All I'm saying is according to English grammatical rules it's a perfectly valid method of referring to a singular person when gender is unknown.
Now according to societal politeness rules on the other hand, it's rude as fuck.
It's not rude, it's dehumanizing. Slightly worse, right?
Unless it identifies as another species, then it's still dehumanizing but also affirming I guess.
Lmao I was thinking that you mean they and was so fucking confused for a while thinking how rude I've been for YEARS.
I default to whatever the traditional apparent gender would be assumed I.E. you look like traditional woman/man I refer to you as such. Then I allow myself to be corrected if it's inaccurate.
The intent isn't offensive and I'm not going to ask each individual what pronouns are preferred but will respect whatever I'm informed is correct in each instance. I think it's being made into a mountain when it's really just a mole hill. You can't expect every human to automatically be correct or informed or even default to a neutral when it is not yet the norm.
It seems too trivial to be butthurt over if it isn't malicious, especially upon first interaction. Let the person know, then if ignored or dismissed it can be considered offensive.
I don't get upset when people call my Bugles potato chips, they are little crunchy cones of heaven
I started using they after 2 years accidentally misgendering a colleague from another country because it looked like she had a beard in Teams profile picture
That sounds reallllly rough haha, hopefully it was taken with more humor than insult. I just go with ye ol "assume ignorance or mistake over malice" anytime an interaction like that happens. Majoritively it is one of the former and there was never an issue to begin with. Sorta like getting some fused Bugles, I doubt the company intended to send it to me, just a simple double delicious mistake
I understand not wanting to ask everyone all the time, but defaulting to a neutral pronoun isn't going to become the norm unless people start using it even when it isn't the norm. That said, it does feel a lot less natural in Ukrainian and Russian to me, so I'm still trying to figure out the best option there. But in English, singular "they" is pretty widespread already, I think.
Y'all.
I just call everyone dude.
"Hey, dude."
"Wassup, dude?"
"My dudes!"
"Dude's crazy!"
I'm 100% down for normalizing 'it'
Gendered pronouns in most sentences are a waste and often lead to a false ascertainment. While I don't use 'it' for everyone, I would love to get used to it.
This is why the universal language should be Indonesian. No gendered words, no pronouns, heck there's even no tenses. By the way, you also pronounce the words the way it was written like Latin so there's no confusion on how to pronounce the words. The grammar is also straightforward enough you can just grab a dictionary and start speaking coherent Indonesian.
After trying to learn Portuguese this sounds like heaven.
While I don't care about the gender crap (use what ever), I appreciate having a different pronoun for people or conscious things vs objects of any kind. They/them still holds info over it/that.
I admit I am a poisoned well, though. I was taught 'it' is outright disrespectful. Even before I knew LGBTQ+ anything, so it implicitly doesn't apply to people, IMO.
I was on Reddit and used he/she. I was scolded by about 15 posters as to why I should be using they.
smh
Jumping down someone's throat about it is stupid - unless they're being malicious, then jump away and tear whomever a new one. They aren't technically wrong, though. "They" is an ideal word that's been correct in both the singular and plural sense for centuries. Given more recent social developments, it's an easy way to be inclusive and not "risk" being wrong.
(I'm assuming you used literally "he/she" to refer to someone of unknown gender)
I see where they're coming from. They is way safer in general. Covers people who are male, female, non binary or others. That being said reddit does have a problem with being unable to educate people. They immediately have to just insult and yell at you for it. I don't get it. It's just way easier to be polite. Takes effort to get angry and yell at someone. This is why I generally make only positive or jokey comments.
You would have thought things would change after reddit abused a family after the Boston bombing but nope. Same toxicity at an all time high.
I would say it takes effort to be polite. What takes no effort is being rude or dismissive.
Maybe you’re just naturally a positive person though which the majority of people aren’t (at least not on Reddit/lemmy)
Refer to people as "it" if you want to sound like a serial killer. "It puts the lotion on its skin..."
It/that
Dwight D. Schrute: Perhaps y'all should just learn Finnish. No gender pronouns.
Then you have the Japanese that just refer to everyone by name and only use pronouns when you don't know the person's name
When a baby is born they say "its a boy" for example.
Learn turkish. We only have one pronoun (two if you count the plural). Also, no gender in job titles (or anything else).
My vote is with for them/they.
i vote for "it" makes it unified for everything, ties it neatly up.
What about "that" or even "that thing" when you want to be fancy.
I just use the humanoids name for everything. Go ask Bob over there. It's Bob's turn. I didn't do it, Bob did it. And then Bob said let there be light.
Me with a bad case of dwarf brain where everyone is he/him unless obvious or told otherwise
Jokes aside, they/them is fucking convinient and I use it all the time in english, I wish German had a equivalent!
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