# Two counties divided by a common language **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 18, 2021, 11:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534 "2021-06-18T11:29:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 11:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/1 "2021-06-18T11:29:30Z")
There are many examples of this but this one really takes the biscuit: [131294201\_10158236705586430\_1643675144519166197\_n.png (739×807) (fbcdn.net)](https://scontent.fbhx4-2.fna.fbcdn.net/v/t1.6435-9/131294201_10158236705586430_1643675144519166197_n.png?_nc_cat=102&ccb=1-3&_nc_sid=730e14&_nc_ohc=EQtJ7Em9-9UAX-3pD-i&_nc_oc=AQkSzWTIHwJeMckK3Uyyh2GH061ExGEBmD_0cU47k8SJUyzMxDTsqBX-YQn1MXN1UvaOBVJ3kTKvsDGR1RKf-uRF&_nc_ht=scontent.fbhx4-2.fna&oh=86ed048379d513bdef7a6777c6a37f63&oe=60D0F1F5) ---
**Author:** ![orcenio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/orcenio/32/1036_2.png) [@orcenio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/orcenio)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 11:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/2 "2021-06-18T11:37:29Z")
[The headline is still standing](https://insider-voice.com/tom-youngs-leicester-tigers-prostitute-charged-by-rfu-after-bristol-incident-rugby-union-news/). Clearly, it wasn’t an error. ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 11:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/3 "2021-06-18T11:39:12Z")
> [@orcenio](#): > > [The headline is still standing](https://insider-voice.com/tom-youngs-leicester-tigers-prostitute-charged-by-rfu-after-bristol-incident-rugby-union-news/). Clearly, it wasn’t an error. If that was a humorous comment, you should have added a smiley face. Maybe the penny hasn’t dropped yet. ---
**Author:** ![orcenio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/orcenio/32/1036_2.png) [@orcenio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/orcenio)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 11:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/4 "2021-06-18T11:42:47Z")
I think your just in denile. ---
**Author:** ![abcdefghij](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/43a26b/32.png) [@abcdefghij](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abcdefghij)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/5 "2021-06-18T12:35:05Z")
(Humorously) misnaming a rugby position may be the [least of their problems](https://insider-voice.com/about-us/). I’m not convinced they have a native language, but it certainly isn’t English. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/6 "2021-06-18T12:39:23Z")
That looks to me like a site that just steals others’ content and runs it through a computer program to replace a few words with synonyms, so they’re less likely to get caught. ---
**Author:** ![orcenio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/orcenio/32/1036_2.png) [@orcenio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/orcenio)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/7 "2021-06-18T12:40:16Z")
The author “Mollie Scanlon” has apprently penned over 10,000 articles for the website since April 12th, 2021. I wish I could work so hard. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/8 "2021-06-18T12:42:38Z")
I’m reminded of this classic piece of internet “journalism”; > **[The Rumor Come Out: Does Bruno Mars is Gay? - Bruno Mars](https://brunomars.us/rumor-come-bruno-mars-gay/)** > > Bruno Mars is gay is the most discussed in the media in the few years ago. Even it has happened in 2012, but some of the public still curious about what is exactly happening and to be the reason there is a rumor comes out about his gay. ---
**Author:** ![orcenio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/orcenio/32/1036_2.png) [@orcenio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/orcenio)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/9 "2021-06-18T12:45:03Z")
As Trump would say: “fraudulent statements of current events” ---
**Author:** ![mcgato](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac8455/32.png) [@mcgato](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mcgato)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/10 "2021-06-18T12:56:00Z")
There was some Christian website that refused to use the word “gay,” so they auto-corrected it to “homosexual.” They then had an article about US sprinter Tyson Gay, where they referred to him as “Tyson Homosexual.” [Here is one article about it.](https://www.standard.co.uk/sport/sport-olympics/london-2012-olympics-sprinter-referred-to-as-tyson-homosexual-because-of-website-s-ban-on-word-gay-8015664.html) ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/11 "2021-06-18T14:33:01Z")
Can’t he be both? Maybe he’s a Civil War general, too. ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/12 "2021-06-18T16:28:09Z")
Talking of errors, I just noticed that I wrote ‘counties’ instead of ‘countries’. 🤯 ---
**Author:** ![abcdefghij](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/43a26b/32.png) [@abcdefghij](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abcdefghij)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/13 "2021-06-18T17:07:00Z")
I kind of enjoyed that part ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Finn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/34f0e0/32.png) [@Mark\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Finn)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/14 "2021-06-18T22:56:03Z")
There was a story about how a newspaper decided to use “African-American” rather than “black”. The financial page headline was “IBM’s earnings were in the African-American”. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/15 "2021-06-18T23:07:01Z")
Similarly, in 1994, TSR (then the publisher of the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game) decided to change the term for a class in the game from “mage” to “wizard.” They had a book in development, and they instructed someone to change the occurrences of the word “mage” to “wizard.” Unfortunately, for one section of the book, whoever did it just did a global find-and-replace, resulting in new words like “dawizard” (was “damage”) and “iwizard” (“image”). ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 8:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/16 "2021-06-19T08:39:48Z")
I believe that AOL did something similar in an attempt to eliminate bad language. This resulted in such abominations as assassinate being changed to buttbuttinate, and Moby Dick to Moby Richard. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 9:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/17 "2021-06-19T09:57:15Z")
> [@bob\_2](#): > > Talking of errors, I just noticed that I wrote ‘counties’ instead of ‘countries’. And here I assumed this thread was going to be about Long Island. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 11:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/18 "2021-06-19T11:39:06Z")
I had the same hope. > Oh Miss, I speak Jive. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/19 "2021-06-19T14:04:00Z")
> [@Mark\_Finn](#): > > There was a story about how a newspaper decided to use “African-American” rather than “black”. The financial page headline was “IBM’s earnings were in the African-American”. I remember that, but I can’t find the fact-check for it. ISTR it was The Sacramento Bee, but I’m not sure. I thought I read that someone made the change intentionally to prove a point. Or not. ---
**Author:** ![glowacks](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/glowacks/32/5548_2.png) [@glowacks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/glowacks)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2021, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534/20 "2021-06-20T03:03:29Z")
In case you’re confused about this like me… > **[Website blunder labels Tigers captain as 'prostitute'](https://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/news/leicester-news/website-blunder-labels-leicester-tigers-5535920)** > > It's not the first time they've translated the rugby union position incorrectly either [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/two-counties-divided-by-a-common-language/944534.md?page=2)