"Calibri does convey a sense of casualness — and more so, modernity — that is not appropriate for the U.S. State Department. And I do not buy the argument that Calibri is somehow more accessible for those with low vision or reading disabilities. People with actual accessibility needs should be catered to, but they need more than a sans serif typeface, and their needs should not primarily motivate the choice for the default typeface."
Official departmental paperwork shouldn't look clownish.
The same John Gruber that, quote tweeting a news article about Israel closing off phone and internet services to Gazans, wrote "Fuck around and find out"
> And I do not buy the argument that Calibri is somehow more accessible for those with low vision or reading disabilities
Oh well that settles it, John Gruber doesn’t buy the argument. Wrap it up and let’s head home, folks, this one’s settled, no need to refer to any actual research or evidence.
I hadn't planned on spending my evening googling the pay grade of government officials, calculating the time taken to change a font on Microsoft Word and extrapolating that over a year.
If you had read the article, you would know the answer to this question.
Calibri is a font designed to be easier to read on screens, which is where documents are primarily read in 2025. Switching to using Calibri as the default was a meaningful change that provided improved accessibility at literally no cost to anyone.
Switching back to Times New Roman, a serif font that is provably more difficult to read on screens is yet another act of performative cruelty by this administration who seemingly operates with "the cruelty is the point" as one of its core tenets.
You made a low effort post, and I pointed out how if you had put in the effort to read the article prior to commenting you would have gotten the answer to your question.
Would you like me to be more patronizing to you and say, "The article clearly states which of the font changes was the performative one and which was meaningful."?
But sure, buddy, run off to hide behind a site rule the moment you get called out for a low effort post you made that is breaking at least two rules itself:
- Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive.
- Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work. A good critical comment teaches us something.
> Is screen readability the only value to consider?
Whether it is "the only value to consider" or not is beside the point, and you know it. The Trump Administration's only value they considered is "Biden did it, so we're going to undo it." They considered nothing else. You know. I know it. Everyone knows it. Why do we know it? Because they have made it abundantly clear that they have no idea what "DEI" actually is, so they just slap that label on anything the previous administration did, put out an order rolling it back, and use it as a wedge issue.
If he was actually worried about whether a san-serif typeface was worse for printed documents, he could have simply ordered that all printed documents must use TNR or any of the other better options that exist. But he isn't. He's simply concerned with killing "DEI," where "DEI" just means whatever they decide it means today.
Because Calibri is an easier to read font on screens, which is where a lot more reading is being done.
Since it was done as an accessibility measure, it is seen as something for "inclusion" which is part of the scary "DEI" (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion). So it had to go, because forbid we do something that makes things slightly easier for people.
Let's even say (incorrectly, probably) that the switch to Calibri was "performative" or "virtue signaling". That's, in my opinion, significantly less terrible than performative cruelty or anti-virtue signaling.
"Here is a thing that makes a slight difference, with no cost, to a small percentage of people"
"Nah, woke. Let's make it worse for them."
There is nothing funny about performative cruelty