Gender-sensitive language: SRF uses special characters only for boys
Swiss Radio and Television (SRF) is dispensing with the gender asterisk in its classic radio and TV programs. According to the ombudsman's office, a colon as a special character and as a placeholder to include male, female and diverse-gendered persons will be used primarily in social media content in the future.
Spellings such as "Parlamentarier:innen" and "Politiker:innen" are only used by SRF where a younger audience is addressed, according to a statement published Wednesday by the Ombudsman's Office of SRG Deutschschweiz. The latter is more familiar with this form of gender language.
The background to the statement is several feedbacks with criticism of the use of gender-appropriate language at the broadcaster, as the ombudsman's office wrote. SRF had revised its journalistic guidelines in this regard during the current year.
SRF wants to take equality into account and dispense with the generic masculine, in which women are merely "included". In the radio and TV programs, both forms ("politicians") or gender-neutral formulations ("demonstrators") should therefore be used whenever possible.
The ombudsman's office explained that language is constantly changing and that the generic masculine is no longer appropriate - even though the adjustments may disrupt the flow of language. Language and thought, it said, influence each other. "Those who think women are included in generic masculine ignore research that has proven otherwise: Children draw scientists as men, not women." (SDA)
