Britain’s flagship tourism agency has told workers that in order to foster a “culture of belonging”, they must not use words such as ‘blindspot’, ‘blackspot’ and ‘man hours’, as the language is not inclusive. Many other words and phrases used for generations are also “no longer acceptable”, it claims.
As reported by the Mail, instead of ‘man hours’, travel agency VisitBritain told firms hosting guests from overseas to say ‘person hours’ as to not to offend anyone.
The travel agency’s formal role is to grow Britain’s visitor economy and encourage tourists to explore the country. It also advises the Government on tourism, providing research and insights into the industry.
According to its 50-page language guide for staff, the word ‘blacklist’ should be replaced by ‘deny list’ and ‘blindspot’ by ‘missed opportunity’.
VisitBritain – which is funded by the government’s Department for Culture, Media and Sport – also warned not to use the term ‘guru’ as it is said to have been appropriated from Hindu culture. Instead, the £54million-a-year taxpayer funded agency said to use the term ‘expert’.
Last year, VisitBritain issued an ‘accessible and inclusive’ toolkit for those in the tourism business.
In the 2023 information pack, the section of ‘inclusive language’ encouraged using positive language when asking about disabilities.
It warned people against using negative language such as ‘suffers from’, ‘is a victim of’, ‘handicapped’, ‘invalid’, ‘crippled by’ or ‘wheelchair bound’.
But the new guidance goes a step further, giving business partners a list of words they can and cannot say.
To avoid offending people with disabilities, the word ‘lame’ should not be used in a derogatory manner, with the agency suggesting ‘uncool’ or ‘cheesy’ as an alternative.
In the place of using ‘sanity check’, VisitBritain advised saying ‘confidence check’, and instead of saying ‘man up’, telling people to ‘be brave’.
Similarly, it advises workers to say ‘everyone’ or ‘team’ instead of using the term ‘guys’ to describe a group, despite it being commonly used in an all encompassing manner for all genders.
The blacklist was sent to the guys at the agency’s partners to ‘help shape the future’ of the events hosted.
The move comes one month after MP Penny Mordaunt told Whitehall chiefs to stop using woke language in official documents.
In a letter to permanent secretaries, the Commons leader said official bodies should avoid using ‘gender neutral language’ in contexts where traditional words like mother and father would be more accurate.
In her letter to Whitehall chiefs, Ms Mordaunt said the same rules should apply to all official documents, including those produced by Whitehall departments and arms-length bodies like Ofsted, the Office for National Statistics and the Environment Agency.
Ms Mordaunt said that the “huge progress made on gender equality means it is right to avoid using language that assumes only a man or a woman could perform a particular role”.
But she added: “However, there are a great many contexts in which a person’s biological sex is highly relevant and, in these circumstances, gender neutral language should be avoided.”
She pointed out that the guidance “states that, for example, in the context of pregnancy or women’s health, departments should avoid replacing a term like ‘woman’ with gender neutral terms such as ‘person’.
“In contexts such as these, sex-specific language should take precedence”.
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