"The largest organization of insect experts in the world is dropping its common names for two insects ?? the gypsy moth and gypsy ant ?? because it says the names are inappropriate and offensive.
The Entomological Society of America said it would take input on new names for the moth?ÿLymantria dispar?ÿand the ant?ÿAphaenogaster araneoides.
Many scientific groups follow its lead in referring to insect species."?ÿ?ÿ
The NPR article continued:
"Words matter, and what we call something matters. And by using the former name for?ÿLymantria dispar, it really was very hurtful to the Romani people," says Chris Stelzig, the executive director of the organization.
The Romani people, or Roma, are Europe's largest ethnic minority and?ÿface discrimination. "Gypsy" is considered a pejorative term."
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In light of this recently outed social atrocity I would like to apologize to the universe for my inconsiderate usage of the term "Gypsy" in the past.?ÿ It won't happen again.?ÿ Now as a purer society we can move ahead with our heads held high.
I am concerned however about a couple of things.?ÿ First I'm wondering if the Gypsy Horse Registry of America will fall in line.?ÿ And second, if I wake up and see this in my front yard:
..along with tambourine tapping ladies circling the campfire...what shall I call them??ÿ?ÿ
I'd hate to offend anyone with my ignorance.
Roma, or Romani, whichever they call themselves. It's the polite thing to do.
I know a woman who has part (1/4?) Romani ancestry but was not raised with strong ties to that culture. She has chosen to claim, learn about, and emphasize that heritage.
She uses the word Gypsy (only) to explain to people what Romani means because few recognize it. She does not get particularly offended when others use Gypsy.?ÿ It does raise her hackles if you use "gypped" to say you were cheated, and she strongly dislikes some of the other steroetypes.
Well, I'm bothered by male and female plumbing parts.
Political line to be crossed soon?????
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Lol
If political correctness were applied evenly, in all things.
All the pipes would leak.
I have a db 9 pin gender changer. Should I throw it away?
Would it be ok to eat other people, if it were my religion? Where do I stop??ÿ
How would we get more cows, if weren't for bulls?
If anger management classes makes the instructor so mad, he kicks me out of class, does it mean I have a problem, or he has a problem? If we both have a problem, where do we go?
I hope you are mature enough to avoid primal scream, when you read this. Or, they might put you in remedial thinking class.
If you love power, and you discover love is better, is it ok to act like a rooster, and do both?
Political correctness means you should, I'm mean I should, well, forget it. I don't think anybody should tell anybody anything. Maybe I'll just keep quiet. But, then I see politicly correct rioting. Shouting. Dominating. If I agree with them, should I join them, and if not, should I.... Hey, I got it, never mind! Hey, what's circular reasoning?
Never mind I gotta milk a cow, and get to work. Now, there is an answer. Get to work!
That'll solve alot of the problem. Work.
N
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@mathteacher I've always thought it was awfully presumptuous of us to label the ends of all the cords for our survey equipment as male & female.?ÿ Shouldn't they come as bare cables (genderless) and let them decide how to express their connectivity?
Tip-toes away from the keyboard to look for asbestos britches.?ÿ
In the mid-80's I worked for a utility company on their survey crews. When we got back to the yard each afternoon we took care of the vehicles, put equipment away, etc. All the crew members (minus party chiefs) stood out on the parking deck waiting for the whistle to go off in the linemen's yard. It was your typical BS session and someone usually got targeted for razzing for a bonehead move, or the clothes they had on. All in fun, of course. One day a guy named Bob was the target. As guys were ribbing him, he started to tear up and blurted out "I don't know why you guys are picking on me? You know I am the sensitive type." Might as well have thrown a bucket of bloody meat into shark infested waters. Bob was the target almost every day after that. It wasn't long until he rotated to a meter reader job.
Many of us have such jumbled ancestry that we have probably insulted ourselves and didn't realize it.
One of the fascinating things one may discover while working on their own family tree is that many people fail to realize a family story passed down from one generation to the next may be wrong.?ÿ For example, a story recounting the ship ride from a certain English port to a port in the US suggests that part of the ancestry were English.?ÿ Not hardly.?ÿ Those ship riders may have been born in any location in Europe and simply boarded a ship in England for the long jump across the Atlantic.
Another fallacy is that a couple who lived in Luxembourg prior to departure where both natives of that country, when in fact each was born in a different country.
Especially in Europe, a specific site may have been a portion of multiple countries over the centuries, thus leading to confusion in labeling.
A terrible thing to discover is that in many cases the father of a child was, in fact, a victorious soldier of some army celebrating the defeat of whichever country it was in which the future mother was living at the time.
Many people were adopted with no record of who the parents were or what their country of origin was, so the one adopted assumes they were identical to the adopting parents and passes that information down to younger generations.
Those with a claim to Irish ancestry may find this to be of interest: Geneticists?ÿat?ÿTrinity College Dublin?ÿfound that 21 percent of men from north-western Ireland, 8 percent from all of Ireland, a substantial percentage of men from western and central Scotland, and about 2 percent of men from New York bore the same?ÿY-chromosome?ÿhaplotype. The geneticists estimated that about 2??3 million men bear this haplotype. Moore et al. concluded that these men descend from "a single early-medieval progenitor" and proposed that this could be Niall.[20][21]?ÿAccording to the PBS documentary series?ÿFinding Your Roots,?ÿBill O'Reilly,?ÿStephen Colbert,?ÿColin Quinn,?ÿBill Maher, and the show's host,?ÿHenry Louis Gates Jr.?ÿall display STR markers consistent with the Irish Modal Haplotype.[22]?ÿThe series suggested that Niall may have been the most?ÿfecund?ÿmale in Irish history.
I was surprised to recently learn "actress" is a pejorative term; do not use actress except when in name of award, e.g. Oscar for best actress.
The guy at Ace Hardware politely calls them "innie and outie" fittings.
Elvis Presley, Charlie Chaplin and Rita Hayworth were part Roma. Story is they originated in the Punjab in North India and migrated to Eastern Europe in the 10th century. Given their persecutions over the centuries, including mass extermination by Nazis, changing the name of a moth and ant so as not to offend anyone, seems just a tad bit ridiculous.?ÿ
