If if is done manually, it is an active check. If it happens automatically, it is a passive check. That is the full determination of those labels. Anything said to try to explain your way out of calling something that happened automatically "passive" is blatant falsehood, no matter who it comes from, devs and WotC included. If you don't want it to be called a passive check, then it needs the player to manually initiate it with an intentionally used action.
You are applying definitions used in the real world to a fantasy world that uses its own definitions. The etymological semantics are completely irrelevant to the discussion. In DnD a passive check does not involve dice rolls. An active check does. Get off your grammatical high horse and understand that the real world and the DnD world are not the same.
