Politico’s Dylan Byers reports that the AP is eliminiating such terms as “ethnic cleansing,” “Islamophobia” and “homophobia” from its official lexicon:
The online Style Book now says that “-phobia,” “an irrational, uncontrollable fear, often a form of mental illness” should not be used “in political or social contexts,” including “homophobia” and “Islamophobia.” It also calls “ethnic cleansing” a “euphemism,” and says the AP “does not use ‘ethnic cleansing’ on its own. It must be enclosed in quotes, attributed and explained.”
“Ethnic cleansing is a euphemism for pretty violent activities, a phobia is a psychiatric or medical term for a severe mental disorder. Those terms have been used quite a bit in the past, and we don’t feel that’s quite accurate,” AP Deputy Standards Editor Dave Minthorn told POLITICO.
Bravo for the AP. Personally, I have found “Islamophobia” one of the most deliberately misleading locutions to appear in some time. Those accused of it are usually not phobic of Islam at all, but disdainful of it on an ideological basis.





‘Those accused of it are usually not phobic of Islam at all, but disdainful of it on an ideological basis.’
Yes, and those who used it were being deliberately deceptive and manipulative.
This is a change that was overdue to be made: indeed, the –Phobia terms are grossly inaccurate. Unfortunately the jury must remain sequestered for the trial: I fear that these changes may be rendered as “incorrect for thee, but not for me”.
“Islamophobia” comes from the Islamists very cleverly taking the gay-rights lobby’s playbook and adapting it for themselves. Ironic, of course, since the Islamists, given the chance, would massacre the gay-rights lobby and its supporters—but they can see that, just as the gay-rights lobby has hermit-crabbed itself into the empty shell of the Civil Rights Movement, the Islamists can hermit-crab themselves into the huge hollows the gay-rights lobby has already carved out of the First Amendment.
“Homophobia,” the locution from which the Islamists concocted “Islamophobia,” is also a bogus word. It was intended to do two things: first, provide a term that, if clunkier than “racist!”, could still be screamed dismissively at opponents to stop any honest debate. Second, it was designed as a pseudoscientific term to enable the gay-lobby activists to say, “We’re not sick, you are.” The whole issue of “sickness” arises out of the very pseudoscience that originally birthed “homosexual identity” in the 19th century, but that’s another discussion; the “sickness” notion had become well entrenched by the time the gay-rights movement became vocal in the late ’60s/early ’70s, and “homophobia” was invented as a shorthand for “I’m rubber, and you’re glue.”
Kudos to the AP for retiring these two corrosively fraudulent terms—or, rather, attempting to retire them, since there will doubtless be howls of outrage from these two pressure groups before which the AP may yet cave.
eliminiating ?