Language Matters

Biased Free Language

• Brown Bag (racist) – lunchtime learning, BYOL (bring your own lunch)
• Crazy/ Cuckoo/ Bonkers/ Deranged/ Hysterical/Insane or Insanity/Lunatic/ Madhouse / Mad / Madman/ Maniac/ Mental/Mental Case/ Nuts/ Psycho/ Wacko/Whacko (ablelist) – confusing, unpredictable, impulsive, reckless, fearless, lives on the edge, thrill-seeker, risk-taker, out of control, hectic, catawampously, catawampus, awry, amiss
• Blind to _ / turn a blind eye to / blinded by / double-blind review/Deaf to / turn a deaf ear to _ / (Silence) is deafening/ Are you blind/ deaf?? (ablelist) – willfully ignorant, deliberately ignoring, turning their back on, overcome by prejudice, doubly anonymous, had every reason to know, feigned ignorance
• Cake walk/takes the cake (racist) – easy victory, easily accomplished, simple
• Cotton picking (racist) – blasted, everloving, dang, rotten
• Dummy (ablelist) – sample/placeholder, uninformed
• Dwarfed (ablelist) – overshadowed, eclipsed
• Grandfathered in (racist) – the old rules apply, exempted, excused, preauthorized, legacied
• Gypped (ethnically biased against Roma) – bamboozled, beguiled, bilked, burned, conned, deceived, cheated
• Jew down (antisemetic) – bargain, negotiate
• Lame (ablelist) – boring, uninteresting, monotonous, lacks excitement, uncool, out of fashion
• Low-hanging fruit (insensitive) – [while this term does not have a direct tie to lynching, it has for some created connotative links so that it is better to replace it] quick win, easy rewards, low risk/high reward.
• Mankind/manmade (sexist) – humankind, humanity, handmade, hand-built
• Master/slave (racist) – primary/secondary, leader/follower, primary/secondary
• OCD (ablelist) – pedantic, precise, fastidious, finicky, fussy
• Off the Reservation (anti-indigineity) – oversetepped, out of line, off script, gone rogue
• No Can Do/Long Time No See (racist) – I am unable to, it has been so long
• Peanut Gallery (racist/classist) – crowd, audience, critics, heckler
• Powwow (anti-indigineity) – chat, meeting, discuss(ion)
• Spastic/Spaz/Spakka (ablelist) – klutzy, clumsy, forgetful, impulsive, reckless
• Seminal (sexist) – foundational, influential, critical, crucial, fundamental, important, original
• Third world (imperialist) – developing nation, developing world
• Tipping Point (racist) – turning point, critical moment, critical point, crucial point, crucial moment, critical stage, decisive moment, game changer
• Tribe (anti-indigeneity/racist) – friend group, network, community, ilk
• Whitelist (blacklist)/blackballed (racist) – allowlist (denylist), allowed, denied, boycott, ostracize
• Black market (racist) – illegal market

There are many words in my vocabulary that I have had to replace once I became conscious of their problematic origins and negative impact. That’s ok, life is learning. I wanted to collect these in one place. Resources I leaned on for some of these are available at the end. This is not exhaustive; I tried to include terms I hear regularly or have used myself. Being conscious of these terms helps us remove bias from our language and become more inclusive, thoughtful allies. 70 Inclusive Language Principles is a great article to reference for more thoughtful, inclusive communication.

Resources

• 25+ Examples of Biased Language, The Magnet, https://blog.ongig.com/diversity-and-inclusion/biased-language-examples/.
• Patrick Allan, Seven Words And Phrases With Racist Origins, Lifehacker
• Ableism/Language
• Jocelyn Ocampo & Mariam Shahab, Problematic & Divisive Terms in the English Language
• Petrina Darrah, Biased Free Language
• Northwestern’s Inclusive Language Guide