AP again clarifies tweet advising that writing 'the French' is 'dehumanizing'

That'd be rather "islamophobic" as well as an example of cultural appropriation, now wouldn't it? Croissants got their half-moon shape after the half-moon on the flag of the Ottoman empire (i.e. the Turkish flag) in celebration of beating off the Ottoman siege of Vienna. The story goes that its origins date from 1683 when Vienna was under siege by the Ottomans. The Grand Vizir decided to invade the town by digging underground tunnels beneath its foundations but one of the tunnels was dug close to a bakery. The bakers alerted the Viennese guard who sounded the alarm and the invasion attempt was thwarted whereupon the Ottomans lifted the siege and left the outskirts of the town. The Viennese decided to celebrate this by creating a new pastry symbolising the depiction of the crescent moon on the Ottoman flag, hence the name “croissant”.

I disagree.

I don't see the difference between "the poor" and "people who are poor." As described in the cambridgeblog post, the problem is the underlying issue (e.g., being poor), not necessarily the phrases used to describe the issue.

I suppose you can say that, as time progresses, certain terms are saddled with unnecessary pejorative baggage (e.g., "retarded"), so I can understand the desire to swap in a new term that doesn't have the baggage. But sometimes it seems that the difference is so fine (e.g., between "the poor" and "poor people") that I don't have the resolving power to tell the difference.