Euphemisms are unpleasant truths wearing diplomatic cologne. — Quentin Crisp
All euphemisms are dishonest, but many are designed to make life easier — Kate Burridge
Euthanasia is a long, smooth-sounding word, and it conceals its danger as long, smooth words do, but the danger is there, nevertheless. — Pearl S. Buck
It is an immense loss to have all robust and sustaining expletives refined away from one! At. moments of trial refinement is a feeble reed to lean upon. — Alice James
Certain things acquired an evil complexion if phrased, but remained harmless in the mind. — R.K. Narayan
Abstract words such as glory, honor, courage, or hallow were obscene beside the concrete names of villages, the numbers of roads, the names of rivers, the numbers of regiments and the dates. — Ernest Hemingway
By and large, language is a tool for concealing the truth. — George Carlin
One feels 'the dearth of human words, the roughness of mortal speech' in trying to describe things intangible. — Ernest Shackleton
There's always a euphemism for it - like 'the test facility' or 'the base' - but never 'Area 51.' — Annie Jacobsen
The Good Book - one of the most remarkable euphemisms ever coined. — Ashley Montagu
Women's fashion is a euphemism for fashion created by men for women. — Andrea Dworkin
in terms of the biology of the planet, development is a euphemism for destruction. — Helen Caldicott
The more syllables a euphemism has, the further divorced from reality it is. — George Carlin
Frankness is usually a euphemism for rudeness. — Muriel Spark
Faith is a euphemism for prejudice and religion is a euphemism for superstition. — Paul Kenneth Keller
A composite is a euphemism for a lie. It's disorderly. It's dishonest and it's not journalism. — Fred W. Friendly
Sleeping together is a euphemism for people, but tantamount to marriage with cats. — Marge Piercy
Spoilt is a euphemism for loved. — James Nesbitt
What A Euphemism Quotes
When I heard you could get a disease from playing with your prairie dog, I thought, 'Wow, what a euphemism.' I thought playing with my prairie dog was the best way to avoid diseases. — Greg Giraldo
Do you know what I was smiling at? You wrote down that you were a writer by profession. It sounded to me like the loveliest euphemism I had ever heard. When was writing ever your profession? It's never been anything but your religion. — J. D. Salinger
It's often the case that when a critic uses an embarrassingly accurate term to describe what a wrong-doer is doing, the wrong-doer protests: "Why don't you use my white-washed, conscience-soothing euphemism?" Such euphemisms, they claim, help promote "civilized debate." — Steve Kangas
I'm waxed clean - hairless as the day as I was born. But don't say 'Tia has no pubic hair.' That's so clinical. Use a nice euphemism. Say 'She's mowed her secret garden' or 'She's cleared the way to the Promised Land.' Because that's what it is, right? — Tia Carrere
The term ‘free market’ is really a euphemism. What the far right actually means by this term is ‘lawless market.’ In a lawless market, entrepreneurs can get away with privatizing the benefits of the market (profits) while socializing its costs (like pollution). — Steve Kangas
The intangibles are a euphemism for we have no idea what we're looking for but we know it when we see it. — Brian Billick
In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible... Thus, political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging, and sheer cloudy vagueness... Political language [is] designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable. — George Orwell
The language of the younger generation has the brutality of the city and an assertion of threatening power at hand, not to come. It is military, theatrical, and at its most coherent probably a lasting repudiation of empty courtesy and bureaucratic euphemism. — Elizabeth Hardwick
Some kids get called "bundles of joy" or "slices of heaven" or "dreams come true." We got "the fifty-fourth generation of DNA experiments." Doesn't have the same warm and fuzzy feel. But maybe I'm oversensitive. — James Patterson
Euphemisms are not, as many young people think, useless verbiage for that which can and should be said bluntly; they are like secret agents on a delicate mission, they must airily pass by a stinking mess with barely so much as a nod of the head, make their point of constructive criticism and continue on in calm forbearance. Euphemisms are unpleasant truths wearing diplomatic cologne. — Quentin Crisp
Underhand euphemism are used, not so much to conceal offence and to deliberately disguise a topic and deceive — Kate Burridge
When we shrink from the sight of something, when we shroud it in euphemism, that is usually a sign of inner conflict, of unsettled hearts, a sign that something has gone wrong in our moral reasoning. — Matthew Scully
