Institutional language can render human remains unrecognizable as human

Evidence

Thorough linguistic cleansing extracts every ounce of humanity. Who would know from NASA’s account that the “recovered components” in “crew transfer containers” were the remains of the astronauts killed in the 1986 explosion of the space shuttle Challenger? Oftentimes the linguistic masking of detrimental activities takes the form of convoluted language. — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 369

Categorization

• XREF: Echoes the Soundscape book on how naming and technical jargon erase lived reality. — connects to: Language itself has become a site where reified theory falsifies lived experience — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 1100
• CANDY: The NASA ‘recovered components’ / ‘crew transfer containers’ example is a striking, quotable instance of bureaucratic euphemism.