Reading Time: 6 minutes Words matter because they carry meaning and sometimes that meaning isn’t clear to everyone. We hear the words “dog whistle” politics more and more frequently for a reason. Figuratively, a ‘dog whistle’ is a coded message communicated through words or phrases commonly understood by a particular group of people, but not by others.

Some of us hear the word animal in the context Trump used it and we are alarmed. Others hear it as a rallying cry. There is no clearer dog whistle for racists than the language of dehumanization. When the President of the United States of America blows a dog whistle like that, people hear it and it has consequences.