NYT Falls Victim to Own Political Correctness. Forced To Apologize for ‘Racist’ Crossword Answer

Apparently, the lunacy of political correctness knows no bounds. It has no common sense and is always on the prowl for something new to be offended over.

The latest nonsensical PC controversy is over a crossword puzzle answer in The New York Times, a news outlet that stands out for its liberal bias even in the liberally biased mainstream media. When it comes to virtue-signalling, the left will eat its own.

The hubbub is over the answer to a clue from The Times crossword puzzle on Tuesday that read, “pitch to the head, informally.” New York Times Crossword Answers reveals that the solution for that clue is the word “beaner.”

It might have seemed innocuous enough to anyone doing the puzzle (The Free Dictionary defines the word as a baseball term, referring to when “a baseball is deliberately thrown at a batter’s head”). However, in some circles, the term “beaner” is a slur for Mexicans.

Even though The Times puzzle was completely innocent in context, Will Shortz, The Times’ crossword puzzle editor, was issuing a New Year’s Day apology for anyone who might have been offended. (The “Joel” Shortz cites is apparently his assistant, digital puzzles editor Joel Fagliano.)

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A response from Will Shortz about the entry 2D in today’s crossword puzzle. #NYTXW pic.twitter.com/WEF1MCw0AP

— NYTimes Wordplay (@NYTimesWordplay) January 1, 2019

In the apology, Shortz gave other examples of words that hold more than one meaning, including a slur. Those words have also been used in the publication’s crossword puzzles.

“My feeling, rightly or wrongly, is that any benign meaning of a word is fair game for a crossword puzzle,” Shortz wrote.

But now that policy will be reassessed “if enough solvers are bothered” by words that can be slurs are being used in their correct definition for the puzzles.

Shortz also wrote that his viewpoint was expressed “with a pure heart,” but according to Fox News, the apology was not good enough for some critics.

I didn’t know what this was, but when I googled it, the slur was the very first entry, a dictionary definition. The vast majority of results were the slur. No idea what the legitimate use of the word is.

— Ren Jender (@renjender) January 2, 2019

It’s not a good look for the NYTimes when someone points out an obviously offensive puzzle answer prior to publication and the editor’s reaction is, “Meh. I’ve never been offended by that word, so I’ll let the answer stand.” I think you guys can do better.

— James McEvoy (@mcjim311) January 1, 2019

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One Twitter user of Hispanic heritage was quick to point out the problem with all of the outrage.

Respectfully, this is exactly what’s wrong with our society. We let racists usurp perfectly legitimate words and by not using them we give more power to the slur.

This Latino has no problem with the word being used in the proper context as it was in this puzzle.

— Santos L. Halper (@Cromulentness) January 2, 2019

That user was not alone in defending the use of the word in the puzzle — and attacking its attackers.

Just a bunch of idiots…Lets just take every word out of the books and just use single letters cause God forbid someone on the planet be offended.. Guess we cant say, use the work crackers, since that’s a racial slur..though its nice with wine and cheese

— ArrowInTheKnee (@ArrowInTheKnee2) January 2, 2019

I have 3 teenagers. Everyday they tell me how a completely normal word now means something else. There’s no way to keep up.

— angelafaulkner (@angelafaulkner) January 2, 2019

In this day and age of knee-jerk corporate reactions to manufactured leftist outrage, the crossword-puzzle writing team may find themselves lucky to keep their jobs.

It seems once you outrage the snowflakes, simply being attacked on social media is not nearly a high enough price to pay for their choice to be offended.

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