The city of Zurich votes on the battle for inclusive writing

Published on November 5, 2024 at 1:06 p.m. / Modified on November 5, 2024 at 1:11 p.m.

For several years, the German-speaking world, like the French-speaking world, has been struggling with this question: what about inclusive writing? And above all what about its use in official communications?

In June 2022, the city of Zurich – firmly anchored on the left – decided. By taking part in favor of greater inclusiveness. The internal regulations governing the activities of the municipality’s 31,000 employees introduced the Gender star – “gender star” – a symbol for separating a word to “consider women, men and non-binary people equally”. Example: die Zurich residents – German equivalent of Zurichois.es. Perfectly normal for some, scandalous for others, the reform arouses the ire of conservatives, whose initiative “Bye gender star» now wishes to “prohibit the use of special characters in authorities’ texts”, while demanding from them “clear, understandable and readable language”. The population of Zurich, the first to be consulted on the subject in Switzerland, will decide on November 24.

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