One who uses verbal or physical assault to intimidate and subjugate. Euphemism for terrorism. Continuing the cycle. (see also Terrorism)
• Bureaucracy The machinery of government and institutions, designed to serve the people. Serves the design of power.

— C —

• Capitalism Freedom through markets or organized extraction — still being decided.
• Censorship Suppression of truth or protection from someone's view of harm.
• Change Hope or threat depending on what you have to lose.
• Charity Generosity, tax strategy, or substitute for justice.
• Checks and Balances The constitutional design that presumes power will be abused — and purports to reveal, test, and deter it.
• Citizen A person deemed part of a given state or nation, with all its benefits and burdens.
• Citizens United The law that allows corporations to outvoice, outfund, and outvote citizens without accountability or retribution. The most ironically named Supreme Court decision.
• Civilized What the conqueror and the conquered each called themselves.
• Class Economic position, cultural identity, and claiming either as merit or fault.
• Colonization The political control of one people by another. Built on extraction, enforced by propaganda or violence.
• Common Sense Accumulated knowledge deemed applicable by the person or group who raises it.
• Communism Collective control of the production and distribution of resources, without class and without the state — an idea that has outlived every attempt to do so. So far, in theory, not in practice.
• Community Shared place, shared trait, or unity someone wants you to feel.
• Confucianism An East Asian philosophy of right relationship — that we each have duties to the other. For instance, even a ruler protected by the Mandate of Heaven who fails the relationship loses the mandate — and the right to rule with it.
• Consciousness The subjective state of one's awareness and knowing — our personal version of the universe. Indescribable. Cannot be measured, verified, or transferred.
• Consent Agreement or permission — whether informed, induced, coerced, or manufactured. Notice only one of these is real.
• Constitution The rulebook that grants authority, defines power, and protects rights — in theory.
• Corruption The natural result of unaccountable power — personal gain at another's expense. Can be private, public, or institutional.
• Country A state with borders, a government, and international recognition. Also, one's nation. (see also Nation)
• Coup The sudden seizure or replacement of government. Often scripted by others, far in advance.
• Covenant A binding agreement between parties — in theology, between God and humanity; in law, between humans. Enforceability varies.
• Crime An act or event that violates the rights of others — defined by law, which is defined by some of those others.
• Crisis An emergency requiring action, or an excuse for overreach — often both.
• Culture Shared practices, collective identities, and deciding which count.

— D —

• Data Any raw, aggregate, analyzed, or framed information. Also our personal preferences and habits — packaged and sold without actual consent or remuneration.
• Death Our end, a transition, or the thing that makes everything else matter.
• Debate Historically, a method of sharing and testing opposite or incompatible points of view — used to obtain more knowledge, consensus, and/or resolution. Now, often just theater.
• Debt Investment, trap, or moral failing — depending on who owes.
• Decolonization The end of formal colonial rule and the beginning of arguing about what that means. (see also Colonization)
• Deep State The powers that inform the politicians that run the government. Often entrenched through generations. Purgeable but permanent.
• Defense Personal safety, national security, and the claim that justifies attack.
• Democracy Majority rule, representative republic — an experiment with varying results.
• Deserve Outcome justified by merit, luck, or moral presumption.
• Diaspora A people scattered from their homeland. Physically here, but culturally, historically, and/or spiritually from somewhere else.
• Dignity Inherent or earned respect — the oldest human argument.
• Disinformation Deliberately false or misleading information spread with intent to deceive — misinformation with intent. (see also Information or Misinformation)
• Diversity Recognizing the differences between us — an attempt to bring us together — but corporatized and weaponized to keep us apart.
• Due Process Freedom from government except by fair procedure. The line between the law and the color of law.

— E —

• Education Learning, indoctrination, credentials, or liberation — depends.
• Elite Those enriched by capitalism and those democracy can't touch.
• Embargo A prohibition on trade — economic war by another name. (see also Sanction or Tariff)
• Emotion Things we feel and often act on — fear, anger, pride, etc. May be our own, but also induced, coerced, or manufactured.
• Empire A state that rules over other peoples by force, law, and/or economic "arrangement."
• Evidence Actual proof, inconvenience, or invented facts.
• Evil Intentional cruelty, moral failure, and the word that ends further inquiry.
• Executive Order Presidential declaration. Legislation without the legislature. Effective before checks and balances.
• Expert Trusted authority or paid researcher, depending on whether you like the results.

