AP deletes ‘the French' tweet and apologises after it is widely mocked

The Associated Press, the biggest news agency in the United States, has apologised after it was ridiculed for warning journalists against referring to "the French".

The AP stylebook Twitter account had recommended writers avoid using "the" in phrases like "the disabled, the poor and the French".

It said this could be dehumanising.

The French embassy responded by briefly changing its name to the "Embassy of Frenchness in the United States".

"We just wondered what the alternative to the French would be," Pascal Confavreux, the embassy spokesman, told the New York Times. "I mean, really." read more