MAJOR NEWS BULLETIN - AT 6:59 A.M. ET:  From Britain's Telegraph:

The European Parliament has banned the terms 'Miss' and 'Mrs' in case they offend female MEPs.

The politically correct rules also mean a ban on Continental titles, such as Madame and Mademoiselle, Frau and Fraulein and Senora and Senorita.

Guidance issued in a new 'Gender-Neutral Language' pamphlet instead orders politicians to address female members by their full name only.

Officials have also ordered that 'sportsmen' be called 'athletes', 'statesmen' be referred to as 'political leaders' and even that 'synthetic' or 'artificial' be used instead of 'man-made'.

The guidance lists banned terms for describing professions, including fireman, air hostess, headmaster, policeman, salesman, manageress, cinema usherette and male nurse.

COMMENT:  Oh, man!  Wait.  Can't say that.  Oh, person!  What comes next?  These are the countries we think of as our "European partners."  Oh wait, that implies rejection of singleness.  Our European friends?  Equal European colleagues?  No, no, no.  European is so..so exclusivist.  A club. With admissions rules based on the unfair accident of geography.  These are our equal colleagues who live on the other side of a rapidly warming ocean.  Yeah, that's it.  And they're changing our language.  Our civilization.  I know, it's a bigoted concept based on racial norms and intense lookism.  I apologize.

March 16, 2009