In their ever-increasing efforts to refashion the English language into a completely gender-neutral, non-offensive, all-inclusive, sexuality-affirming, LGBTQ-friendly, identity-welcoming, racially sensitive dialect – and largely rendering the entire language null and void in their efforts – progressives, intent on erasing any concept of a gender binary from our speech, coined the phrase “Latinx” to describe Latinos.
The goal? Well, there’s not much of a discernible one, other than to stick a proverbial middle finger to the scientific and biological realities of men and women. Instead of “Latino” and “Latina” to differentiate between the masculine and feminine, instead, progressives decided that the gender-neutral moniker “Latinx” was the way to go.
The only problem? Turns out, Hispanics don’t use it.
According to a new study out from the Pew Research Center, Latinos don’t give two craps about the inclusive “x” stuck on the end of their ethnic descriptor. As Pew reports, “only 23% of U.S. adults who self-identify as Hispanic or Latino have heard of the term Latinx, and just 3% say they use it to describe themselves.”
Of course, this makes sense to anyone who speaks even a modicum of Spanish, who understand that the gendered language’s nouns take on either a “masculine” or “feminine” form, the masculine often ending in “o,” and the feminine in “a.” That linguistic rule extends to more words than just “Latino,” of course – for example, “el teatro” or “theater,” is considered a masculine noun, while “la guitarra,” or “guitar,” end in “a.”
Why is this important? Well, because centuries-old language doesn’t care about your progressive feels – and neither, apparently, do the people who speak it. In fact, Pew also found that among those Hispanics polled, only 4 percent said they prefer the term “Latinx” to describe their ethnic group. Meanwhile, 29 percent – nearly six times more people – say they prefer the original “Latino,” while a full 61 percent say they like “Hispanic.” Even among those who said they were aware of the term “Latinx,” only one in 10 said they preferred the term.
Not, of course, that this will matter to those who care far more about a political and social agenda than, you know, what everyday people actually want.