AP apparently refuses to call "macaca" a racial slur

I owe an apology to Associated Press reporter Nedra Pickler.

On Tuesday, Pickler reported on the fact that President Bush intended to fundraise for Virginia Sen. George Allen, he of the infamous Macaca Incident. In her piece, Pickler had this to say about the word "macaca":

Macaca is a genus of monkeys including macaques. The name also could be spelled Makaka, which is a city in South Africa.

My response to Pickler was unkind. I ridiculed her abilities as a journalist and as a functioning adult human being.

How, I wondered, could Pickler possibly think that the controversy over Allen's remark has anything at all to do with the name of a city in South Africa?

Well, Nedra Pickler is not the only AP reporter whose characterization of the word "macaca" misses the target. Consider the following passage from a story today by the AP's Bob Lewis:

Macaca is a genus of monkeys including macaques. The name also could be spelled Makaka, which is a city in South Africa.

Look familiar?

It appears that the fault for failing to characterize "macaca" as what it is, a racial insult, lies not with the reporter in this case. It appears the Associated Press has made an editorial decision that this is the way the word will be defined. It is certainly possible that Bob Lewis liked Pickler's phrasing so much that he did not hesitate to lift it completely for his own use. Maybe the AP doesn't consider it plagiarism if you're only stealing from a co-worker. I tend to doubt that, though.

Apparently, the Associated Press simply prefers to ignore the fact that the word "macaca" is a racial slur, and that George Allen would likely know this due to the fact that his mother is from Tunisia, where light-skinned people use the word to refer to dark-skinned people.

For some reason, the AP feels it makes more sense to suggest that the word "macaca" is offensive to dark-skinned people because it sounds like the name of a city in South Africa.

I apologize to Nedra Pickler for attacking her over something that appears to be an editorial decision by her employer, rather than a failure of her abilities as a journalist.