Political correctness is damaging our language
Correcting the self-censoring autocue has become an act of resistance. The formidable BBC newsreader Martine Croxall discovered as much when she amended a gender-neutral teleprompter line about 'pregnant people' to say 'women' during a live broadcast. Her quick-thinking was enthusiastically picked up on social media, praised by no less than JK Rowling, the Harry Potter author, and hailed as a fightback against the creeping encroachment of woke language.
For very new readers, it behoves us to point out that only females become pregnant. True, there was once a well-regarded Saatchi & Saatchi advertising campaign featuring men disguised as expectant mothers but this was making a political point about men making decisions about women's bodies. The fundamental biological differences have not been changed either by BBC News style guides or National Health Service gender self-identification rules (which render expectant women as 'birthing persons').
What has changed is that language is becoming increasingly caged, for fear of causing offence. Anne Robinson, former presenter of The Weakest Link quiz show, found that language once seen as funny or edgy ('I never let a thought go unsaid') was later viewed as cruel or bullishly blunt. The hypersensitivity of a few is constraining language and creating a pablum of double-speak.
• BBC bosses back Martine Croxall over 'pregnant people' correction
The result is that the likes of Ms Croxall must add paralinguistic signals, such as the arching of a brow or the rolling of an eyeball, to distance themselves from the prepared text on the autocue. There is charm in these subversive gestures; few have forgotten the interviewer Jeremy Paxman's curled lip as he struggled to remain courteous. But too much ground has been surrendered in the name of political correctness. The result is damaging our language and clouding our expression.
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