"West Sea"

[Jonathan Lighter]

CNN now calls what was once the "Yellow Sea," the "West Sea."

Is "Yellow Sea" now considered offensive?

Acc. to Wikipedia, the name (translated from Korean) comes from the golden
tint of the waters, which is imparted by the down-flowing sands of the Gobi
Desert.

"West Sea," of course, is blatantly ethnocentric. The area may be west of
Korea, but it is equally east of China. That makes it part of the
ethnocentric "East China Sea." Is it west or is it east? Up or down?
Someone must decide.

And while they're at it, there's the Black Sea, the Red Sea, and the
transparently imperialist White Sea.


JL



--
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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