She started thinking about all the euphemisms for death, all the anxious taboos that had always fascinated her. It was too bad you could never have an intelligent discussion on the subject. People were either too young or too old, or else they didn't have time. — Tove Jansson
Every individual needs revolution, inner division, overthrow of the existing order, and renewal, but not by forcing them upon his neighbors under the hypocritical cloak of Christian love or the sense of social responsibility or any of the other beautiful euphemisms for unconscious urges to personal power. — Carl Jung
The inflated style is itself a kind of euphemism. A mass of Latin words falls upon the facts like soft snow, blurring the outlines and covering up all the details. The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. — George Orwell
For the Christian church.... to ignore, euphemize, or otherwise mute the lethal reality of sin is to cut the nerve of the gospel. For the sober truth is that without full disclosure on sin, the gospel of grace becomes impertinent, unnecessary, and finally uninteresting. — Cornelius Plantinga
Negotiations are a euphemism for capitulation if the shadow of power is not cast across the bargaining table. — George P. Shultz
We have entered a period of intolerance which combines, as it sometimes does in America, with a sugary taste for euphemism. This conjunction fosters events that go beyond the wildest dream of satire- if satire existed in America anymore; perhaps the reason for its weakness is that reality has superseded it. — Robert Hughes
The middles cleave to euphemisms not just because they're an aid in avoiding facts. They like them also because they assist their social yearnings towards pomposity. This is possible because most euphemisms permit the speaker to multiply syllables, and the middle class confuses sheer numerousness with weight and value. — Paul Fussell
It is time to stop the mealy-mouthed euphemisms: 'Nationalists', 'Loyalists', 'Communities', 'Ethnic Groups', 'Cultures', 'Civilizations'. Religions is the word you need. Religions is the word you are struggling hypocritially to avoid. — Richard Dawkins
The Japanese tend to communicate via nuance and euphemism, often leaving important things unsaid; whereas Americans tend to think they're being subtle when they refrain from grabbing the listener by the shirt. — Dave Barry
To call yourself 'plus size' is just a euphemism for being fat. Life is much easier when you're thinner. Big is not beautiful, of course a job comes down to how you look. — Sayings
Any euphemism ceases to be euphemistic after a time and the true meaning begins to show through. It's a losing game, but we keep on trying. — Joseph Wood Krutch
Planned Parenthood's entire existence is basically based on keeping people in the dark through euphemism. You don't call it genocide, you call it reproductive health. So that's why Planned Parenthood has - nobody really thought. — Greg Gutfeld
The company calls it 'downsizing' or 'rightsizing.' My own informal "Name the Layoff" contest produced some other euphemisms: Retroactive Hiring Freeze, Resume Revision Days, Amway Opportunity Time, and Corporation Lite. — Dale Dauten
We have entered a period of intolerance which combines, as it sometimes does in America, with a sugary taste for euphemism. — Robert Hughes
To use a Southern euphemism, our space program has been snake-bit. — Al Gore
The Greeks distinguished between good and bad behavior, language that enhanced or diminished persons. Being intoxicated with scientism, we fail to recognize that the seemingly technical terms used to identify psychiatric illnesses and interventions are simply dyphemisms and euphemisms. — Thomas Szasz
Euphemisms, vague terminology or calls for discussions with Turkey to get at the truth are just some of the dodges Congress and the administration have used to avoid Turkish discomfort with its Ottoman past. — Adam Schiff
Beauty of style and harmony and grace and good rhythm depend on simplicity - I mean the true simplicity of a rightly and nobly ordered mind and character, not that other simplicity which is only a euphemism for folly. — Plato
"Fussy eater" is a euphemism for "big pain in the ass." — George Carlin
There's a grosser irony about Politically Correct English. This is that PCE purports to be the dialect of progressive reform but is in fact - in its Orwellian substitution of the euphemisms of social equality for social equality itself - of vastly more help to conservatives and the US status quo than traditional SNOOT prescriptions ever were. — David Foster Wallace
Controversial' as we all know, is often a euphemism for 'interesting and intelligent. — Kevin Smith
Cloud computing is a great euphemism for centralization of computer services under one server. — Evgeny Morozov
Patrimonial capitalism's legacy is that many people see reform as a euphemism for corruption and self-dealing. — James Surowiecki
Tact is kind; diplomacy is useful; euphemism is harmless and sometimes entertaining — Julian Burnside
In Conclusion
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