In a series of papers, Eli Hirsch has defended 
two theses. The first, which I shall call 
semanticism, says that many ontological disputes 
concerning material objects are purely verbal. 
The second is that the ontology of common sense 
is nonetheless true. Hirsch’s defense of the 
latter view heavily builds on his Shmenglish 
Argument, a semantic argument based on the 
principle of charity. Semanticism and the 
Shmenglish Argument are deeply intertwined, for 
the latter cannot be dialectically efficient 
without the former. Nonetheless, in this paper 
I will argue that, maybe somewhat surprisingly, 
semanticism actually undermines the Shmenglish Argument.