It's only a word

แค่ คำหนึ่ง  

In this age of communications, we are not using communications for good instead of or more for evil.  

I read a lot, listen a lot (more than speak and write). I have noticed use of words and learned [not] to use words to convey ‘truth’ [at least as I see and think as truth]. However I prefer to use some words and to avoid some words because of reasons like ‘long traditional understanding of the meaning’, ‘more descriptive and pleasant’, ‘ non-offensive nor personally harming’, ‘direct, concise but not rude’ and ‘circumstances’. But in the past few months (during the political campaigns both in Thailand and overseas), I have noticed a few marked changes in use of words that seem to lead away from expressions of truth and betterment of mankind.      

I see some areas of concerns :

• use of pejorative words like hīnayān (หีนยาน), kafir [lime], ฝ่ายประชาธิปไตย/ฝ่ายเผด็จการ, ด้อม-
• use of words to misinform or partially inform [the public]
• use of words without care of consequences [to audience] especially in children environment 
• use of new or modified words to serve only a specific group of people [code to hide information]
• acceptance of these uses [especially rude words] among young people

It seems we are progressing in sciences and technologies but regressing in social development. Communications have increased in quantity but not in quality. There are so many renditions or versions of truths that the truth is overwhelmed on the Internet. (Artificial Intelligence systems are learning from the Internet, what would be the value of such learning when materials for [machine] learning are not examples of truths.)

In this age of communications, we are not using communications for good instead of or more for evil.

My notes:  

[Added 23/7/2566 to add positive aspects of words and language and to show importance of use of ‘right words’ in education systems]

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==Language Is a Powerful Influence on Children's Development It supports your child's ability to communicate. It also supports your child's ability to express and understand feelings, to think and learn, to solve problems, to develop and maintain relationships.   
   Language development supports many other aspects of development, like cognitive, social and literacy development.   
   Language development starts with sounds and gestures, then words and sentences.
   You can support language development by talking a lot with your child, and responding when your child communicates.
   Reading books and sharing stories is good for language development.
==Questions: 
Are languages equal in performance in children development? efficient cognitive tool, patterns/categories
Are language/speaking styles significant in children learning? 6C's:  Clear, Concise, Correct, Contextual, Concrete and Caring.
Language functions are the following, in order: (1) referential/informative ("The Earth is round"), (2) emotive/expressive ("Yuck!"), (3) directive ("Come here"), (4) phatic/'social' ("Hello?"), (5) metalingual ("What do you mean by 'krill'?"), and (6) poetic ("Smurf")
==Effective in language means: listening, speaking, reading and writing; (phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics) --> rule-based, extensible, dynamic, idiomatic
==Effective language is: (1) concrete and specific, not vague and abstract; (2) concise, not verbose; (3) familiar, not obscure; (4) precise and clear, not inaccurate or ambiguous; (5) constructive, not destructive; and (6) appropriately formal.
==Effective Teaching: The teacher uses the target language at least 90 percent of the time. Examples. The teacher demonstrates and models to make input comprehensible. Students learn vocabulary from using it in language-rich contexts such as stories, hands-on experiences, picture descriptions, or subject-matter content.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaffir_(racial_term)  kāfir ("unbeliever", non-Muslim); in Afrikaans kaffer refers any black person, became a pejorative and considered extremely offensive hate speech. [“Makrut [lime]” or “Thai lime” is now the accepted alternative.]

hīnayāna is a highly derogatory term. It does not simply mean "Lesser vehicle" as one often can see stated as opposite for mahā (cūla is the correct opposite) https://www.budsas.org/ebud/ebdha140.htm 

"Hīnayāna" is a Sanskrit term that was at one time applied collectively to the Śrāvakayāna and Pratyekabuddhayāna paths of Buddhism. And later incorrectly used to referred to Theravada. Modern Buddhist scholarship has deprecated the pejorative term, and instead uses the term Nikaya Buddhism to refer to early Buddhist schools. According to the World Fellowship of Buddhists, the term Hīnayāna should not be used to refer to any extant form of Buddhism. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hinayana 

South Koreans refer to themselves as Hanguk-in or Hanguk-saram (한국인 or 한국 사람), both of which mean "people of (Sam)han." When including members of the Korean diaspora, Koreans often use the term Han-in. Korean Americans refer to themselves as Hangukgye-Migukin. .. The word “han” is a Sino-Korean cognate of the famous “khan” (as in “Genghis Khan”), and “han” (chinese 韓) has been used in the names of ancient countries in both Korea and China. .. The name “Korea,” used by English speakers today, appears to have derived during the time of the Silk Road when the dynasty in Korea called itself Goryeo. ..spelled as Corea in Celtic and Romance languages, changed its spelling when Japan occupied the county in the early 1900s.(Japan did not allow any of its colonies to have the first letter before Japan's in the alphabet, so it was changed to Korea.)

The name “Korea” comes from “Goryeo” (written고려in Korean), the name of a state in the region of the present-day Korean peninsula. In Chinese characters, Goryeo is written 高麗 pronounced “kōrai” or “kaurai” in the Japanese phonetic reading, while in Mandarin Chinese it is Kāolí (Gāolí) [kauli] --this is probably adopted in Thai language. [.. phonemes in English that are not found in Cantonese include the following 14 consonants: /b/, /d/, /g/, /v/, /s/, /z/, /ʃ/, /ʒ/, /r/, /w/, /ʧ/, /ʤ/, /ð/, and /θ/, but as /b/, /d/, /g/, /s/, /ʧ/, /ʤ/and /w/ have similar counterparts in Cantonese, they do not cause too much trouble for Cantonese... https://corpus.eduhk.hk/english_pronunciation/index.php/pronunciation-of-hong-kong-english/   

Chinese people are known as Zhongguoren (simplified Chinese: 中国人; traditional Chinese: 中國人) or as Huaren (simplified Chinese: 华人; traditional Chinese: 華人) by speakers of standard Chinese, including those living in Greater China as well as overseas Chinese. --note the consonant ‘r’ in Zhongguoren.]

Why isn't Korea called Joseon? Korea was formed after the fall of the Joseon dynasty. Because it failed, 'Joseon' is sometimes used as a pejorative term. “For Koreans, it's like we're insulting ourselves,” [a student explains]. “In the Joseon dynasty we suffered a lot, so we're calling it that because that history wasn't good.” [This says there is a deep historic reason for some words being unacceptable.]