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In this paper, I show how effective it can be to use language, with all its twists and turns, to combat the normative assignments of this same language when it is reserved for those with the power to exercise it to the detriment of others. More specifically, I analyze insulting terms and the re-signification to which they may be subjected. Drawing on Goodman’s theory of symbols, I seek to show how, by taking old paths of reference (denotation, connotation, quotation, mention, evocation) and opening up new ones, an insult succeeds in reaching or missing its target. Above all, this descriptive approach aims to familiarize us with tools that we can then re-use to make right worlds.