I have a question. I haven’t had anyone give me a decent answer yet though. How do you work through a major disagreement with an editor when they are clearly wrong?

I had a very good editor work on one of my pieces quite a while ago now, and she took issue with a word because she didn’t like the word. That word was gangbanger.

She insisted it was a joke word that degraded my writing, and that it shouldn’t be used. I pointed out that the word gangbanger is the word ex-gangbangers use (I know because I’m an ex-gangbanger), it is the current term that law enforcement uses (I even double checked), and it’s the word that social workers and sociologists and criminologists use, but that didn’t persuade her.

It’s absolutely the correct word to use. She wasn’t interested and just kept stating it was a joke word. How should I as the writer handle that situation?

It matters not that she hates the word as it’s the correct word. But they were hung up on it.