Several years ago, an employer headquartered near the newspaper where I worked announced major layoffs. But the company didn’t call them that. They called the cuts “reductions in force,” and those affected would be assisted with job hunting at an “outplacement center.”

Reporters typically view euphemisms, and the people who spew them, with disdain. Carrying their use to the extreme, I had suggested, jokingly, that we refer to those layoffs as “leisure time enhancement,” and the job support as a “rec center for the redundant.”

Euphemisms — soft terms used to replace something that is unpleasant or offensive — pepper our conversations about everything from using the bathroom (“powder my nose”) to illness (the “Big C”) and death (“passed away”). Such disguises and deceptive language can be harmless. But when they obscure harmful misinformation, it’s time to unmask them, particularly as we enter an election year, when disinformation and distortions flood our newsfeeds.

Here are some examples:

AI ‘hallucinations’

Because of the ways artificial intelligence technology gathers and distills information, it can “see” things that aren’t there and present these mirages to us as credible information. To downplay bad information that AI is serving up, the tech world has dubbed such instances “hallucinations.”

This growing phenomenon even prompted Dictionary.com to choose “hallucinate” as its 2023 word of the year. Whether generated by humans or technology, inaccuracies, omissions and outright fabrications can mislead us and result in poor decision-making. A recent article in Forbes magazine reported that AI “hallucinations” have provided news consumers with wrong and sometimes dangerous health information.

Consumers need the skills to separate fact from fiction in all their newsfeeds, and especially when it comes to AI-generated posts and images. The News Literacy Project, the national nonpartisan education nonprofit where I work, provides free tools and programs to help the public develop critical thinking skills and learn how to determine the credibility of sources and information (both AI and human-generated).

That’s the first step. In the meantime, let’s stop saying “hallucination” and call this what it is: misinformation.

If it’s fake, is it news?

Originally, the term “fake news” referred to “news articles that are intentionally and verifiably false,” designed to manipulate people’s perceptions of facts, events and issues. However, politicians co-opted the phrase years ago as a label for any news coverage — including credible reporting — that portrayed them unfavorably or included facts they did not want to acknowledge. Given that 2024 is an election year, you can expect to hear shouts of “fake news” every time reality-based journalism bumps up against the scenarios politicians might prefer.

News literacy skills can help us determine whether so-called fake news is fake, news or entirely something else. Here’s a simple tip: Open new browser tabs and do a quick search to learn more about the person making the outcry and their possible motives, and explore how the topic is being covered by a variety of news media and subject matter experts.

If the facts stand up to credible reporting, then the information is not fake news; it’s news, like it or not.

MORE FROM POYNTER: Lateral reading: The best media literacy tip to vet credible sources

Newspeak is ‘ungood’

George Orwell’s dystopian novel “1984” gave us the term, “Newspeak,” defined as “the elimination or alteration of certain words, the substitution of one word for another, the interchangeability of parts of speech, and the creation of words for political purposes.”

In the novel, the government uses Newspeak to short-circuit people’s critical thinking and manipulate them into lockstep loyalty to the ruling party. But such language is not confined to this literary classic. We might see it in government reports, statements from corporations and politicians or even in otherwise straightforward news reports. Consider these examples: electronic surveillance (wiretapping), enhanced interrogation (torture), collateral damage (killing of civilians) or racially tinged (racist). Euphemisms about war are particularly objectionable, as they are designed to dehumanize.

If those who control the news narrative slip into Newspeak, it’s on us to call it out and demand precise, accurate, fact-based information. When we encounter such language, news literacy skills can help us see through the muddle:

Pause before you share a post with inflammatory or confusing language. Use a simple online search to check out the credibility of a source and recognize what distinguishes standards-based journalism from propaganda or shoddy reporting.

There’s no other way to put this: The public is not asking too much to expect decision-makers, public officials and institutions to say what they mean and mean what they say.

Carol McCarthy is a former journalist and the senior director of editorial content for the nonprofit News Literacy Project. Jan. 22 – 26 is National News Literacy Week.