> "Staff at the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) have been told to avoid using the term climate change in their work, with the officials instructed to reference “weather extremes” instead."
That sounds more like a branding guideline for employees than censorship of a topic. But, as you said, this doesn't apply to normal citizens and presumably is done so that the spokespeople seem like they're on the same page.
No, that's clearly censorship. Climate change had a different contextual meaning than extreme weather. One indicates that the climate is on a path towards something different, the other indicates events outside the norm but no overall change. This is an attempt by the Trump administration to cover up the fact that humans are fucking ourselves, so that their corporate overlords may continue to reverse-Robinhood the masses.
I'm not saying that I agree with it, but this is an agency with leaders who have a say in the wording that their employees use in public documents.
It's not censorship, it's just stupid leadership and it's from ephemeral positions that our democracy can be used to reverse by putting people with sane policies in place.
That sounds more like a branding guideline for employees than censorship of a topic. But, as you said, this doesn't apply to normal citizens and presumably is done so that the spokespeople seem like they're on the same page.