The League’s bill: fine for anyone who writes “avvocata” or “sindaca” in public documents

Neither mayor, nor lawyer, nor police commissioner. The League is working on a bill entitled Provisions for the protection of the Italian language, with respect to gender differences and what does he want? ban, in public documents, “the feminine gender for neologisms applied to institutional titles of the State, to military ranks, to professional titlesto honors, and to the roles identified by acts having the force of law”. On the other hand, Giorgia Meloni also prefers a “universal masculine”, and has chosen to use the article “il” in her official press releases: «the» Prime Minister Giorgia Meloniand not “the” Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.

The draft, signed by the Lega senator Manfredi Potenti, also provides for a fine for those who do not respect the rule: «The violation of the obligations set out in this law entails the application of a administrative pecuniary sanction consisting of the payment of a sum from 1,000 to 5,000 euros».

This law, according to the League, aims to “preserve the integrity of the Italian language and in particular, avoid the improper modification of public titles, such as “Mayor”, “Prefect”, “Questor”, “Lawyer” from the “symbolic” attempts to adapt their definition to the different sensibilities of the time”, as written in the draft. “It is necessary to prevent the legitimate battle for gender equality, in order to achieve visibility and consensus in society, from resorting to these excesses that do not respect the institutions”. For this reason, the League has deemed “a regulatory intervention necessary that implies a containment of creativity in the use of the Italian language in the documents of the institutions”.

Article 3 establishes the “prohibition of discretionary recourse to the feminine or overextended form or to any linguistic experimentation. The use of the double form or the universal masculine is permitted, to be understood in a neutral sense and without any sexist connotation”. Article 1 states that the objective is “to preserve the public administration from literal deformations deriving from the need to affirm gender equality in public texts”.

Source: Vanity Fair

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