this whole - words don't kill - only strangers with guns kill business, is silly, and everyone knows it . . . If our perception is altered by language, and we all live in this soup of language, then is it not the gaze that situates an individual into a class or thing, is this not language based . . . was it not rabid propaganda (words and images) in nazi germany that ignited hatred of jews to a frenzy . . . does language kill? I work with those psychologically injured by hateful and oppressive language. does language kill or at least maim . . . look at the suicide rate of gender queer youth and others that do not fit so neatly into the myth of western thought . . . I think of Charlotte Perkins Gilman's main character in The Yellow Wall-Paper, what words where used to diagnose this character, so that a gaze was fixated on to this individual causing a mental breakdown, where before this individual may have just been oppressed . . . ask any one of color, what words mean, ask someone who is differently abled, what the word "disabled means" . . . what does it mean to have a learning disability? maybe it is not all words, but the construct and markers that are in close association with the language. right after 9/11 any one who wore a turban was at risk, was it not language that allows us to identify these markers-.. turban is not a top hat . . . it may be stretching it a bit . . . but I think when you hear words enough like: bitch, stupid, faggot, queer, nigger, spick, kike, retarded and so on . . . something happens . . . and I think there is way to much research on PTSD, and other trauma related behaviors to not except words do kill . . . or do enough harm so someone may take up arms and do the work the words where intended.. if words do not kill, when Brandon Teena discovered to have a vagina. was it not in that moment that the categorization of gender came in to play; male is this, and female is that . . . is it not that moment that led to the rape of brandon tenna that was the the finality of that violent signify practice, but what led to that moment, was it not language based. does language kill - stop being stupid.