Now they can’t openly defy the system, because that would likely invite charges that they’re against law and order. Heaven forbid!

But not to worry. Language to the rescue.

You see, cause-and-effect relationships exist only in minds as inferences; they don’t exist in the real world. Therefore, the people who don’t think we should punish wrong-doers can take the two parties involved in a crime and by inventing a verbal fiction, connect them in such a way as to imply that the assailant was really the victim. Therefore, in the interests of justice, how could he or she be punished?

Let me give you a couple of examples of this beauty.

Mrs. Jones loses her temper and beats the hell out of her kid. Ordinarily, she would be held accountable. But language to the rescue. She is now said to be the victim of a verbal phantom called "premenstrual syndrome." Therefore, how can you blame her for doing what she did? She’s really the victim.

Or take the case of a former soldier who robs a liquor store. Is he to be held accountable for his crime? Not according to those people. For, you see, he’s really the victim. Of what? Oh, of a verbal phantom called "post traumatic stress disorder," that’s of what.

You know, the insidiousness of this verbal nonsense is that it has a scientific air about it, which causes people to see it as fact. And why shouldn’t it have a scientific air about it? After all, it was created by scientists. Weeeeell, pseudo-scientists, anyway. You know, psychologists and psychiatrists.