The German word “Flüchtlinge,” translated to mean refugees, was selected by the Society for the German Language as its Word of the Year after nearly 12 months of roughly one million newcomers flowing into the western European country, Reuters reported Friday. “Flüchtlinge” is derived from the German verb “fluechten” — meaning “to flee” — and the…
Cover Photo Credit: International Catholic Migration Commission/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
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This College Paper Just Decided To Start Using Gender Neutral Terms
Back in 2010, the University of North Carolina’s student newspaper, The Daily Tar Heel, was approached by roughly 30 students with a petition containing over 430 signatures that demanded that the paper use gender neutral terms- chairperson instead of chairman, first-year instead of freshman.
This week the paper decided to make the change to gender neutral terms.
“We don’t really believe in leaving things the same way just because it’s the way it’s always been, and now more than ever, we all see a pressing need to be inclusive in the way we write about people.” Paige Ladisic, editor of the paper said in a message explaining the decision.
These changes, like the Associated Press Stylebook, considered by many as the Bible of journalistic standards, seem to reflect society.
For example, Jose Antonio Vargas, an undocumented immigrant, tracked news media’s use of “illegal alien” to convince outlets to use the term “undocumented immigrant” instead.
But was the Daily Tar Heel in the right to make the change?
“Gender neutral titles have slowly been making their way into everyday usage for decades. For instance we don’t call a female flight attendant a ‘stewardess’ anymore,” Jason Parsley, Executive Editor of South Florida Gay News said in an interview. “As for ‘chairperson’ there doesn’t need to be separate terms for men and woman because both positions are equal. Men and women are equal. Period. And ultimately that’s what this gender neutral movement is all about.”
Marimar Toledo, a 20 year old freelance journalist also supports the use of gender neutral usage, because it was more respectful to people in the LGBT community.
“You’re just never gonna know- and just to be on the safe side, and be on the respectful side, you should use the gender neutral terms, rather than the ones that specify which sex you are.”
While people may be of different opinions, The Daily Tar Heel‘s decision seems here to stay.
Rise News reached out to DTH editor Paige Ladisic and will update this story when she responds.
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Cover Photo Credit: William Yeung/Flickr (CC By 2.0)
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American Muslim Groups Are Standing Up To Donald Trump In A Big Way
WASHINGTON—A man from Sacramento is screaming down the phone. “Tell me one time, just one time a mullah stood up against ISIS and said ‘stop!’” And so it goes. Since 9/11, ignorance, intolerance and hate have flared around the modest red-brick office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, better known as CAIR — the uber-group defending… Read More
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Japan Needs To Have A Lot More Sex Or The Country Could Collapse Into The Sea
The Japanese population is rapidly declining.
The population has lost almost one million people over the past five years.
This decline has been long predicted by demographers but the world’s third largest economy has been unable to find a solution.
The situation is dire and hard to overstate.
If Japan can’t start having many more babies then the country will face great challenges later on in the century. These challenges could undermine the very core of the country’s social order.
Japan has one of the world’s lowest fertility rates, 1.41 children per woman in 2012.
As a result, the number of people 65 and over has increased from 12.1% in 1990 to 26% in 2014.
Furthermore, estimates put Japan’s retirement age population at 40% of the total national population by 2060.
This would likely put a tremendous burden on Japan’s social safety net, state pensions alone being ¥792,100 per year ($6,960.76). This accounts for nearly 33% of Japan’s national budget in 2015 and it will only continue to balloon as the years roll on.
Having to cope with close to half of your population being in need of geriatric care is not a problem exclusive to Japan.
There is a lot of pressure on young people in Japan to have more children. But will they listen? Photo Credit: J3SSL33/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
China recently revoked and replaced its One Child Policy, with the Two Child Policy.
In part this is to combat China’s low fertility rates, 1.66 births per woman, and in part to counter act the imbalance between the number of men and women, a 30 million person disparity.
Other low fertility countries include, but are not limited to: Singapore (0.81), South Korea (1.18), Germany (1.44), Russia (1.61), The United States (1.87), and the United Kingdom (1.89). All of these nations have fertility rates incapable of sustaining their current populations without immigration helping to offset the disparity.
Elderly populations then are not only a threat to the economic growth of Japan, but to advanced economies in general.
It would then seem that in order to combat global population decline, and with a greater number of developing nations creating advanced economies, nations may need to compete for immigrants in order to sustain their populations.
This may be particularly difficult for Japan, due to the relative difficulty in learning its national language, and a culture that is not as used to welcoming immigrants as many of its potential competitors.
Of course the other way for Japan to get back to an equilibrium in terms of old and young is to have young people have more children- lots more children. The government has tried many different methods, including offering to pay parents to have kids, but it has had little impact.
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