Preferred Terms for Select Population Groups & Communities

Language in communication products should reflect and speak to the needs of people in the audience of focus. The following provides some preferred terms for select population groups; the terms to try to use represent an ongoing shift toward non-stigmatizing language.

Non-U.S.-born Persons / Immigration Status

Instead of this…

• Illegals
• Illegal immigrants
• Illegal aliens
• Illegal migrants
• Foreigners
• The foreign-born

Try this…

• People with undocumented status
• Mixed-status households
• Immigrant, migrant
• Asylee or asylum seeker
• Refugee or refugee populations
• Non-U.S.-born persons/foreign-born persons

Corrections & Detentions

Instead of this…

• Inmate
• Prisoner
• Convict/ex-convict
• Offender
• Criminal
• Parolee
• Detainee

Try this…

• People/persons who are incarcerated or detained (often used for shorter jail stays or youth in detention facilities)
• Partner/child of an incarcerated person
• Persons in pre-trial or with charge
• People who were formerly incarcerated
• Persons on parole or probation
• Non-US citizens (or immigrants) in immigration detention facilities
• People in immigration detention facilities

Drug / Substance Use

Instead of this…

• Drug-users/addicts/drug abusers
• Alcoholics/abusers
• Persons taking/prescribed medication assisted treatment (MAT)
• Persons who relapsed
• Smokers

Try this…

• Persons who use drugs/people who inject drugs
• Persons with substance use disorder
• Persons with alcohol use disorder
• Persons in recovery from substance use/alcohol disorder
• Persons taking/prescribed medications for opioid use disorder (MOUD)
• Persons who returned to use
• People who smoke

Sexual Orientation & Gender Identity

Instead of this…

• Homosexual
• Using MSM (men who have sex with men) as shorthand for sexual orientation to describe men who self-identify as gay or bisexual, individually or collectively
• Transgenders/transgendered/transsexual
• Biologically male/female
• Genetically male/female
• Hermaphrodite
• Gendered pronouns:
  • Her or she
  • He/she
  • His or her
  • His/her
• Sexual preference, which is used to suggest someone’s sexual identity is a choice and therefore could be changed by choice
• Gendered, binary language when not necessary

Try this…

• LGBTQ (or LGBTQIA or LGBTQ+ or LGBTQIA2)
• Lesbian, gay, or bisexual (when referring to self-identified sexual orientation)
• Using MSM (men who have sex with men) to mean people who report being male at birth and having had sex with a person who was male at birth, regardless of self-identified sexual orientation
• Queer
• Pansexual
• Asexual
• Transgender
• Assigned male/female at birth
• Designated male/female at birth
• Gender non-conforming
• Two-spirit
• Non-binary
• Genderqueer
• Gender diverse
• People/person with intersex traits
• Pronouns:
  • Singular they or their
  • He/she/they

Notes:

• Use LGBTQ community (and not, e.g., gay community) to reflect the diversity of the community unless a specific sub-group is meant to be referenced.
• Consider using the terms “sexual orientation”, “gender identity”, and “gender expression”.
• Use gender-neutral language whenever possible (e.g., avoid “stewardess” and consider “flight attendant” instead).
• Considering using terms that are inclusive of all gender identities (e.g. parents-to-be; expectant parents).
• Be aware that not every family is the same, and that some children are not being raised by their biological parents. Build flexibility into communications and surveys to allow full participation.

For more political correctness involving the mentally ill, aging individuals and other identity groups, the entire Preferred Terms for Select Population Groups & Communities guide is available on the CDC website.

CNN EXCLUSIVE 'Something has to be done': After decades of near-silence from the CDC, the agency's director is speaking up about gun violence

[OCS: According to the CDC, “Whether diseases start at home or abroad, are chronic or acute, curable or preventable, human error or deliberate attack, CDC fights disease and supports communities and citizens to do the same.” <Source>

Violence is not a medical problem, it is not communicable, and unless it is pathologically induced by a physiological or psychological condition, treatment should be limited to those afflicted, not the broader public of unafflicted individuals.]

'I'm not here about gun control'

[OCS: This is a bald-faced lie.]

In restarting gun violence research, Walensky said she wants the CDC to find common ground with gun owners.

"Let's agree, we don't want people to die. Let's just agree there. What can we do to stop people from dying, and what can we do to stop people from being injured," she said.

[OCS: If this were a sincere statement, I would posit that the CDC would be more concerned with automobiles, knives, clubs, and fists – all of which result in more deaths than firearms. Not to mention drugs, including the various forms of legal and highly-taxed alcohol and tobacco.

