Your politically correct guide to language
NY Mag has a copy of The University of New Hampshire’s bias-free language guide. Some examples:
Preferred: people of advanced age, old people*
Problematic/Outdated: older people, elders, seniors, senior citizen
*Old people has been reclaimed by some older activists who believe the standard wording of old people lacks the stigma of the term “advanced age”. Old people also halts the euphemizing of age. Euphemizing automatically positions age as a negative.
Preferred: person living at or below the poverty line, people experiencing poverty
Problematic/Outdated: poor person, poverty-stricken person
Preferred: person of material wealth
Problematic: rich
Being rich gets conflated with a sort of omnipotence; hence, immunity from customs and the law. People without material wealth could be wealthy or rich of spirit, kindness, etc.
Preferred: people of size
Problematic/Outdated: obese*, overweight people
Preferred: person who is blind/visually impaired
Problematic: blind person, “dumb”
Preferred: U.S. citizen or Resident of the U.S.
Problematic: American
Preferred: White people, European-American individuals
Problematic: Caucasian people
Preferred: Folks, People, You All, Y’all
Problematic/Outdated: Guys (when referring to people overall)
Preferred: Other Sex
Problematic/Outdated: Opposite Sex
Preferred: Children who are gender non-conforming, Children who are gender variant
Problematic/Outdated: Girlie or Tomboy
So the sentence:
“Guys, I had lunch with Sheldon Adelson, an American senior citizen who hates anybody who is not Caucasian, and he insisted we go Dutch, even though he is really rich and I am poverty-stricken.”
would have to be:
“People, I had lunch with Sheldon Adelson, a US citizen of advanced age who hates anybody who is not a European-American, and he insisted we go Dutch, even though he is a person of material wealth and I am a person experiencing poverty
I wonder how many staff ours went into the salaries of the language police who produced this.