Gender-based German language row anything but neutral

The spirit of Malcom Tucker – the fictional spindoctor in the BBC comedy The Thick of It – is haunting German politics, in particular his love of political initiatives that “look good and cost nothing”.

On Monday, the same day Germany legalised cannabis for personal use, Bavaria banned so-called “gender-neutral language” in schools and public bodies.

“Language should be clear and understandable for all,” said Bavaria’s ruling Christian Social Union (CSU), something it feels is not always the case with gender-neutral language.

This is the term for various spelling formulas devised to correct the default masculine in the German language.

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The German word for teacher, for instance, is Lehrer – the male form – while a female teacher is Lehrerin. If someone refers to Lehrer, are they referring only to men? No, say one camp, pointing to what is called Germany’s generic masculine. But critics disagree. To sidestep what they see as potential male bias leaking from language into thinking, why not modify words accordingly: LehrerIn, Lehrer:in, Lehrer*in or Lehrer_in?

Some have embraced the latter two forms – asterisk and underscore – to ensure everyone is addressed, including those who do not identify with the binary male or female genders.

Debated in Germany since the 1970s, gender-neutral language – and its special characters – has become more visible in everyday use in the last decade.

Some welcome this as a sign of the times, reflecting the diversity previously hidden in society.

Many critics of the trend, meanwhile, argue that texts filled with special characters look ugly. Others view the shift as ideologically problematic.

For Bavarian interior minister Winfried Hermann, the new ban challenges the “missionary zeal” of activists to create “moral pressure and, effectively, force” people to use gender-neutral language.

So far the new measure is restricted to Bavarian state body publications, websites and correspondence, as well as school communications and schoolbooks.

Bavaria’s teacher union president Simone Fleischmann said she was “relieved” to read that the ban will not affect the individual written texts of school pupils.

Noting that many young people have embraced gender-neutral language, she told BR public television “it wasn’t possible to hold back a societal development with language police”.

As yet it is unclear how far Bavaria’s new rules will be policed on a day-to-day level – and what punishments are likely for gender language rebels.

The move doesn’t affect universities in the same way, though Munich plans provisions to ensure students can avoid gender-neutral language without penalty.

So far the ban is most popular among Germany’s conservative-run states: introduced in eastern Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt last year, while Bavaria’s neighbouring state of Hesse plans to introduce its own ban soon.

In Berlin, the capital’s mayor Kai Wegener insists his city state government will take a live-and-let-live approach.

Surveys show about three-quarters of Germans reject gender-neutral language in its various forms. Berlin’s Tagesspiegel newspaper, which once described gender neutral language as a “human right”, announced recently it is abandoning the obligatory use of gender asterisks, colons and underscores because too many readers were cancelling their subscriptions in protest.

This scepticism is shared by Germany’s leading language body; unlike France, however, it has no binding oversight powers for spelling and grammar.

The German language thrives on neglect, it seems, which is exactly as it should be, according to Prof Petra Wagner, a phoneticist at the University of Bielefeld: “We should allow language shifts to happen on their own.”

For Bavarian critics of the plan, the ban is a clear case of dog-whistle politics from Bavarian prime minister Markus Söder.

Announcing his gender-neutral language ban in a parliamentary speech last month, Mr Söder moved on to warn about mainstream politicians co-operating with extremists, such as the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD).

Looking back to German politics of a century ago, Mr Söder said: “Whoever tears down the firewall [to extremists] will be the first to burn.”

Minutes later, AfD parliamentary party leader Katrin Ebner-Steiner noted that Bavaria’s gender-neutral language regime “sounds like an excerpt from our party programme”.

“I would like to congratulate our voters,” she joked. “The AfD is working.”

The opposition Social Democratic Party (SPD) agreed with the far-right politician, calling the gender-language law a “populist pseudo debate to distract from our staggering teacher shortage”.

Tucker would be proud of Mr Söder: teachers are pricey, while a gender-neutral language ban looks good – for some at least – and costs nothing. Unless it collapses and becomes that other Tuckerism: an omnishambles.

[ Fintan O'Toole: Refusing to address someone by their preferred pronouns may not be unlawful, but it is rude ]