Words I Hate IX

This is a new one:

Human-crewed


This word-thing was coined by those who run screaming, ears covered, when someone speaks the word “manned,” as in “the first manned lunar landing occurred on July 20, 1969.”

I first spotted this travesty, this ugly ornament to political correctness, on wikipedia:

It’s awkward, unsatisfying, wimpish. It’s reminiscent of the bad writer’s credo: never use five words when five hundred will do. Blech.

After all, all the astronauts in the Apollo space program were men. Sorry, but that’s the way it was forty and fifty years ago. Every single American who walked on the face of the moon, was a man. Apollo spacecraft thusly were manned, literally as well as figuratively.

I also recall posting a while back about a writer using “persons” when referring to the Apostles (another all-male group). I have yet to see the neuter “persons” in reference to the Popes, or the New York Yankees, or the Navy Seals. But that’s only a matter of time, I suppose.

Human-crewed: how I despiseth thee.