Spanish views from a small town

The day was rainy and ugly. The choice was opening an umbrella, having to hold it up high to avoid hitting the people around me, or getting wet. It didn't much matter. With the umbrella open, I was also getting wet. I hadn't expected so many people to appear. But I wasn't going to leave, either. 8 March. International Women's Day. I went with my mother-in-law to my daughter's student apartment, from which the three of us went to the concentration at noon in Santiago's Praza Roxa. It's a largish area, with a one-lane street running through the middle. We were there before noon. I took my umbrella and my purple scarf, but not my rain repellant coat because it wasn't cold. We walked down to the square, where there were already quite a few people standing. There, we stood under a tall structure that protected us a bit from the incessant drizzle that threatened to become full fledged rain. But noon came and went, and people were still arriving. If there was...

For the past twenty years, or more, political correctness has infiltrated speech, and terms once simple have now become awkward landmines. Titles like chairman, mailman, fireman, steward or stewardess have now become chairperson, mail carrier, firefighter, or flight attendant. All of this has presumably been done to reflect the entry of women into almost every job and thereby their equality in the workplace, and to avoid sexism.  In Spanish it's not just the terms that have been changed, it's the grammar. I'm sure most who have studied Spanish have learned that everything has gender, and that when there is a group of something with different genders, such as people, the group is referred to in the masculine. Yes, it's sexist because it gives primacy to the masculine gender, but it's also an attempt to simplify language. And political correctness here can lead to chunky phrases that detract from the message the speaker is trying to convey. Granted that that is expe...