Posts Tagged ‘Complaint’
BBC Website Humiliating Dwarfs (Again)
UPDATE #2: Received e-mail from the BBC confirming they have changed the text as “an inanimate lump of rock cannot really be said to be humiliated”. On my part, I do not think there was any “bad” intention. Just a poor choice (mix) of words
UPDATE: No word from the BBC yet but the article has been retitled “‘Non-planet’ Pluto gets new class” and its overall tone much changed, addressing 95% of my concerns. There could still be the possibility to argue for more, but frankly it would be pointless and pedantic.
Thank you, whoever did the changes at the BBC
Complaint sent to the BBC website today:
In the article “Humiliated Pluto gets new class” you explicitly associate the word “dwarf” to “humiliation“, “demotion” and “relegation“.
I am not saying we should all be “politically correct” all of the time, but the article’s author could have just said that Pluto had been reclassified as “dwarf planet“, with no reference to “humiliation“, “demotion” and “relegation“, WITHOUT losing ANY information.
Who would say that to be a dwarf is to have a lesser dignity?
Conversely, you could try answering this question: why did you feel compelled to use the words “humiliation“, “demotion” and “relegation“?
Imagine if cars were sorted by colour, and somebody wrote of them being “demoted to black” after being repainted!!