In Name Only

'In name only' used to make me wary; now it only makes me weary. I encounter it daily; sometimes countless times in the course a single day.

The nominal. The so-called. The self-styled.

Masks of unreality hiding reality. Labels that don't match the contents. 

We live in the Age of 'In Name Only'. Hear the name and then decide whether the name represents an actuality, reality, or truth; or serves merely as a veil hiding the unacknowledged or unseen. People, things, actions - very few possess the qualities their names profess. And why should they?  After all, there simply isn't much demand for the Real these days. The zeitgeist reveres only the fake; the feigned; the falsified.  

So welcome to the perpetual masquerade! Look at what I appear to be, then guess what I really am! It's an endless game of dress-up - the sheer thrill of disguising and dissembling. Go ahead! Unceasingly deform the fabric of the universe and then eclipse it all with shadowy simulations. Conceal, cover, and camouflage until even the vestiges of veritas are cloaked in suspicion. That's the goal, you see. 

The children's rhyme got it mostly right - names will never harm us, but like sticks and stones, 'in name only' most surely will.