“Employees” – Audi wins process because of gender language guidelines

The district court of Ingolstadt has dismissed a lawsuit against a guideline for gender-fair language at Audi AG. An employee of the parent company VW, who has to work with Audi colleagues, had sued the car manufacturer. He was bothered by the fact that Audi employees used gender forms with an underscore (“employees”) when communicating with him about the guidelines – the so-called gender gap.

As the civil chamber decided on Friday, the plaintiff has no right to injunctive relief. The presiding judge emphasized that the VW employee is not obliged to actively use the guide because it is only aimed at Audi employees. Even the fact that the plaintiff was passively affected was not enough for the court. There is no right for him “to be left alone,” said the judge. The process had attracted attention in Germany because there are also guidelines for the use of gender-sensitive language in other companies. The plaintiff announced that he now wants to review the verdict with his lawyers. “I explicitly do not rule out that there are further steps,” he said of possible legal remedies. If he appeals, the Munich Higher Regional Court would have to deal with the case again. “Gender language must be legible” The plaintiff also said, regardless of the legal process, that he wished there to be a discussion about the correct gender forms. He rejects the gender specifications used at Audi because they lead to new injustice. “That cannot be the last word of wisdom.” He also emphasized that gender language must also be legible. Last year, the car manufacturer issued the company directive on gender language. Alluding to a well-known Audi advertising slogan, the guideline is “Vorsprung begins in the head”. The company justified the language requirements in March 2021 by saying that this is a sign of equality and better reflects gender diversity. “From now on, Audi would like to make gender-sensitive formulations ubiquitous in internal and external written Audi communication,” it said. At the oral hearing in June, an amicable agreement between the parties failed. The lawyers for Audi AG refused to remove the gender forms from all emails to the VW process manager and the accompanying attachments. This is not practicable, they said. Form of gendering is controversial The lawsuit against Audi was supported by the German Language Association, which is controversial among experts and which generally rejects gendering and speaks of an “ideology”. Other language maintenance organizations see a need for gendering, but appeal to compliance with grammatical rules. For example, the Society for German Language sees a double naming (“employees”) as positive, the underscore in the word or the gender asterisk (“employees”) ), however, problematic. The plaintiff in the Audi case also emphasized that he was not against gendering if the rules of grammar were not violated.
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