For the average person, an update to the AP Stylebook is like climate change; most people just ignore it. What people might not know is that the stylebook basically dictates how certain words will appear in print and online. It recently updated a way to refer to French people, for some reason, and Jon Stewart was all over it.
Some context: Most news articles, though not all, follow what’s called “AP Style” — the A.P. stands for Associated Press — and its specific rules for grammar, spelling, language usage, and how to refer to certain things. For example, AP Style dictates that numbers one through nine are spelled out, and 10 and above are rendered numerically, except in cases when numerals begin a sentence, or the otherwise-spelled-out numbers are denoting dates and times.
Here’s another idiosyncrasy of the AP Stylebook – com directions are in lower case, but regions of the U.S. (periods between letters is also AP Style), are capitalized. An example: The wind is blowing cold in the Northeast, but the breeze from the south is colder.
Also, these rules tend to change from time to time, seemingly arbitrarily. The official AP Stylebook Twitter sometimes tweets out these updates, which happened earlier today. It said:
“We recommend avoiding general and often dehumanizing ‘the’ labels such as the poor, the mentally ill, the French, the disabled, the college-educated. Instead, use wording such as people with mental illnesses. And use these descriptions only when clearly relevant.”
Whether or not French people (see, now I’m doing it) should be included in the same list as mentally ill and disabled people is not the debate, but it is kind of funny regardless. Former Daily Show host Jon Stewart couldn’t help but chime in.
Pretty good joke. It should also be noted that America and have always had a pretty contentious relationship. Americans like to say the French surrendered at WW2 and had to be bailed out. French hate Americans simply because they’re Americans.
This wasn’t the case in the 1700s, of course, when the French helped fund the American Revolution. Also, they gave America the Statue of Liberty. Obviously, it’s not that simple but it’s important to note those geopolitical facts as well.
During his tenure on The Daily Show, Stewart took a particular delight in mocking the French, so this isn’t coming out of nowhere. Stewart could use all the help he can get right now as his new show on Apple TV Plus, The Problem with Jon Stewart, has been struggling to find an audience. is probably not watching.
The Problem with Jon Stewart is currently streaming on Apple TV Plus.
Published: Jan 26, 2023 07:46 pm