There's something called the "etymological fallacy." A word must mean etymology. Words change meanings--but typically it's a agreed-upon change.
Changes in meaning often happen through ignorance. Take the expression "stay the course." Overwhelming ignorance of the phrase's meaning lead a few reporters (English majors, no doubt) to assume it meant "don't change the course," don't change your actions or plans. They used it in a way that could only really mean that. "Bush is 'staying the course' instead of changing his plans." The phrase, however, was precisely parallel to "stay the night", whatever happens to your plans while your guest is there. "Stay the course" was a horse-track term. A horse that finished its course instead of dropping out and stopping would "stay the course."
"Anti-Semitic" was coined to mean specifically "anti-Jewish" and that's what it meant exclusively for well over a hundred years, and pretty much means today (except in little closed-off pockets of self-reinforcing and self-justifying social networks). However, sone people found they were being termed "anti-Semitic" for calling for actions that would lead to the de-facto "decolonialization" of Palestine, if only because they were close allies with people who tended to yell out "Death to the Jews". They thought this was a bad thing. And realized that Arabs were also Semites and so they wanted to neuter the term. More Worf-Sapir gibberish-think. If you dispose of the term you dispose of the idea. (Which, of course, means that no new ideas can ever arise, because if you don't already have a term for the idea you can't have the idea. So what we had 25k years ago are all the ideas we can ever have. So much for iPhones. I expect them to go "poof" and vanish immediately if the strong version of Worf-Sapir is true. ... No, mine's still there. Perhaps it'll take a moment longer. ... No, sorry. It's still sitting there, un-vanished.)
It's like "racism". It's a term that's perceived, but often the racists themselves don't think they're racist. "Arabs are also Semites" is really rather like "but how can I be racist when I have black friends?" In some cases it's overused and the erstwhile "racists" are just being insulted because there's no other good way to make them shut up or get them ignored for saying unpleasant things. Sometimes a real racist will have a real, fact-based objection to some policy that isn't racist. (It happens that even racists are right sometimes, and on occasion those "sometimes" involve policies that involve race. But who wants to agree with a racist? Ugh. It's like wanting to agree with an anti-Semite. Better guilt by association ... No, wait, that makes us fascist. Arghhh!!!! My self-perception of ideological purity and superiority is being tainted!!!!!!!)
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