Germany's Federal Anti-Discrimination Agency (FADA) is warning against prohibiting inclusive and gender-neutral language, following a recently imposed ban in the conservative southern state of Bavaria.
"Banning people from using inclusive language is a step backwards into the last century. The state should promote respect and tolerance, not prohibit it," said Ferda Ataman, Federal Commissioner for Anti-Discrimination, in a statement.
Several German states, including Bavaria, Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, Hesse and Schleswig-Holstein, have imposed or announced bans on the use of gender-inclusive language at schools, universities or in administration in recent months.
Ataman emphasised that there is no such thing as an alleged gender constraint, which bans at state level are directed against. "This is a sham debate," she said.
So-called gender bans are constitutionally problematic and serve a culture war on the backs of minorities, said Ataman.
She referred to a brief report by lawyers from the ADS. According to the report, there is a risk of violating the prohibition of gender discrimination and general personal rights by banning gender-appropriate language.
In addition, a ban at universities would interfere with academic freedom. At schools, a ban could infringe teachers' and pupils' freedom of expression and general freedom of action, the report said.
Like many European languages, German has different masculine and feminine forms for some nouns, and in the past used the masculine plural as the all-inclusive default form. For example, "Autor" is the word for a male writer, and "Autorin" a female writer. The plural forms are "Autoren" and "Autorinnen." "Autoren" was previously used to mean "writers," not just male writers.
Some have argued that "Autoren" is grammatically masculine and therefore inherently excludes female writers and non-traditional gender expressions. They therefore prefer to combine the two forms with a symbol, like an asterisk, slash, colon, underscore or internal capital letter to give: Autor*innen, Autor/innen, Autor:innen, Autor_innen or AutorInnen.
One alternative without a symbol is to write both forms with and: "Autorinnen und Autoren."
Traditionalists, like those in Bavaria, reject these changes as unnecessary.