Everybody’s favorite frame-meister, George Lakoff, analyzes the framing of the “Global Struggle Against Violent Extremism”.
It is important to note the date on which the phrase “war on terror” died and was replaced by “global struggle against violent extremism.” It was right after the London bombing. Using the War frame to think and talk about terrorism was becoming more difficult. The Iraq War was declared won and over, but it became clear that it was far from over and not at all won and that it created many new terrorists for every one it destroyed. The last justification — fighting the war on terror in Iraq so it wouldn’t have to be fought at home — died in the London bombing.
And so the term “War on Terror” had to go.
The new phrase is less comprehensible, long, complicated. You almost have to memorize it: “global struggle against…†what was that exact wording again…? Oh yeah, “violent extremism.†It doesn’t sound like poetry, but it a perverse way it is. It says the administration’s policy is like the words for it: hard to comprehend, long, complicated. The new phrase is not memorable, and that’s the point.
