From ThePostMillennial.com
The CDC has released new, inclusive language that they want the American public to use in place of lots of already extant words that we typically use to describe individuals or groups. Essentially, in place of single words that are used, the CDC wants us to put the word “person” first, before the descriptor, except in the areas where they believe that group identity supersedes individual identity, as in race, ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation.
There are many examples of this, in many categories, such as “Corrections & Detentions,” where words for “prisoner,” “criminal,” and others are to be replaced with “People/persons who are incarcerated or detained,” or “Persons in pre-trial or with charge.” In the category of “Disability,” terms like “Differently abled” should be replaced with “People with disabilities/a disability.” “Drug-users/addicts/drug abusers,” etc., should be instead “Persons who use drugs/people who inject drugs.”
The idea behind this is clear even without reading the CDC’s preamble: the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention want Americans to see and think about each other as people first, before they consider the person’s condition. The CDC’s intention is to humanize us, and seem to believe that their function is to tell us how to speak, and how to think, in order to do that. However, it is poorly designed, and will only be replaced by new missives in very short time.
The CDC has as its mission to protect public health, “to protect America from health, safety and security threats, both foreign and in the US.” But they also write that they have the goal of “Promoting healthy and safe behaviors, communities and environment.” It must be under this aspect of their purview that they have suggested that Americans change their language.
