How do you define....?

The first time I used to word "troll" to describe my mother (she is, it's cute) I got an odd look from her and my father both. This is not the first time I've used words that have not entered their lexicon, so I explained, because a common vocabulary is the baseline to good communication. My parents laughed.

Apparently, when they were young (60's and 70's) "trolling" was cruising for a date. In my hometown in Shawnee, you'd "cruise the 'Poo" (Kickapoo is the main street). For them, it would have been "trolling the Poo", which doesn't have the same ring.

It was the result of a generational difference in language. I love how language evolves and changes over time, the way words take on new meaning or context. I find that people who seek, as my parents do, to understand the way the generations after them use language rather than dismissing it as irrelevant have an easier time adjusting to the changes in the world...and the world changes quickly with technology connecting us in a way that would have been unheardof to my grandparents. That said, I text with my grandparents often. People can change with the times, if they aren't afraid of the changes or holding too hard onto a past that's gone.

I think another word that has had both a change of meaning but also a generational difference in understanding is socialism. My podcasts have talked a lot about the way many Democrats are embracing the word and how defining it will likely be something we will be seeing a lot over the next couple of years.

The Iron Curtain fell when I was about 9 so most of my life has been spent post-Cold War. I have an aunt who is from Russia and who has talked a lot about the terrible of living in the USSR and it's fascinating. But when my generation and later is talking about socialism, we're not looking at other countries, we're looking at ours.

At how Social Security and Medicare are regularly spoken of as two of the most important programs we have (and which our grandparents fight for zealously) and which are prime examples of socialism.

We look at the failings of rampant capitalism, how a lack of government involvement makes our country the most expensive healthcare in the world but we don't even have paid leave when someone gives birth; how people have a 4-year degree, student debt they can't pay, and are working for minimum wage, which can't even cover their housing costs. Housing costs that continue to rise while wages remain flat.

So we look at this country, which has a few really successful programs that are clearly socialism but a bunch of really failed areas (areas that effect our generations in way they don't effect the ones before us) that have been left to the ravages of unchecked capitalism. We aren't afraid that socialism will lead to communism because...well, it doesn't. We're more interested that democratic socialism would lead to homes, job, wages, healthcare, a chance at a life our parents and grandparents got a chance at...and then voted to dismantle for us.

For us, socialism isn't a scary threat from outsiders. We have time and history to look at and since our history books focus almost solely on European and Western history, we had them fed to us year after year. We can see what has gone well and what has gone terribly. And our thoughts have been formed accordingly.

If the word "socialism" causes you distress coming out of the mouths of your loved ones, I think the first thing to do is to ask them what they mean. Listen to what they're saying. It's possible that you and they are using two very different defintions for the same word. And try to look at the world through their eyes, through the eyes of their contemporaries. Our world is different than the one you were in at our age. We may well need some different definitions to navigate it. The question is, will you hold onto the past that is gone, afraid to change your understanding or adapt your definitions, or will we navigate it alone?