The Times will begin immediately to call the former Bradley Manning by her preferred name â€" Chelsea Manning.
An e-mail on Monday night from Susan Wessling, the deputy editor who supervises the copy desk, to newsroom editors said:
“Starting tomorrow, we will move to a new formulation:
… Chelsea Manning, formerly known as Pfc. Bradley Manning…
‘Private Manning' on later references, and ‘she' for the pronoun.â€
As I wrote last week, this is a circumstance that has little if any precedent, given Private Manning's prominence in the news. Over the weekend, the executive editor Jill Abramson, appearing at the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association event in Boston, said The Times would go in this direction.
The Huffington Post reported on Tuesday that many news outlets are following the same course.
I'm glad to see The Times make this move and to do so fairly quickly. It's the right thing to do.
