As Matt Walsh continues his quest to discover the meaning of the word ‘woman,’ it appears the editors of the Merriam-Webster dictionary have made it a little more difficult for him to find a clear answer.
The dictionary recently expanded the definition of the word ‘female’ to accommodate transgender activists. Just another example of the left’s drive to alter reality by rewriting the English language.
According to a Daily Wire analysis, Merriam-Webster is modifying words and phrases at a fast clip to align with far-left sensibilities. The computer analysis compared the current dictionary with one from January 2020 – just predating the COVID pandemic and the rush of protests driven by Black Lives Matter.
Here’s a sample of some newly added abbreviations, words, and redefinitions from the middle section of the alphabet – including changing the definition of the word “girl,” adding the term “folx,” and making democratic socialism more positive.
democratic socialism was made more positive with examples like “Might it be better to chuck conservatism and liberalism altogether in favor of something like democratic socialism?” and “Democratic socialism is growing in popularity among millennials.“
decolonize went from “to free from colonial status” to a Critical Race Theory-infused essay, like, “To free from the dominating influence of a colonizing power especially: to identify, challenge, and revise or replace assumptions, ideas, values, and practices that reflect a colonizer’s dominating influence and especially a Eurocentric dominating influence.” Examples include, “A decolonized curriculum would bring questions of class, caste, race, gender, ability and sexuality into dialogue with each other, instead of pretending that there is some kind of generic identity we all share.”
drag went from “entertainment in which performers dressed as members of the opposite sex caricature gender stereotypes through the use of often outrageous costumes” to a discussion including a quote from RuPaul and one about “a conversation within the LGBTQ community regarding trans, female, and nonbinary drag performers.”
drag king went from people “lampooning” to series of examples including “blind, non-binary drag king Totio Bone showcases their signature skills of song, dance, and audio description.”
eugenics, which was widely practiced by liberals in the early 1900s, was edited to remove a quote from conservative Dinesh D’Souza critical of “techno-utopian” Silicon Valley types who may use technology to give wealthy people the ability to improve their children’s genes.
family man morphed from a “man with a wife and children” to “a man with a spouse and child.”
Added fat-shame, as in “The author, a doctoral student therapist, discusses her experience with a clinical supervisor who fat-shamed a client during supervision. — Melissa A. Meulman.”
Added folx, “used especially to explicitly signal the inclusion of groups commonly marginalized. Having women teach other women matters. Women of color. Transgender women. Disabled women. Gender-nonconforming folx. It matters because in a sea of educators who look alike, students who stand out can find themselves adrift.“
female was expanded to include: “having a gender identity that is the opposite of male”
gay can now also mean “of, relating to, or intended for people who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, etc.”
Added gender-fluid: “of, relating to, or being a person whose gender identity is not fixed. Gender-fluid individuals prefer to remain flexible about their gender(s). Some dress in ways that reflect both genders at the same time, while others may express one gender one day and another gender another day.”
gentrification became more negative, adding: “The construction of luxury housing and gentrification of neighborhoods is pushing families out of communities they have called home for years.”
girl added “a person whose gender identity is female,” illustrated with the quote “Narrator Taylor Meskimen draws listeners into the emotional life of Zenobia July, a tech-savvy trans girl who’s facing a new year at a new middle school.”
gypsy went from “sometimes offensive” to “usually offensive.”
Added headscarf: “a fabric covering for the head worn especially by women,” … young, well-educated European Muslim women who wear the headscarf as a conscious, articulate choice …
homosexual is “now sometimes disparaging + offensive.”
identify went from 56 words to 340 to accommodate the likes of a new sample sentence that said “Of the high school students who participated, 77% identified as female, 20% identified as male, 2% identified as nonbinary.“
implicit was changed to include references to racism and “implicit bias.”
immunocompromised now includes the example quote, “Fear of vaccines doesn’t just potentially harm the children whose parents forgo vaccination but also other kids, as well as immunocompromised adults.”
lockdown was changed to say that in addition to being imposed in prisons, it may also refer to “a temporary condition imposed by governmental authorities (as during the outbreak of an epidemic disease) in which people are required to stay in their homes and refrain from or limit activities.”
junkie, used as a reference to a drug addict, is now “disparaging + offensive.”
lily-white can now mean “lacking racial diversity,” as in “Most disappointingly, the main cast remains lily-white” and “Unless the Saints hire a black coach…, the NFL will continue its lily-white string of hires.”
maiden name is now not simply “the surname of a woman before she marries” but – in a notable example of the dictionary being grammatically incorrect — “the surname prior to marriage of a person who takes their spouse’s last name.”
male went from “a man or a boy” to “having a gender identity that is the opposite of female.”
mask is now not only “a grotesque false face worn at carnivals or in rituals” or a device “to prevent the dispersal of exhaled infectious material” but can also simply be a “covering (as of polypropylene fiber or cotton fabric) to prevent inhalation of dangerous substances or to prevent the inhalation or dispersal of exhaled infectious material (such as bacteria or viruses).”
mental retardation is “now often offensive.”
Examples of meritocracy were changed to more negative ones, replacing “many private schools have sold their birthright by choosing… ‘diversity’ over scholarly meritocracy” with “Merit, it turns out, is at least partly class-based.”
This is the second of three parts. For more, see Part 1 – Newspeak: How Merrian-Webster Is Redefining Words To Fit A Leftist Agenda