social murder
English
[edit]
Etymology
[edit]Calque of German sozialer Mord, first attested in Friedrich Engels' Die Lage der arbeitenden Klasse in England. Engels attributes the phrase to English workers' newspapers.
Noun
[edit]social murder (plural social murders)
- (politics) The knowing causing of the inevitable premature death of members of an oppressed class by deliberately and structurally exposing them to potentially lethal conditions.
- 1962 [1845], Friedrich Engels, “Resultate”, in Die Lage der arbeitenden Klasse in England (Marx-Engels Werke), volume 2, page 325; English translation from “Results”, in Florence Kelley, transl., The Condition of the Working Class in England (Marx/Engels Collected Works), volume 4, translation of original in German, 1975, page 394:
- I have now to prove that society in England daily and hourly commits what the working-men's organs, with perfect correctness, characterise as social murder, […]
- [original: Ich werde nun zu beweisen haben, daß die Gesellschaft in England diesen von den englischen Arbeiterzeitungen mit vollem Rechte als solchen bezeichneten sozialen Mord täglich und stündlich begeht; […]]
Usage notes
[edit]Primarily used by leftist commentators who consider such deaths premeditated and not incidental, may be considered offensive by others.
Translations
[edit]systemic causation of premature death
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