Some time ago, in an effort to practice my understanding of spoken German, I watched a “reality-style” video about police officers working the night shift in the wild district of St. Pauli in Hamburg. The officers had stopped a group of slightly drunk young men who, despite their alcohol level, behaved reasonably and decently toward the police. They didn’t seem particularly respectful, though.

One of them, after reluctantly answering the officers’ questions, displayed a surprising level of self-criticism and started insulting himself in front of the police with phrases like:

“I’m a fucking idiot! I’m a total moron! I’ve screwed my own life! Obviously I’m a complete loser. I’m a clown! I’m just a worthless asshole…”

…and so on, until the officers finally told him to move along.

The narrator of the video commented that despite the insults directed at them, the police officers remained completely calm and acted professionally. No, the problem wasn’t my limited German. I hadn’t misunderstood either the man in the video or the narrator. What I realized was that this was a legal and relatively safe way for the man to express his opinion about the police directly to their faces—without suffering serious consequences. He addressed them, and they understood him perfectly, but they couldn’t really do anything, because technically he was insulting himself.

That’s when it hit me how rapidly communication is changing. The meaning of words increasingly depends on the context in which they are used. Indirect speech, hints, and metaphorical language are becoming more common. This is easiest to observe on social media and in the media in general, where trolls often carry out personal attacks following the principle of “I’m talking to my daughter, but my daughter-in-law should get the message”—commenting on someone mentioned in the article above, while clearly aiming at someone else. The assumption is that the target will recognize themselves in the message, and that this recognition will actually intensify the toxic emotional effect of the troll’s post.

When language loses its concreteness, communication can easily drift into a competition of increasingly sophisticated backstabbing. Apparently, the modern “civilized” person is quite willing to engage in some not-so-civilized behavior, as long as they are confident there will be no negative consequences. At the same time, the loss of linguistic clarity often leaves us “lost in translation” as well—causing us to see in other people’s words reflections of our own tendencies, suspicions, and assumptions.

But regardless of all that, we will always keep “one thing in mind”…