What’s Up With All the Euphemisms?

I don’t drive a used car, I drive a pre-owned car. I’m not watching a TV rerun, I’m watching an encore presentation. I’m not feeling old, I’m feeling chronologically challenged. Politicians never retract a statement, they clarify their position. If your doctor advises you to have surgery, be sure to ask him or her about the odds you might experience a negative patient care outcome.

You might need out-placement if your company out-sources your job. I’m sure you’ve never been fired from a job, but perhaps you’ve been decruited or dehired because you were redundant after a skill-mix adjustment. Maybe you were given an early retirement opportunity during a personnel realignment. I was rightsized, unassigned, and selected out when my company was defunded and had to restructure, retrench, and streamline in order to rationalize the workforce and invoke a workforce imbalance correction.

Why in the world are all these euphemisms necessary? Can’t anyone just say what they mean? I would like to expound further on the subject but right now I have to talk to a man about a horse.