— F —

• Fact What we observe, agree upon, or declare — most often the latter.
• Failure When things don't go as planned or expected. Often seen as a negative — but the best teacher we may ever have. (compare with Success)
• Fair Equal, equitable, or whatever suits the moment.
• Faith Trust, religion, or belief beyond proof.
• Family Bonds by blood, choice, or cohesion — recognized or not.
• Fascism A political system built on ultranationalism, authoritarian leadership, and the active suppression of opposition. Usually recognized afterwards.
• Fear Perhaps the prime mover of all human behavior. (see Emotion)
• Feminine The receptive, nurturing, yielding, and intuitive forces of the universe — cyclical and perennial, but eternal. (compare with Masculine)
• Freedom Personal choice, political voice, or collective liberation. (see also Liberty)
• Fundamentalism A rigid return to foundational texts or principles against the encroachment of change — found in every major religion and most ideologies.
• Future What we plan for, what's actually coming, or abstraction to defer action.

— G —

• Gender Biology, identity, expression, or range — apparently fluid.
• Gerrymandering Drawing electoral district lines to favor one party — legal, pervasive, and defeating the purpose of fair representation.
• Global South The nations left out of the postwar order — not a geography, a structural condition with a plan. (see also BRICS)
• God Creator, metaphor, authority, or comfort — the most contested word in history.
• Good What's right, what works, or what feels nice — used as if they're the same.
• Government Servant to the people or threat to liberty — usually the same institution.
• Growth Physical development, economic expansion, or population increase — not always good.

— H —

• Health Physical state, commercial industry, or human right.
• Hegemony A dominant military, economic, and cultural force in a given region (i.e., global).
• Heritage Pride, mythology, or inheritance — rarely examined.
• History What happened in the past, less what we recorded, less what gets lost or erased.
• Home Where we're from, where we live, and where we belong — defined by us and by others.

— I —

• Immigrant Welcome newcomer, despised threat, or needed labor force — depending on the decade.
• Immunity Protection from consequence — in medicine, from disease; in law, from prosecution. More often a veil for accountability and a shield for power.
• Imperialism The extension of a nation's power over others. By conquest, trade, or culture. Consent not required.
• Incarceration Confinement as punishment, deterrent, or rehabilitation. Sometimes just for being. State function and business model.
• Independence Self-determination. For nations, individuals, and anyone who can sustain it.
• Indigenous People who originate in a given place through ancestry. Most applicable when displaced or destroyed.
• Inflation When prices go up — which means when money's worth less. Natural or engineered. Intentional or not.
• Information Raw material of knowledge. Not necessarily what happens to it after. (see also Disinformation or Misinformation)
• Internet The network that connects anyone to anything and isolates everyone from many things. Infrastructure, marketplace, and battlefield.
• Investment Building something or extracting value — both use the same word.

— J —

• Jihad At its core, struggle. Striving and exerting oneself toward something worthy. Translation subject to misuse and manipulation.
• Judgment Private thoughts, public criticism, legal ruling, and divine reckoning.
• Jurisdiction The authority that creates the authority that decides the law in a given place; and also the place.
• Justice Punishment that fits the crime, reasonable restitution, and fairness for all — good luck with that.

— L —

• Labor The individual or collective workforce that produces goods and services — including better technology that reduces the need for labor. (see also Work)
• Language How we communicate and define our realities. Spoken, signed, written, drummed. Our first tool. (see also Technology)
• Law Written norms and/or rules. And those authorized to decide whether and how to enforce them. (see also Norms)
• Legacy What we leave behind and what we're blamed for.
• Liberty Freedom to learn and freedom to act without harm. (see also Freedom)
• Life Biological and biographical — defined by us and by others.
• Lobby People, groups, and money that influence politicians. Legislative telemarketing — named for where it originally took place.
• Loser The one who didn't get there first, didn't get lucky, or was eliminated by the competition. Also, someone we don't like. (see also Winner)
• Love Connection and caring for another. Not possessive or conditional. Our driving force and only real salvation. Whether we realize it or not.

— M —

• Masculine The active, protective, assertive, and logical forces of the universe — linear and momentary, but perpetual. (compare with Feminine)
• Media The space between the event and the audience. Print, broadcast, digital, social — and now, the algorithm. (see also Algorithm)
• Memory Individual, collective, and media-managed — simultaneously.
• Meritocracy The extent to which a system's outcomes are determined by talent and effort, and not just opportunity. (see also Opportunity)
• Military Industrial Complex The self-sustaining relationship between defense, government, and industry — and its revolving door. Also, a five-star-general-prior-President’s predictive warning. (see also The Revolving Door)
• Minority Numerical or structural — not always the same.
• Miracle Divine intervention or improbable event — depends on belief.
• Misinformation False facts, or information that those in power call false. (see also Information or Disinformation)
• Modern Current, superior, or Western — often the latter.
• Monarchy Rule by birthright: royalty, nobility, and aristocrats. Kings, queens, and dynasties. Celebrated, ceremonial, and sometimes unseen.
• Morality What is said to be right and wrong — by nature, by God, or by edict. To some, dynamic or even a reason to destroy.
• Myth The obscure stories of our creation and original history. Basic to humanity. Captured, controlled, and corrupted by our institutions.

