Disingenuity
August 5th, 2009 by ftobiaIt’s a good thing that the noun form of disingenuous is disingenuousness, or I’d end up confusing it with the opposite of ingenuity. From Wiktionary, disingenuous can mean “Not frank or open; uncandid; fake or deceptive.” So it didn’t surprise me when this word leapt into my head as I was skimming RPI’s public relations publication, Inside Rensselaer.
I was reading the article titled “Rensselaer Unveils Newly Renovated Residence Commons in Downtown Troy.” Personally I would have hyphenated “Newly Renovated,” and wouldn’t have capitalized every word, but that’s not my call. Then I got to the second paragraph, where they mention the “vibrant community of Troy”. That is just a lie. There are a thousand adjectives better suited to describe Troy. I would go so far to say that Troy is perhaps the most un-vibrant community I can think of.
I got used to this kind of public relations doublespeak while I was attending RPI. It’s kind of awful when the instutition you’re a part of needs to practically lie about things like censorship and budget cuts and staff layoffs. I truly hope my new school is a tad more reasonable.
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September 21st, 2009 at 8:35 pm
[...] I have some serious issues with its leadership, my experience there was positive. That said, I have written about my feelings for Troy, and they are not positive. (I should clarify that when I referred to [...]