And if this were statistically driven, one would demand the disarming of all black men below the age of 35 who live in the inner cities. It is a fact that most white youngsters are killed by automobile accidents, and most black youngsters are killed by other black youngsters.]

Walensky seems careful to avoid the ire of gun rights activists -- she doesn't even like using the word "gun," preferring the term "firearm."

"Generally, the word gun, for those who are worried about research in this area, is followed by the word control, and that's not what I want to do here," she added. "I'm not here about gun control. I'm here about preventing gun violence and gun death."

[OCS: This is language manipulation to drive an ideological narrative and agenda.

If Walensky was serious about preventing gun violence and gun death, one might assume she was interested in the root cause of those deaths – CRIME – and be speaking out against defunding the police and incarcerating violent criminals instead of releasing them back into the community.

Again being mindful of the science, the statistics, and psychological profiles of criminals with high recidivism (relapse) rates.]

She said she doesn't want people to think she is trying to take away their guns.

"This is not a conversation about having them or not having them. This is a conversation about how we can make them being here safe," she said. "The research that we intend to do is going to be squarely about making America safe. Making people safe."

[OCS: Guns are tools, just like power tools. You can use them to kill or maim your victims or defend yourself from evildoers or build useful items.]

She invited gun owners to be part of the solution.

"Come to the table. Join us in the conversation," she said. "I want you to teach me what you have done to make your gun safe, and then I want you to teach everybody else," she added.

[OCS: Let’s see, I try to be a responsible adult American, I am not a criminal, I am not psychotic, or experience fits of anger or spousal abuse. And, I represent the vast majority of gun owners, not the relatively few that commit heinous acts that drive the progressive communist democrat agenda of disarming the law-abiding public.]

"We cannot understand the research of firearm violence, firearm injury, without embracing wholeheartedly, the firearm owning community," she added. "I really do believe that the population of people who wants to own a gun doesn't want people hurt by them. The majority of the population does not want people hurt by them. I want them at the table."

[OCS: Like all the pointy-head academics who sponsor identity-studies programs that start from the premise that white Americans are evil or racist, why would any sane individual legitimize your efforts by sitting down with someone who is a liar?

By the way, since you are an acknowledged HIV/AIDS “expert,” do you still buy into the lie that HIV/AIDS is a major threat to the entire population or is limited mostly to the male gay and drug-using subset of the public.]

The CDC's plan

In April, President Joe Biden said the country was facing "a gun violence public health epidemic," but the CDC hasn't said how it plans to address the epidemic until now.

[OCS: Commonly, “an epidemic is a condition affecting or tending to affect a disproportionately large number of individuals within a population, community, or region at the same time.” Using this definition, one can plainly deduce that there is no national epidemic that demands drastic action but, if anything, is limited to the population of black inner-city residents and, more broadly, criminals and drug dealers.] 

"I swore to the President and to this country that I would protect your health. This is clearly one of those moments, one of those issues that is harming America's health," Walensky said.

[OCS: Neither you nor the President of the United States has the constitutional authority to interfere with Second Amendment protections. Sort of like your disregard for private property rights in declaring an unconstitutional moratorium of rent payments that disproportionately disadvantaged property owners.]

Decades after lobbying pressure and politics all but stopped gun violence research, Walensky's plan is to restart that research and identify effective solutions.

[OCS: This is another bald-faced lie. Most lobbying pressure was to prevent the infringement of the Second Amendment by petty tyrants attempting to disarm a law-abiding public to advance a toxic authoritarian agenda. Most of those conducting research were ignored as their findings did not support the progressive communist democrat narrative.]

For example, the CDC is spending $2,224,482 to fund a surveillance mechanism that tracks, in nearly real time, the number of people coming into emergency rooms with nonfatal gunshot wounds. It collects data on the intent of the injury -- documenting, for example, whether it was self-inflicted, unintentional or related to an assault.

"We don't even know who enters the emergency department, in most places, as a result of firearm injury -- we don't even know it," Walesnky said.

[OCS: The CDC can’t even accurately track deaths related to Covid-19 and distinguish between deaths from COVID-19 and those dying of other causes with COVID-19. Primarily because the government incentivized false reporting to support a political narrative.]

The NRA's next steps

By speaking up, Walenksy risks enraging the NRA.

If the gun lobby again pressures Congress to cut CDC gun research funding, it's unclear if lawmakers will acquiesce as they did in 1997.

[OCS: By all means, we must create an enemy, and the NRA makes a handy target. As a life member (benefactor level), it annoys me that tens of thousands of my fellow shooters and gun enthusiasts are tarred with a brush that should be reserved for criminals and politicians – often one in the same thing.

As for enraging anyone, consider the millions of people who just want you to do your effin’ job and stay out of Democrat politics.]

<Source>