New Game: Social Justice Autocorrect!

I need a break from horribleness. Let’s play a game! Let’s play Social Justice Autocorrect!

Do you ever find that your assorted autocorrect thingies (phone, word processing, blogging software) don’t recognize social justice terminology? Do they come up with amusing autocorrect suggestions?

This came up during a Twitter conversation with Not All Misandrists (@artfulscientist). They were clearly attempting to ask someone to stop mansplaining, but it got turned into “plz stop mans plainsong.” I said that “mans plainsong” was my new favorite autocorrect — and they said that their autocorrect had also turned “dogwhistle” into “doge buster.” (To which I replied, of course, “Who ya gonna call? DOGE BUSTER!”)

So what are your favorite social justice terminology autocorrects? I’ll collect my favorites and repost them. Your time starts… now!

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New Game: Social Justice Autocorrect!
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8 thoughts on “New Game: Social Justice Autocorrect!

  1. 1

    I’m sure there must be a huge market for Doge Busting. Someone get me a time machine and a boat, I need some extra cash.

    Seriously, I’ve noticed spelling-check/autocorrect algorithm/dictionary weirdness for years. Who writes these things? (My spelling check demands a hyphen or space in autocorrect.) Honestly, they even have extreme issues in their own bailiwick of computer and internet terminology. WTF, browser? But that ability to suggest some off the wall replacement term with obscure words from who-knows-where really takes the biscuit.

    mansplaining : mainspring, plainsman
    dogwhistle: again, wants a space or hyphen, or thistledown
    MRA: MAR ARM MA RAM ERA (Mothers of the American revolution? IDK wut that first one is. Unless it thinks I’m goin’ ALL-CAPS up in here.)
    intersectionality: meh, these aren’t amusing at all. but I’ve never heard anyone use “interjectional” ever.

    Not good, so I await better from others in this cleverly devised game.

  2. 2

    I’ll look out for funny replacements and I can’t think of any myself, but has anyone else noticed the way “externality” is almost never noticed by spellcheckers? I know that it’s a technical term, but it should not be that obscure.

  3. 4

    A few from Vim:

    “cisgender” -> 3 boring ones and then “suspender”, “his gender”
    “intersectionality” -> “intersection laity”
    “LGBTQ” -> “LG BBQ”, and further down I particularly like “LUBED”

    A lubed lesbian and gay BBQ sounds like fun.

  4. 5

    cisgender: transgender. Uh, no, pretty much exactly not.
    LGBTQ: apparently wrong, but no suggestions!

    Seriously, I love “intersection laity”. Yeah, that possibly makes way more sense! But watch out for the intersection clergy, they can be harder to see in the dark if they aren’t all dressed up.

  5. 6

    transphobia – transpiration, train spotting
    mansplaining – mainspring
    cishetro – cashier
    ableism – amiable
    pansexual – panhandle
    genderqueer – endanger
    intersectionality – interjection

  6. 7

    Seriously, I’ve noticed spelling-check/autocorrect algorithm/dictionary weirdness for years. Who writes these things?

    Sometimes I think it’s people working very late at tech companies getting stoned and starting to giggle too much.

    Seriously the prevalence of profane corrections that match the base word in like only one letter has always made me drop my jaw and slap my knee in surprise. Some of the corrections are just super improbable and jump over very common words while leaping to words you might not want to say in correcting a coworker.

    (Most of my ‘data’ is cherry picked from DamnYouAutoCorrect, not personal experience and clearly reflects a confirmation bias.) (Would it turn “bias” into “bodice”? IDK.)

  7. 8

    Pansexual –> Pans equal
    Mansplaining –> Man splinting
    CIShetro –> Cush euro
    cishetro –> Cisneros (cush euro is 2nd option)
    Genderqueer –> Gender queen
    LGBTQ –> LGBT
    Dogwhistle –> Dogs the
    MRA –> MR
    Misandrists –> Miranda It’s
    Transphobia –> Transportation
    cisgender –> c is gender

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