Soltalk November 2022 | Page 26

Jottings

News from the UK and around the World
. . . the wild , the wacky , the wonderful , the weird and the downright infuriating
Woke Updates
Your Jottings team has suffered déjà vu in recent weeks thanks to a decision by the UK ’ s Local Government Association to get in on the act by , “ embedding equality , equity , diversity and inclusion .” An 18-page language guide has been sent to 359 Councils in England and Wales listing words and phrases which are now considered to be unacceptable alongside their approved replacements .
The term BAME ( black , Asian and minority ethnic ) is out , together with “ minorities ” and “ multicultural ,” to be replaced by “ global majority communities .” Council employees face blacklisting if they refer to “ illegal immigrant ” or “ economic migrant ” with “ non-UK resident ” given as the approved alternative . ( Can we still say blacklisting , by the way ?) “ Foreign ” and “ second generation ” sound fine , but they ’ re on the blacklist as well . ( Oops , used that word again .)
Transport for London were at it as well last month with their language guide for staff . The guidelines are reported to instruct staff to use , “ gender-neutral language where possible , only including gender if necessary .” Out go the terms “ youngsters ” and “ elderly ,” replaced with “ young people ” and “ older .” Certain phases , such as “ road traffic accident ” should not be used it says and instead suggests “ road traffic incident ” as a replacement . Similarly , the word “ accident ” should be avoided and staff members should instead use “ collision .”
These new guides follow the obsession demonstrated by the British National Health Service , previously highlighted in this column , which seems to have deleted women entirely from its work vocabulary . As Richard Littlejohn in the Daily Mail put it , “ The wokerati are not content rewriting the language . They are now rewriting history and human biology , too .”
Festive wokery
Christmas is coming . Your Jottings team can confirm this after seeing the first commercials for Easter eggs on TV . But the festive season is already the subject of woke watchers in the French town of Strasbourg , famous for its 500-year-old Christmas market which attracts around two million visitors every year .
24