Attack of the Verbs: C

Good Friday to you! We continue our “action-packed, verb-laden” trip around the alphabet this week with the letter C.

And filed under the subject of Current Events, our verb this week is….

CENSOR

Oh, could you not read that? If you’ve been following the news…wait, sorry, some news media didn’t actually cover the subject that well, for rather obvious reasons. Let’s start again….

If you tried to access Wikipedia, hit the Google front page, or were active on Twitter or Facebook on Wednesday, you probably noticed there was a great deal of chatter on the internet about certain legislation that Congress was considering: SOPA and PIPA. Since this blog is about verbs, I’ll leave it at that, and allow you to draw your own conclusions as to why I chose “Censor” as my verb this week.

Censor can be a noun (a censor is an official that monitors content for inappropriate material, a la the person in a radio station with her finger on the “delay” button lest the deejay or a guest drop the F-bomb.) It’s origins are Roman:

1531, A Roman magistrate who took censuses and oversaw public morals, from L. censere "to appraise, value, judge," from PIE base *kens- "speak solemnly, announce." Transferred sense of "officious judge of morals and conduct" is from 1592; of books, plays, later films, etc., 1644. The verb is from 1882.
From dictionary.com

In its verb form, “censor” means to ban or cut portions from whatever you’re judging/reviewing (books, speeches, television programs, films, etc) due to content you find inappropriate, keeping it from others.

Now, censoring is not always a bad thing: “He censored his words to keep from hurting his mother’s feelings. No need to tell her the casserole was a complete disaster.”

However, most of the time it has a very negative connotation – that someone or some entity is trying to govern what you see, read, hear….

“Congress’s poorly thought out attempt to stem the tide of music/movie piracy actually censors websites so fully, under threat of steep penalties, that many sites might cease to exist as a result.”

Ahem, I let my politics show there for a second. Sorry.

You hear cries of censorship anytime a school board creates a banned book list. Or when certain topics aren’t fully covered by news channels due to the editor's particular ideological leanings.

Either way, it’s a very strong verb, with very particular implications, which can add just the right nuance to your writing.

What's the matter? Cat got your tongue? Or did the PTBs censor that bit of news?