“We recommend avoiding general and often dehumanizing ‘the’ labels such as the poor, the mentally ill, the French, the disabled, the college educated.”
(Tweet from The Associated Press Stylebook)
How “the French” constitutes a “label” left many French people mystified. It is simply who they are… Certainly, no French diplomat has ever complained that being called an envoy of “the French” was somehow dehumanizing. In fact, the French rather like being stereotyped as the French, if that is the issue. They undergo Frenchness with considerable relish.
(Roger Cohen, “The French Want to Remain the French,” New York Times, 1-27-23)
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