Blair Sadewitz

Hello. OK, so please don't think I'm [completely] crazy, but the term "abliterate" has been bothering me. I'm not expecting that you change it, lol, but I kinda suspect that you had to have struggled a little bit when naming this, right? At this point, it's essentially a neologism, so I suppose it's too late to change it. And since it's popular, and people know the term, etc. etc., why would you want to?

But I'm thinking the best word is actually "debridement". I don't speak French (I suspect you probably do!), but: débrider. To unbridle, to remove restraint.

In English, it's a medical term for the process of removing dead/damaged tissue or unwanted material. It certainly could apply metaphorically, though, and just think: you could possibly alter the English language by steering the word's usage a little bit toward home. How patriotic! ;-)