Last night Peta Credlin asked me about the word ‘repatriate.’
This, as you would understand, arose out of the so-called ‘ISIS brides’ who want to return to Australia from the Syrian refugee camp where they have been living with their children.
There are eleven families involved, 34 people in total.
As one commentator remarked, these women should not be called ‘ISIS brides’ but ‘ISIS supporters’—they chose to leave Australia, to go to an area that was banned under Australian federal law at the time, to join up with, and support, the terrorist organisation Islamic State.
That makes them a threat to Australian security—people who are likely to bring sympathy for, and support for, a known terrorist organisation with them when they come.
Anthony Albanese keeps saying in media conferences ‘we are not repatriating’ these women.
So, what does that mean?
The verb ‘to repatriate’ is recorded in English from 1611 (although the Oxford notes that it was rare before the mid-1800s).
It means ‘To return to one’s native country’ and comes from a post-classical Latin word with the same meaning.
Albanese is clearly trying to distance himself from the return of these 34 people from Syria to Australia and claiming that it has nothing to do with him or his government.
The point I made speaking to Peta last night is that this is abuse of language—an Orwellian abuse of language.
It is the sort of thing George Orwell drew attention to in his famous essay ‘Politics and the English Language.’
All ‘repatriate’ means is ‘return’ and Albanese is claiming he and his government have nothing to do with the return of these people.
That simply can’t be true—because these people are coming.
They have been issued with Australian passports—and that is a government function.
One of them has been identified as such a security threat by the Australian security agencies that she has been placed under a temporary exclusion order for the next two years—so the government has blocked one of this group of 34 and, therefore, is capable of blocking more (or even all) of them.
And the Australian who is helping their return is an Australian doctor, Jamal Rifi, who is head of the ‘Friends of Tony Burke’ group.
(If memory serves correctly, Tony Burke, notoriously went to the airport to personally welcome back an earlier group of so-called ‘ISIS brides.’)
So, at a time when—because of the Bondi radical Islamist slaughter of Jewish Australians—we all extremely sensitive to ancient hatreds from the Middle East being imported in Australia,
Albanese is dodging the issue by claiming he is not ‘repatriating’ these people.
That is an Orwellian abuse of the English language!
Tonight, I'll join John Stanley for 'The Word Clinic' on 2GB, 4BC, 2CC and the Nine Radio Network -- right after the 10pm news (9pm in Queensland). This is your opportunity to text or call on the talkback with any comment or question about language that you would like to raise.
If you ever miss one of these language columns, you can catch up (or look up an old column you want to consult) by turning to the 'History' page of this website -- where you'll find a long list of recent columns.
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