Just when you thought woke scolds could not possibly become any more intrusive, Microsoft embeds a political correctness checker in Word:

When switched on, spelling mistakes are underlined in red, grammar errors in blue and “inclusiveness” issues in purple. …

The checker can be turned on and off in a menu called “Grammar & Refinements”, which lists everything it checks: Age bias, Cultural bias, Ethnic slurs, Gender bias, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Gender-Specific Language, Racial Bias, Sexual Orientation Bias and Socioeconomic Bias.

Examples:

Users who write “Mrs Thatcher” are told it “may imply gender bias” and are prompted to change it to the supposedly less offensive “Ms Thatcher”.

And the phrase astronaut Neil Armstrong uttered when he became the first person on the moon is not deemed acceptable.

Rather than “one giant leap for mankind”, he should have said “humankind” or “humanity”.

The word “mankind” is deemed thoughtcrime by our Big Tech overlords.

It also proposes changing “maid” — used for centuries to describe female housekeepers — to “house cleaner”.

Others to change include “headmaster” (Word suggests “principal”), “mistress” (“lover”), “master” (“expert”), “manpower” (“workforce”) and “heroine” (“hero”).

The aptly named digital strategist John Bull praises the political correctness checker:

“Your spellchecker will now help you to start overcoming your subconscious biases. It’s a brilliant feature.”

The allegedly brilliant feature is included in the latest version of Office 365. Future versions might provide electric shocks through the keyboard to those who type words that have been deleted from the Newspeak Dictionary, the better to cure us of our subconscious biases.

On a tip from Mr. Freemarket.