— N —

• Narrative Story or spin — the frame around the facts. (see also Spin or Agenda)
• Nation A place, a people, a government, or an idea. May also be a country. (see also Country)
• Nationalism Love of country as a political force. Ranges from pride to persecution.
• Native Where you were born. And who was there before.
• Natural From nature, or morally correct. The confusion sells.
• News Events we select and report. Some manufactured. The picking may be the story.
• Normal The average, the standard, and what we agree not to question.
• Norms The mostly unwritten rules of acceptable behavior in a given place and time. Enforced by others, even without law or in spite of it. (see also Reasonable, Normal, or Law)

— O —

• Occupation Military control of an area; often starts as temporary. Also your job. Also the space you take up.
• Oligarchy "Government" by those who can buy government. The private extraction of public wealth and resources in a collapsing society — like birds of prey.
• Opinion Public and private personal views. Often treated as fact. (see Fact)
• Opportunity Access to possibility. The inequality in nature is exacerbated by design. Sold as meritocracy. (see also Meritocracy)
• Order Natural rhythm, structured routine, or authority to restrict liberty.
• Original Sin The theological and secular concept that humanity inherits the guilt of Adam and Eve's desire for knowledge — also called disobedience.

— P —

• Pain Significant physical, psychological, or existential suffering. Always relative. Perhaps the price of too much pleasure, or just being alive. (see also Pleasure or Suffering)
• Patriot Lover of country, or our version of it. Hating the others — optional.
• Perspective The angle or viewpoint from which we see and understand the world. Shapes everything we each think we know.
• Petrodollar The so-far dominant, self-sustaining system of selling oil in US dollars through extraction enforcement. Replaced the gold standard with military might and more money.
• Pleasure The opposite, or flip side, of pain and suffering. What we seek, what we're sold, and what we're warned to moderate. (see also Pain or Suffering)
• Police "Public" safety built from private security. State authority or occupying force. Sometimes all in the same shift.
• Populism The people's voice against the powers that be — may be mob rule, even when created by the powers that be.
• Poverty Living below some standard. The individual, the group, and the system each blame another.
• Power Energy, force, and authority. (Often corrupting those with it. Seducing the rest.)
• Prayer Communication with the divine. Or wishful thinking.
• Precedent A prior decision that guides future ones, whether honored, adapted, or abandoned. The mechanism of consistency and change, in law and in life.
• Private What belongs to you and what's hidden from view. Also, what's no longer public. I.e. utilities, prisons, and schools… and land and water… (compare with Public)
• Privilege Advantage, blessing, or grievance.
• Professional Trained, credentialed, and paid. The line between amateur and authority — sometimes just a fee.
• Progress Moving forward, or just moving on. Usually at great cost and loss.
• Propaganda What we call their lies. What they call our news.
• Property What you own, what owns you, and what was taken to become either.
• Protest Public expression or civic disorder. Often the same event with different headlines. (see Riot)
• Proxy War A conflict where outside powers fuel or exploit local combatants, keeping the battlefield — and the destruction — over there.
• Public The people. The spaces and resources that belong to everyone. Funded by all, maintained by few, but controlled by who? (compare with Private)

— R —

• Race Biological fiction. Social reality. To some, a basis for nation.
• Radical Fundamental change at the root level. And the word used to discredit it.
• Reality What's actually happening — actually relative and malleable.
• Reasonable The standard for acceptable behavior in certain circumstances. Based on probability and norms, which change.
• Reconstruction The period after the Civil War when the US attempted constitutional enforcement and multiracial democracy — and failed at least both.
• Reform Promised improvement. Often celebrated prematurely.
• Regime A system of government, or a faction that runs it. Theirs or ours. Neutral in origin, weaponized in media.
• Relative A view or comparison dependent on context and perspective. Also, one of your clan by blood or affinity.
• Religion Faith with structure. Power with scripture.
• Reparations Compensation for historical injustice. Deserved if not delivered.
• Representation Those who speak for us — in government, in court, and in culture. Whether we ask, agree, or even know.
• Responsibility A person or entity's share of the burden. Whether accepted or not.
• Revolution Turning a new page on authority, government, or technology. Your participation or say not required.
• Rights Inherent, God-given, government-granted, or agreed to by a group. Subject to change.
• Riot A chaotic, lawless protest — often not without reason — or an exaggeration of one that is not. (see Protest)
• Rules Written or unwritten norms and laws that we agree, or are made, to follow and how the game is played.

