Humans evolved from monkeys

[God of Mr. Hanky]

The response above would be small dollops of truth interspersed with deep pools of bullshit.  The first three sentences most closely approach the truth, and the rest is trash. 

The rest is him telling you that we -should- call the ancestors prior to that monkeys...seems like he knows that we don't.  Apes aren't a type of old world monkey and there is no "should be" about it.  

Prosimians aren't "just as much a monkey" as a monkey..if they were, we'd call them monkeys, like all the other monkeys.  We call them prosimians...and there -are- prosimians alive today which we call..wait for it, prosimians.  

Primates aren't "just as much a monkey" as a monkey either.  I'm a primate, but I'm not "just as much a monkey" as a baboon..which is a monkey.  The very real and demonstrable differences between myself and, say, a baboon..are why we refer to ourselves with different terms.

We didn't make these differences up, we had no say in the ways that a monkey and an ape are different.  The terms exist only to describe what differences we find.  

That it has anything to do with not offending people is ridiculous, people are offended anyway...hell, this guy is offended that we -don't- get to call people monkeys.  I guess you just can't make everyone happy?

If you want an easily-grasped, fun way to understand these differences and see a "picture" of human evolution from our shrew-like ancestors, read Evolution by Stephen Baxter. It's sci-fi, but it starts with the story of Purgatorius a proto-primate who watches the fall of the asteroid that kills the dinosaurs, tells the story of various species we've discovered along the way from a first-person perspective, and then projects human evolution into a speculative future about our extinction.

It's just science-fiction, but I found it completely engrossing, and it may help you have a better picture of what scientists are talking about.

I don't think Baxter gets half the credit that he deserves, he's one of the most intelligent and scientifically-credible sci-fi writers of all time!