A word means whatever I want it to mean, neither more nor less.”

–Humpty-Dumpty

Like George Orwell and Humpty Dumpty, the wellness industry (thanks largely to the Business Roundtable pressuring the EEOC) has now managed to redefine wellness programs as their opposite: “voluntary” now means “required,” in the sense that if you don’t volunteer to submit to “wellness or else” you could be fined up to about $3600 (if you spouse is on your insurance), which is a little less than 10% of the median annual wage, and exceeds the amount in many people’s savings.

But the wellness program is still voluntary, according to the EEOC. Or as Surviving Workplace Wellness says: “wellness programs will make employees happy whether they like it or not.”

These wellness people have experience at redefining words as their opposites. Health Fitness Corporation’s Dennis Richling redefined “514 Nebraska state employees didn’t have cancer at all” to “we made life-saving catches of 514 employees with cancer.” He referred to this subtle difference as “semantics.”

Jon Robison and I just posted a “Pulse” on the wellness industry’s creative use of the English language, which rivals their creative use of fifth-grade math.

We hope you hate it, where “hate” means “love.”