cover your ass

The phrase cover your ass is generally viewed as a vulgar term, often replaced by the less-vulgar sounding initials CYA. Safire identified CYA as a synecdoche, in the same sense that the word "ass" had come to reference the whole person.{{cite news |first=William |last=Safire |author-link=William Safire |date=August 18, 1987 |work=The New York Times |url= https://www.nytimes.com/1987/08/16/magazine/on-language-glossary-of-a-scandal.html |title=On Language: Glossary of a Scandal |access-date=August 26, 2014 |pages=163–164 |quote=[A] new sense has evolved that uses the word for the posterior as a synecdoche for the whole person ... the initials today are an anachronism ...}} The word "ass" in the phrase is often replaced with more polite versions or other euphemisms, such as "cover your actions", "cover your rear end", "cover your back", or "cover your butt", according to Safire.{{cite news |first=William |last=Safire |date=October 30, 1994 |work=The New York Times |url= https://www.nytimes.com/1994/10/30/magazine/on-language-on-the-edge.html |title=On Language: On the Edge |access-date=August 26, 2014 |quote=... the choice of 'cover your rear end' to define C.Y.A. by Senators ...}} The "cover your butt" variant has been used in various ways, such as by Minnesota health authorities urging citizens to undergo preventive colorectal exams, as a way to "cover" themselves medically from possible future cancer.{{cite news |first=Carol |last=Kuruvilla |work=New York Daily News |date=March 22, 2013 |url= http://www.nydailynews.com/life-style/health/minnesota-takes-aim-colon-cancer-cheeky-new-ad-campaign-article-1.1296786 |title=Minnesota takes aim at colon cancer with cheeky new ad campaign: March is National Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month. Commuters in the Twin Cities metro area are getting daily reminders of why they need to get tested}} In banking, officers tasked with making sure the bank follows proper regulatory procedures, called compliance officers, may realize that certain dubious transactions, such as money laundering and terrorist financing, will occur regardless of any regulatory restrictions;{{cite news |newspaper=The Economist |url= http://economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=5053373 |title=Financing terrorism: Looking in the wrong places |date=October 20, 2005}} still, to protect themselves and their banks against possible future sanctions, they may engage in CYA activity such as issuing unnecessary memos, obfuscating documents or conducting transactions discreetly, as ways to absolve themselves from possible future liability. The term is widely used in journalism. Safire explained how the term is used in bureaucracy:{{cite book |first=William |last=Safire |title=Safire's Political Dictionary |publisher=Oxford University Press |date=2008 |chapter-url= https://books.google.com/books?id=c4UoX6-Sv1AC&q=%22CYA%22+%22william+safire%22&pg=PA164 |chapter=C.Y.A. |access-date=August 26, 2014 |page=164 |isbn=9780195343342 |via=Google Books}}

{{Quote|A bureaucrat adept at C.Y.A. (a) likes to employ passive constructions (see mistakes were made), (b) follows up a meeting or phone call with a self-serving memcon—"memorandum of conversation", (c) routes memos to and through as many other bureaucrats as possible, thereby spreading the risk of future criticism, and (d) "papers the file" with memoranda sometimes supporting and sometimes contradicting his or her position.}}

In the novel The Negotiator {{cite book |last1=Forsyth |first1=Frederick |title=The Negotiator |isbn=9780552134750}} by Frederick Forsyth, CYA finds mention as:

{{Quote|There was silence. America has some of the most sophisticated alarm systems in the world. Her scientists have developed infrared sensors that can detect body heat from several miles above the earth’s surface; there are noise sensors that can hear a mouse breathe at a mile; there are movement and light sensors to pick up a cigarette stub from inner space. But no system in the entire arsenal can match the CYA sensor system that operates in Washington. It had already been in action for two hours and now was headed for peak performance.}}

Because these practices are so routine, a genuine warning can be mistaken for CYA behavior, causing a type II error or false-negative error, with disastrous results. For example, in the summer preceding the attacks of 9/11, U.S. president George W. Bush was briefed on a now-famous August 6, 2001, memo titled Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US. Bush's response to the briefer was erroneously reported as: "All right. You've covered your ass, now."{{cite news |first=Barton |last=Gellman |date=June 20, 2006 |newspaper=The Washington Post |url= https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/19/AR2006061901211.html |title=The Shadow War, In a Surprising New Light |access-date=November 5, 2014}}

