!['Anti-racism experts' declare if you use words such as 'savage,' 'spooky,' 'blackmail,' or 'ghetto,' you haven't quite made the woke squad yet](https://www.theblaze.com/media-library/anti-racism-experts-declare-if-you-use-words-such-as-savage-spooky-blackmail-or-ghetto-you-haven-t-quite-made-the.jpg?id=28136137&width=1245&height=700&quality=85&coordinates=0%2C0%2C0%2C19)
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Just in case you've been hard at work on your "Things I Need to Change in My Life to Get Woke" list, here's a little addition featuring words that "experts" in "anti-racism and language" say you should consider never uttering again.
The Ottawa branch of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation said it listed words and phrases submitted by readers and some CBC journalists who are black, indigenous, and people of color — and then talked to "anti-racism and language experts" who said some of the entries "can be hurtful to various groups of people."
Ai Taniguchi — a linguist and an associate language studies professor with University of Toronto Mississauga — told CBC that saying "'I didn't know it was racist' does not eliminate the pain of the hearer. As language users, we have the social responsibility to monitor the impact our utterances have on others, especially when it involves a marginalized group."
So, what's on the un-woke word and phrase list?
Joseph Smith — an anti-racism trainer and educator — told the network that "blackmail," "blacklist," and "black sheep" possess meanings related to "evil, distrust, lack of intelligence, ignorance, a lack beauty — the absence of white."
He added to the CBC that even prior to the transatlantic slave trade the word "black" became "associated with a particular group of people, and that group of people received all that negative connotation. That's why we try to move away from these kinds of terms."
The experts told the network said that words like "whitelist" and "blacklist" can be replaced by "block-list" or "deny-list."
Smith added to the CBC that terms like "ghetto" and "inner city" come from the idea that they're "where less refined people lived — the people who weren't up to date culturally, development-wise." Such places also connoted danger while the suburbs were seen as safer, the network said.
The term "spook" — besides its use in ghost stories and during Halloween — has a history as an anti-black slur beginning with black soldiers being called "spooks" during World War II, the CBC said.
The term "savage" has become popular on social media as it's often used to describe someone who is "fierce, or a situation that is intense — and carries a positive or semi-positive connotation," the network said.
But Smith told the CBC that colonizers used "savage" as a way of differentiating themselves — "the epitome of refinement, intelligence, spirituality" — from indigenous, black, and other people of color.
The network was far from done with its un-woke list. The others entries are: