In this moment of geopolitical sword-dancing, words matter more than ever

Words change the thing. Kingsley Amis said that. He’s an author of diminishing influence, a mid-century comic novelist who delivers much less potency and insight than his son Martin – something that would annoy him, by all accounts.

The late Kingsley Amis was pretty intolerant of a lot of things, the misuse of words and language being one of them. But that succinct epithet of his still lands, and ironically for a man who liked the clarity of meaning in words, it is an adaptable phrase.

I thought of it twice last week. The first was after 10 people were convicted of online harassment of Brigitte Macron, the French president’s wife, for posting malicious comments on social media, mostly claiming she was a man. There were also suggestions of paedophilia related to the age difference between her and her husband. None of it was true. I’m pretty sure there was a big dollop of misogyny in it for some of them too. 

The issue of free speech rose around this. One of those convicted, Bertrand Scholler, said the court rulings were a “nuclear bomb for free speech”. He’s talking garbage. I am against the rich and the powerful using their wealth and court procedure to shut down the little man with something to say. They’ve been known to use it against the media as well when they don’t like some truth that is about to be revealed. 

But that’s not what this is. There is a big difference between having a fact that could change things being suppressed and being found guilty of a campaign of falsehoods that materially seek to destroy someone.

Scholler, and the others, might be hiding behind free speech, as if they are incredible truth tellers sent to perdition in a Soviet gulag, but they’re not. They’re nasty pieces of work. I don’t know what the motivation is for them – some level of fame, low self-esteem, being once slighted by a woman – but if they want to carry on with the free speech push, they’ve got to accept that there are consequences.

Free speech doesn’t just mean saying what you want because you want to say it. If you give it, you better be ready to take it. Words change the thing. There’s a related lawsuit coming in the US where right-wing influencer Candace Owens has repeated the false claims and is now heading to court. 

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It will be interesting to see how a judge in the US views things. Their president now is the man for whom words and threat bring no consequences. Is it any wonder that sense seeps into wider consciousness. It was the fifth anniversary of the January 6 storming of the Capitol earlier this month – what looked as close to a coup in the US as has happened in my lifetime.

But in the new Trumpian worldview, a post-January 6 world, the reality of rioters actions has been overturned by a new narrative in which everybody else – even down to the police at the Capitol – was responsible. There is even a new page on the White House official website detailing this. The world watched it, courts held those responsible to account, but now, there is a new presentation because the leader of the free world deems it so. Words change the thing.

The Maduro capture and the upcoming show-trial is not the most telling moment of geopolitical sword-dancing we have just now. You can make arguments about the breaking of international law, but it all feels a bit 1980s, Noriega and the invasion of Grenada. It doesn’t feel uniquely Trump. I suppose if you’re spending $874 billion (BILLION!) per year on the military, you’re itching to use it.

What is more telling is the Greenland rhetoric. “We have to have it,” he said, like it’s a lovely car he’s coveting. Yet, the words are delivered, he believes, without consequence. It might unsettle the world if he makes a move, but so what, he said it. And Trump’s acolytes insist he always keeps his word. Given the length of some of his speeches, it’s a wonder he can remember them.

For now, we all watch and wait. As Kenny Rogers said, there’ll be time enough for countin’ when the dealing’s done. Right on Kenny – words change the thing.

Paul McNamee is editor of the Big Issue.Read more of his columns here. Follow him on X.

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