In another example, before the launch of the United States spaceship Challenger which ended tragically with the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, the final launch approval by rocket maker Morton Thiokol contained the phrase "information on this page was prepared to support an oral presentation and cannot be considered complete without the oral discussion"; this notice was later described as a "CYA notice" by information design specialist Edward Tufte.{{cite book |first=Edward R. |last=Tufte |author-link=Edward R. Tufte |title=Visual Explanations |url=https://archive.org/details/visualexplanatio00tuft |url-access=registration |publisher=Graphics Press |date=1997 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/visualexplanatio00tuft/page/26 26–53]|isbn=9780961392123 }} In print, it can have the form of a disclaimer; for example, Slate magazine suggested that the White House used the phrase "It is important not to read too much into any one monthly report" as a disclaimer on reports, and this was described as a CYA activity.{{cite web |first=David |last=Weigel |date=September 6, 2012 |work=Slate |url= http://www.slate.com/blogs/weigel/2012/07/06/the_white_house_uses_the_exact_same_cya_sentence_in_every_jobs_report.html |title=The White House Uses the Exact Same CYA Sentence in Every Jobs Report}} The term has been applied in the medical profession to describe doctors who prescribe unnecessary medical tests for patients, to protect themselves against possible future lawsuits.{{cite news |first=Megan |last=McArdle |date=February 8, 2010 |work=The Atlantic |url= https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2010/02/the-reality-of-health-care-plans/35533/ |title=The Reality of Health Care Plans |access-date=August 26, 2014 |quote=... we could eliminate a hell of a lot of unnecessary day to day expenses ... visits of convenience and CYA tests for diseases there's no indication the patient has ....}} The term has been used to describe a cultural tendency which works against accountability and risk-taking, such as in a war effort when generals engage in much cover your ass activity which avoids taking real responsibility.{{cite news |first=Thomas E. |last=Ricks |date=October 24, 2012 |work=The Atlantic |url= https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/11/general-failure/309148/ |title=General Failure |access-date=August 26, 2014 |quote=... appropriate risk-taking diminished (the art of combat pursuit was almost lost in Vietnam), and a 'cover your ass' mentality took hold ....}}

In regards to Congressional impeachment hearings into President Donald Trump's talks with Ambassador Gordon Sondland, on October 16, 2019, Member of Congress Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) told reporters that she was not sure whether lawmakers can trust Sondland's testimony to the House, saying his opening statement was "a lot of CYA."Kyle Cheney and Andrew Desiderio, "Gordon Sondland breaks with Trump in impeachment testimony: Trump's EU ambassador told House investigators he opposed the president's request to run Ukraine policy through Rudy Giuliani." [https://www.politico.com/news/2019/10/17/gordon-sondland-to-break-from-trump-in-impeachment-testimony-000288 POLITICO Oct. 17, 2019]

In an op-ed's inferred example regarding Trump's speech prior to the 2021 storming of the United States Capitol, The Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank juxtaposed two of Trump's statements as evidence:{{cite news |last=Milbank |first=Dana |date=January 6, 2021 |title=President Trump has committed treason |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/01/06/president-trump-has-committed-treason/ |work=Post |location=Washington |access-date=January 6, 2020}}

{{Quote|"You'll never take back our country with weakness, you have to show strength and you have to be strong," he admonished them, with CYA instructions to make themselves heard "peacefully and patriotically."}}

In Cambodia, under the Khmer Rouge, the government never had any idea how much food was actually being grown, because local bureaucrats "covered their asses", and lied to make themselves look good and avoid getting shot. Consequently, starvation was rampant.{{cite web | url=https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2499193 | ssrn=2499193 | title=Justice and Starvation in Cambodia: The Khmer Rouge Famine | date=2014 | last1=C. | first1=Defalco }}{{cite web | url=https://www.cambodialpj.org/article/justice-and-starvation-in-cambodia-the-khmer-rouge-famine/ | title=Justice and Starvation in Cambodia: The Khmer Rouge Famine – Cambodia Law & Policy Journal }}

• Due diligence
• Mistakes were made
• Plausible deniability
• Principal–agent problem

{{Reflist}}

Category:Risk management

Category:Slang

Category:Prevention

Category:Public administration