According to a speech guide published privately, the major intelligence agency of the United States wants to ban its spies from using “biased language,” including the terms “radical Islamists” and” jihadist,” saying these words “are terrible to Muslim- Americans and adversely affect our efforts as they boost extremist rhetoric.”
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence ( ODNI), which is in charge of overseeing the country’s detective apparatus, wants to outlaw a number of common words because it contends they offend Muslims and incite racism against staff members. In addition to words describing Islamic extremists, ODNI advises people to avoid statements such as “blacklisted”,” cakewalk”, “brown bag”, “grandfathered”, and” sobriety check”.
” Blacklisted”, for instance, “implies black is bad and white is good”, while” cakewalk” is said to refer” to a dance performed by slaves for slave owners on plantation grounds”. ” Colored bag”, a name most often used to identify a paper bag that holds one’s meal, really “refers to the’ colored bag’ test practices in the 20th century within the African American community”, according to ODNI, which outlined these terms in an inner magazine produced by the agency’s Office of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility.
The document is the most recent illustration of how employee interactions and their positions in the United States ‘ government are being redefined. These programs are portrayed by critics as part of a “woke” cultural shift promoted by far-left activists and their allies in the Biden administration. Republicans in Congress are proposing to cut off$ 2.5 billion worth of federal funding for DEI programs across the military and other organizations, arguing that these programs fundamentally harm the nation’s international operations.
A comment request was not received by ODNI.
Rep. Jim Banks ( R., Ind. ), a member of the House Armed Services Committee, which oversees the intelligence community, said woke initiatives like the ones laid out in the magazine are” a gift to our adversaries”.
” U. S. intelligence officials are being trained to use terms that do n’t’ disparage’ China or Islamic terrorists”, Banks said. ” Wokeness is a gift to our adversaries”.
A male intelligence officer writes in an anonymous article about the advantages of being a crossdresser, which is included in the quarterly magazine The Dive. ” I am an intelligence officer, and I am a man who likes to wear women’s clothes sometimes”, the anonymous employee wrote. ” I think my crossdressing experiences have improved the abilities I have as an intelligence officer, particularly in terms of critical thinking and perspective-taking,” he said.
The subject of the ODNI magazine, which was released earlier this year, is” the importance of words.”
” What we say can make or break rapport, elevate or tarnish a reputation, and even support or refute a narrative”, wrote the magazine’s editor in chief, a DEI employee whose name is redacted. Our work and our words as members of the intelligence community are forever etched in history and reflect the significant work we do for the greater good. We must be aware of the terminology we employ in every aspect of our responsibilities.
The magazine is a product of discussion among” all nine diversity advisory committees” housed in the U. S. intelligence community. The officials are “working tirelessly to identify their constituents ‘ challenges, concerning terminology, and themes to incorporate in their respective language guidance reports”.
The intelligence community, which prioritizes “disentangling Islam from words and phrases used to discuss terrorism and extremist violence,” continues to be a major concern for discussions about Islamic terrorists and their ideology.
Officials claim they “reported how some trainings and official presentations conjured Islamic principles with terrorism, which is offensive and offended our Muslim-American colleagues.” Additionally, they “noticed how the]U. S. government], particularly the]intelligence community], used certain phrases to identify international terrorism threats that are hurtful to Muslim- Americans and detrimentally impact our efforts as they bolster extremist rhetoric”.
These observations led to the use of several common phrases that were labeled as “problematic” and prohibited from use. Intelligence community employees should not say” Salafi- Jihadist”,” Jihadist”,” Islamic- Extremist”,” Sunni/Shia- Extremism”, or” Radical Islamists”, according to the document. These phrases incorrectly suggest that Islamic principles somehow condone the deeds and rhetoric used by these foreign terrorist organizations.
When developing this policy, intelligence community representatives spoke with a variety of academic and community activists.
The majority of people we spoke with said they” cry” when government officials use these offensive terms, which in turn leads to the false impression that the American identity conflicts with Islamic values, despite the magazine’s claim that Muslim-Americans have been a part of this society’s foundation as far back as the war for independence.
” Together”, the publication states,” we can make micro- changes in our culture and in our personal and professional environments”.
Other terms that are not racially charged but are still deemed problematic are provided in the document.
” Grandfathered”, for instance, refers to a” statutory and constitutional clause enacted by seven states from 1895 to 1910 that denied suffrage to African Americans, preventing them from the right to vote prior to 1866″, according to a list of hurtful words included in the documents.
” Sanity check” is also listed as a term that could offend colleagues because it “implies that individuals with mental illness are inferior, wrong, or incorrect”.
In the article on crossdressing, headlined” My Gender Identity and Expression Make Me a Better Intelligence Officer”, the employee writes that” I’m more aware of, and hopefully supporting, my women colleagues”.
” I now have a better appreciation for how it can be uncomfortable to wear women’s clothes sometimes”, he writes. I am aware of how wearing heels can cause pain in your feet and prolong the length of your walk. Although I like wearing a bra, I know it is n’t comfortable for everyone, and is less comfortable after a few hours. On top of the biases that women often face at work, it must be hard to be uncomfortable, too”.
Crossdressing, the employee says, makes him “better at understanding clandestine assets and their motivations. I get your motivation to keep secrets about who you are and what you do, which echoes some of the experience of being an asset.
The magazine also includes a word search game that includes terms like “accessibility”, “inclusion”, “equality”, and “ally”.
