Dictionary.com’s ‘Biggest Update Ever’: only changed homosexuality
Speaking of Orwell’s 1984, a blogger noted that, “By controlling the language, Big Brother controls the way that the people think. With a limited vocabulary, the people are limited in how much they can think, as well as, what they think about.” That’s why we should be concerned with Dictionary.com’s “biggest update ever.” Yes, in addition to the many new words added “are the deeper revisions that document what drives us here at Dictionary.com: the ways language is constantly evolving. A great many of these entries we’ve updated address topics that touch all of us on the most personal levels: race and ethnicity, gender and sexuality, health and wellness.” The revisions are intended to “help eliminate heterosexual bias in language,” and they were “informed” by the gay activist (or, gay activist driven) organizations GLAAD and the APA. No wonder LGBTQ websites like Out.com are celebrating the changes. What, then, were some of these major revisions? Goodbye “Homosexuality” — The “Clinical”...