double talk

When a mafia boss orders a free man killed, it's called putting a hit out on that person, and is frowned upon.

When a judge orders a caged man killed, it's called an execution, and cheered as justice. In fact, there's nothing more just than killing someone. Stormborn said it, and we knew it was true.

When a child acts counter to parental expectations (desires, goals, intentions, etc.), it's called being bad.

When a parent acts counter to child expectations, it's for the child's own good. It is good, and don't dare ask why.

When a person continues to pursue a goal in spite of having already failed at least once, it's called either stubbornness or persistence, depending on the speaker/judge's biases. What matters is not the ambitious one's chances of success, but whether the judge wants her to continue, for whatever reason. The judge's motives remain mostly hidden, though, as the positive/negative element is meant to be about the act as such, as some kind of object. By implication, it's good or bad, period, whereas, in fact, it can only be good or bad from the speaker's point of view.

A woman who has sex with many men is a whore. A whore is the opposite of a player, a person who also frequently has sex but who, thanks to belonging to the right a priori category, is a priori good.

When power gets what it wants, it's called good.

When neurons get what they want, it's called good. 

Two men raising a happy child is covered by an umbrella called profane. A man and a woman raising a miserable child is covered by an umbrella called sacred. The judgment comes before. How else to condemn happiness?

A black man in a hoodie with a gun is called thug. A black man in the right uniform with a gun is called hero, unless he's acting, knowingly or not, outside the expectations, at whatever point in spacetime, of the ones who get to decide what's good. At that point, he will be considered, at worst, a bad apple.

A man who blows up a civilian-filled building and himself for a cause he's fully committed to, but not under the orders of big local power, is called a coward.

A man who blows up a civilian-filled building for a cause he may or may not be committed to -- for reasons, to be frank, often of personal finance and video-game-ish fun -- on the orders of big local power, is called a freedom protector and is covered by an umbrella called brave. The judgment comes before.

A nihonjin in France calls the French people she sees gaijin. To the nihonjin, the furansujin is a foreigner in her own country. Big local power's double talk can cross borders.

Americans are the good guys even in countries they've invaded.

And so on.