— S —

• Sacred Holy, protected, or beyond criticism. Including things we just say are.
• Salvation Rescue from sin, suffering, or circumstance. Seemingly free. Many pay a fee. Results vary.
• Sanction A penalty, punishment, or embargo. Same root as sanctity — something sacred and protected. (see also Embargo or Tariff)
• Science Method, data, consensus, and authority. Pseudoscience obscures at least one.
• Secular Of this world, not the next. Centuries of separating church and state — actually, church from power.
• Security Safety and defense. Also surveillance, monitoring, and control. (see also Surveillance)
• Settler Someone who moves to a new territory and calls it their own.
• Shadow Government The parallel power structures operating beneath the visible one — real in some forms, imagined in others. (see also Deep State)
• Shame Normally a moral consequence of transgression. Also a social and political weapon.
• Sin Religious, social, or cultural transgression. Guilt optional.
• Socialism Collective care and shared resources. Radical politics or human default.
• Soul Theological basis, poetic metaphor, or quantum reality?
• Sovereignty A nation's right to self-rule. Inherent by history, geography, and culture. In practice, what wealthy nations say.
• Spin The deliberate reframing of facts to serve someone's position. Narrative with an agenda. (see also Narrative)
• Success Recognition for achievement by effort or just by circumstance. Can be fleeting, often illusory, and always relative. (see also Failure)
• Suffering The sustained experience of pain — physical, psychological, or existential discomfort and discontent. What we try to avoid, what we tend to cause, and probably a purpose or result of life. (see also Pain or Pleasure)
• Surveillance Watching, recording, and tracking — for safety or control. Used to be used for security. (see also Security)

— T —

• Tariff A tax on imported goods. Trade policy, revenue tool, and weapon of diplomacy and war. (see also Embargo or Sanction)
• Tax Civic contribution or government theft. You pay either way. Unless you're very poor or rich enough.
• Technology Every tool we ever built to expand knowledge, reduce effort, increase comfort and security, or tighten control. (Access may be limited.)
• Terrorism Violent assault on people or institutions intended to intimidate, silence, or destroy. By hate, ideology, or power. (see also Bully)
• The Market The collective mechanism of exchanging goods, finance, ideas, and culture. Natural, or made to look natural.
• The Middle East On the way to the Far East, a region divided by foreigners drawing lines on a map with heavy hands — disregarding sovereignty and the people who lived there.
• The Revolving Door The legal pipeline between regulating an industry and being employed by it. (see also Military Industrial Complex)
• Them The most dangerous four-letter word. The stranger, the competitor, the enemy. To us, it is we. (see also Us)
• Theocracy Government by divine authority. Or those who say it is. Sometimes sudden.
• Theory In math, proof. In science, a well-tested explanation. In common use, a guess or a belief. To each their own evidence.
• They The most dangerous four-letter word. The stranger, the competitor, the enemy. To them, it is us. (see also We)
• Time The only resource that can't be hoarded or recovered — but it can be sold. We can make ours our own — and/or just let it run us.
• Tradition The stories and rituals we tell ourselves and pass down, regardless of origin. Also, the reason not to change.
• Transparency Openness in operation. Operational due to concealment.
• Treason The betrayal of one's country — the most serious political crime, and the most serious false allegation.
• Treaty A binding agreement between nations. A record of what's ignored when convenient.
• Truth Fact, experience, or the "official" version. Malleable and elusive.

— U —

• Us The most dangerous two-letter word. Born from ego and the need for security. To them, us is they. (see also Them)

— V —

• Veto The power to say no. Line item or wholesale. A check that can block. If applicable.
• Violence Actual harm upon people, groups, and institutions. With or without guns. (see also War)

— W —

• War Organized violence against a defined enemy in the name of defense, aggression, or policy. (see also Violence)
• We The most dangerous two-letter word. Born from ego and the need for security. To them, we is they. (see also They)
• Wealth Access to resources and power; earned, inherited, extracted, or accumulated. Rarely just one.
• Winner The one who got there first, got there lucky, or got there by eliminating the competition. Also, someone we like better.(see also Loser)
• Work Dignity, identity, value, and exploitation, any or all of the above.