While I was reading “Politics and the English Language” by George Orwell, I remembered the first political science class I took. George Orwell was talking about the tarnished English language. He talked about how politicians abuse the English language by using different euphemisms in their speeches to confuse the general public. What I also found interesting was when he said that writers are too lazy to pick an object and describe it so instead they use metaphors to describe things for them. His overall lesson was that the simpler the words the better.

My political science teacher talked about euphemisms everyday and emphasized how ridiculous they were. I didn’t fully understand what he was talking about then because I wasn’t familiar with the political world. But being involved in this internship and reading what’s out there in the media, on top of what Orwell had to say, I realized that it’s all true. When I would write short stories and poetry for my English class I would used different tactics where I would rephrases and repeat the same things I said in many ways. It served two purposes. To trick the reader into thinking I have something new to say to appear more informed with my topic and increase my credibility. I would also use a lot of metaphors and similes to grab the reader’s attention to what I had to say.

 Interning at the ANCA showed me that the politicians do the same thing in their speeches. All this time, I thought I knew nothing about how the political world functioned when in reality I was using their strategy for my stories. Now that I made this connection with something I know a lot about, I finally fell like I understand an important aspect of politics. I thought I would never be able to make my own connection or feel comfortable with anything related to politics but I realize now that is not true. I don’t see the barriers that were separating me from that world anymore. The possiblilities are endless.