The Power of Words

"Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me!"

Just an old child's rhyme with a minimum of truth in it. Sticks and stones can do us bodily harm, but words can hurt us in ways that can't be seen. Words have the power to inflict harm with a careless curse or a snide remark. Perhaps a parent telling their child they're stupid or lazy or should never have been born.

There is power in words whether written or spoken. They can make us love or hate, help or hinder, whatever path the speaker or writer chooses. This was driven home for me this morning while listening to an old movie on TCM. It was a children's movie from a series called Rusty that was made in 1948. The line? "Our good neighbor policy can't penetrate the iron curtain."

While the line was meant to be about a man who didn't want anything to do with his new neighbors, there was also a deeper political meaning in that sentence. In truth, I suspect that it was a warning for children about Russia and the "Communist threat" that was starting to dominate the political scene at that time. And just two years before Joseph McCarthy started his witch hunt.

Many writers tend to put their political beliefs in their stories, some in a bash-your-head sort of way and others very subtly like the sentence in that movie. Of course, our stories come from the world each of us lives in, the beliefs we've learned from parents, the books we read, our friends.

Words have the power to sway people. They have the power to point out truth and lies. They can draw a picture of the lives of people we've never met. Those words can bring us together or tear us apart. As writers we seek the truth with our words, it may only be our truth, but a truth, none the less. A view of life we want to share with readers. As readers we seek the truth in the words of others, measure them against our own beliefs and either find them wanting or embrace them.

Words are powerful, tender them with care.