Eurasia or not

[Big RR]

Or even more to the point, why don't we call our calendar the Gregorian Calendar honoring the pope who had it designed and implemented, although a bit later in Great Britain and the US? Is it to strip the context of why it is in use?

[Crackpot]

My problem isn't the replacement of calanders it's the sanitation of historical references for no good reason. As I said you want to start a new calander go ahead but don't scrub the history fom an already existing one.

[Sue U]

I've already got a calendar that's been in use for more than 2500 years, but I'm not insisting that everyone who uses it call this the 5774th year since creation of the world ("anno mundi"), even though that's the supposed basis for its calculation.

[oldr_n_wsr]

I think time should go metric.

[Scooter]

Yes it is in common use but to rename it "Common Era" strips the context of why it is in common use. Like it or not the dating system we use is because of the primacy of the the Catholic Church over much of the last two millenniums for good and bad. And in my opinion changing the name separates us from that history. At worst doing so echoes some of the worst cultural crimes the Catholic church committed to our collective history the systematic co-opting and sanitizing of "unpopular" history to suit current cultural ideals.

But you could argue the same about pretty much every calendar that has been created. Someone thought that the time it takes the earth to revolve around the sun should be called a year (even before they knew that was what they were doing), and pretty much every calendar since has done the same. Someone thought that using the lunar cycles would make pretty handy divisions for months, and monthly divisions of roughly that length have been used ever since. The time of rotation of the earth on its axis made a nifty length for a day, and seven of those days made what some people thought was a reasonable length for a week (some making it an article of religious dogma, even), and most forms of calendar proposed since have stuck with that.

I don't think you would insist that everyone who uses a seven day week must for all time label every seventh day as a "Sabbath", just because that was how it was done for thousands of years in large parts of the world. I don't think there is any more cause to insist on retaining the labels that were first applied to years before and after a dividing line that bears no true relationship to the event for which those labels came to be applied in the first place.

ETA -

My problem isn't the replacement of calanders it's the sanitation of historical references for no good reason.

It's not a reason that makes enough sense for you. Can you accept that those who use the alternative terminology believe that they are doing so for a reason that makes sense to them, and that it has nothing to do with dissing a belief system that you subscribe to?

[Econoline]

I like to think of "Common" as really being "Christian" (although that's not accurate but it makes me happy). Common or Christian is rather like "Eurasia" vs "Europe and Asia" - it's just a thought pattern in people's heads.

If it makes people feel better I propose
BCE = Before Common Era = Before Christian Era
CE = Common Era = Christian Era.

As I've already pointed out, it's quite accurate and historically authentic to use the term "Christian Era"...

The first so-far-discovered usage of "Christian Era" is as the Latin phrase aerae christianae on the title page of a 1584 theology book.[38] In 1649, the Latin phrase æræ Christianæ appeared in the title of an English almanac.[39] A 1652 ephemeris is the first instance so-far-found for English usage of "Christian Era"

... and a happy coincidence that the abbreviation for it is the same as for "Common Era"--so if you use the abbreviation, no one will ever know for sure which term you are abbreviating.

Also too, it just seems really strange (to me, anyway) to use a Latin term for the positive (later) years and an English term for the negative (earlier) years.

[liberty]

Reference yahoo news: Progress in solving this problem could send oil prices sharply lower, according to the Eurasia Group risk assessment consultancy.
CNBC Politics & Government Iran China

[liberty]

Do you know what, I just went way too far with this last night by getting way too personal. This entire controversy completely baffles me, and that came out in the worst way in my responses, and I apologize.

Wow Scooter , congratulations

There is nothing said or insinuated on this site or most others, for that matter, that is worth the slightest increase Blood pressure. Instead we should enjoy the discussion and occasionally learn something.

[MajGenl.Meade]

it just seems really strange (to me, anyway) to use a Latin term for the positive (later) years and an English term for the negative (earlier) years.

Maybe "Ante Christos" sounded a bit too much like.....? Or is that Greek?