Google: the new language police
Google Docs will now prompt users to use gender-neutral terms in their writing.
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Spell-checking software has spared many blushes by pointing out typos and poor grammar. Soon it will be used to spot politically incorrect language.
As part of a new update, Google Docs will prompt users to make their writing more ‘inclusive’. The software will suggest they change terms like ‘mailman’ and ‘chairman’ to gender-neutral ones like ‘mail carrier’ and ‘chairperson’.
Thank God spell check is turning wokehttps://t.co/xREpcGwaFT
— Paddy Hannam (@paddyhannam) May 19, 2021
Google announced the changes at its annual I/O developer conference, which began on Tuesday. Sundar Pichai – CEO of Google’s parent company, Alphabet – said he wanted social justice to be a priority for the business.
In 2018, Google purged gendered pronouns like ‘he’ and ‘she’ from Gmail’s predictive-text feature, after staff raised concerns that it might wrongly predict someone’s gender. The horror!
Now, Google wants to ensure all your documents are gender-neutral, and that you don’t use your PC to type un-PC language.
Picture by: Getty.
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