> these initiatives are not about what the law requires.
Except they are. Your word list is an exceedingly literal straw-man interpretation of a law that is purposefully vague, and doesn’t prescribe which words you can use. You can’t assume that specific policies of a company aren’t there for legal reasons just because the law doesn’t state the exact same policy in the exact same words.
The spirit and the letter of the law, as I already pointed out, requires that employers take “reasonable” actions toward making all employees feel welcome. Society and business have collectively decided that certain words can or do make some people feel unwelcome. Because of that fact, and because companies don’t want their management sued for neglect, we have interpretations of what it means to be compliant that are predictive and speculative. That really does not mean that the initiatives are not about the law, in fact exactly the opposite. Asking people not to use certain words counts as one of those “reasonable” actions, and gives the company a paper trail of attempting to be compliant.
Except they are. Your word list is an exceedingly literal straw-man interpretation of a law that is purposefully vague, and doesn’t prescribe which words you can use. You can’t assume that specific policies of a company aren’t there for legal reasons just because the law doesn’t state the exact same policy in the exact same words.
The spirit and the letter of the law, as I already pointed out, requires that employers take “reasonable” actions toward making all employees feel welcome. Society and business have collectively decided that certain words can or do make some people feel unwelcome. Because of that fact, and because companies don’t want their management sued for neglect, we have interpretations of what it means to be compliant that are predictive and speculative. That really does not mean that the initiatives are not about the law, in fact exactly the opposite. Asking people not to use certain words counts as one of those “reasonable” actions, and gives the company a paper trail of attempting to be compliant.