The observant reader already knows where this is going. We have an Olympic athlete, whose last name is Gay, being run through a politically correct software package without human intervention such that we now have articles that read:

"Homosexual eases into 100 final at Olympic trials"

"Homosexual runs wind-aided 9.68 seconds to make Olympics"

"...Homosexual misjudged the finish in his opening heat, and had to scramble to finish fourth..."

True, is the case here that the problem has multiple levels; automation, and political correctness being the two of them, but there is also a third; the fact that when you run an existing article through this software, you are changing the words of someone else without their authorization. It seems to me that if you are using someone else's words, you need to either one, request permission to change them, or two, acknowledge that you are editing the article, and what the purpose is for the editing when it is published. To just make the wholesale changes is akin to Photoshopping someone else's words.

To me, this is a fundamental problem that I see at times on the Web; people want to use your words but not the way you say them. They do not want to take the time to rewrite it in a way that fits their own views; that would require work on their part, so instead they take an existing story and "make it better."

While that is not in and of itself, plagiarism, it is journalistic dishonesty, and it is something that should not be tolerated. To me it is unethical and, in general, wrong to do. When you read something next time, be aware that you could hear the author say "I didn't really say everything I said."