The uses of thou, thee, thy, thine, had the additional baggage of having formal and informal forms, analogous to the French tu and vous. But we (this poster included) would all have to re-learn which was which.
Moderator Note
While a discussion of gender identifiers and preferred pronouns on the SDMB is definitely an ATMB topic, this is turning into a more general discussion of gender pronouns, which is more of an IMHO or GD topic. Let’s keep the discussion here directly related to the SDMB. Those who wish to discuss the topic in a more general sense are free to start a new thread (link back to this one if desired), or to join one of the threads that already exist on the topic.
UPDATE:
As the original topic is basically resolved, the thread has been moved to IMHO. This mod note no longer applies. Please focus on the general discussion of pronouns instead.
Seems to me like the OP’s original topic has long-since been beaten to death and fully resolved in this thread, with great finality. Perhaps, therefore, this thread could now be moved to IMHO?
I was about to propose the same thing. Creating a whole new thread tends to kill the momentum of the conversation. People don’t want to jump between two threads to be able to reply to what people said in the other one.
In fact, unfortunately, that almost always happens when the mods tell us to take a side-conversation to a separate thread.
The only thing that is certain about language is that it changes. Everything else is just extrapolation from the past, and in any case that’s more specific than “language change”—unless you’re gambling (and gambling on language is kind of pointless, considering the timelines)—then playing percentage games is pretty irrelevant, so far as I’m concerned. So, again, so what?
Oops sorry. Didn’t see the mod note before I replied.
I can do that. Thread moved.
Well surprise, surprise. I come to the IMHO forum, and looky what thread I find here! So it’s all good.
ETA:
Clara Bow seemed okay with it.
This.
In theory, it could be optional. However, if there’s an option, then the choice not to use the option becomes a thing itself. “Why did this person select ‘None’”? Et cetera.
Back when “Ms.” started to enter the language, it seemed like a good idea, because it fixes the problem that, for women, relationship status was baked into their name. If you’re writing a check for a purchase and the clerk is a creepy male, there’s no good reason to have to identify whether you’re “available” or “taken”. Inevitably, though, “Ms.” took on its own additional burden of significance: oh, you’re one of those Women’s Libbers, huh? It was provocative enough that a magazine took the term as its title, to try to cash in on it. Enough with prying into people’s business with everyday language!
There’s more. Gender has been a huge tool for marginalizing people, and making unwarranted assumptions about them. If we’re not starting dating, then what difference does it make? Likewise sex. If you’re not a medical doctor, why do you need to know what I’ve got?
Here’s a thought experiment to consider the wisdom of having gender identifiers built into language that didn’t involve gender per se: Suppose we started having different pronouns for people of different ethnicity or race? No harm done – we’ll provide an option meaning “doesn’t want to say.” Or how about pronouns that announce your religion? Your net worth? These ideas are just loaded with possible trouble. The only reason gender gets a pass is that we’ve done it that way for so long.
Yup. That’s why I’m (at least currently) in favor of eliminating gender from pronouns rather than having everyone constantly identifying their gender pronouns.
I don’t know why this is even a thing. It seems to me if you “don’t know for a fact” the poster’s gender, even if it could possibly be relevant to anything, simply use their Message Board name or “OP” if they’re the original poster.
Gender pronouns are useful because they can be used to identify different people when multiple people are being discussed. They allow us to say “Give the key to her and the box to him”. If both people are the same gender or it’s not clear what their gender is, then another descriptive form needs to be used, like “Give the key to the person on the left and the box to the person on the right.” Pronouns won’t become genderless in general because it’s so useful to use the gendered pronouns in this way.
I think they/them will be the default for the situations where genderless pronouns are used, but I’m not a fan of it because of the confusion between singular and plural. For example, “When Quinn’s negative drug test is submitted to the track team, then they will be eligible for the tournament.” The use of “they” is not clear if it refers to just Quinn or to the whole team. It could mean Quinn will be eligible for the tournament or if it might mean the whole team will be eligible. Perhaps the team could go without Quinn. We may end up with something like they-all similar to the various you-all variations to distinguish between second person singular and plural.
We have one, “Mx”. It hasn’t caught on, yet, but I have a couple of friends who use it, and I notice that it’s one of the options for an honorific on the drop-down if I want to email my senators. I’m seriously considering adopting it for myself.
I greatly prefer E/em to they/them, but I think the singular “they” has won. It’s in widespread use among my younger friends.
But because I hear it all the time, I can think of lots of situation where I find it confusing.
“Do you know if Alex will be coming to this party?”
“I ran into them earlier today, and i think they have other plans.”
Yeah, that’s a response and is just about Alex, but I think “Alex and who else?” when I hear that.
I am hanging my hopes of “They all” becoming the plural.
I don’t assume that somebody who hasn’t filled in their location field is in hiding, and I don’t assume that somebody who hasn’t stated their pronouns hasn’t done so for any particular reason. Some people just don’t want to be bothered. I really can’t see the existence of an option, in this context, as some sort of burden on those who don’t want to use it.
I can understand that it might be in some contexts, just as I understand that it can be a burden on people forced to choose either ‘male’ or ‘female’ on forms. But insisting that nobody should be allowed to express preferences appears to me to be at least as much of a burden as insisting (which I don’t think anybody has here) that everybody should be forced to.
It did for a while. And then Ms. became an ordinary, routine part of the language.
It may be necessary in some cases to get through the first stage in order to get to the second.
Yup. And one of those unwarranted assumptions is often ‘people in certain lines of work are male’ or even ‘people can be assumed to be male unless proved otherwise’.
Problem is, that people do use gendered pronouns in ordinary speech. Are you suggesting that gendered pronouns should not be allowed on these boards, and everyone should be required to use gender-neutral forms?
I do try to do that whenever I’m not sure of a poster’s gender or pronoun preference, and often when I am pretty sure of their gender but don’t think they’ve expressed any other strong pronoun preference. But I don’t think we’re at a stage at which we can reasonably try to insist that everyone on the boards avoid the gendered pronouns.
Me too. Sometimes I walk past the pink stuff a couple of times, so I can feel like I didn’t buy two of them.
In all my time here and on Fathom, the one single time I ever had an issue was when someone was not aware on Fathom that I was a woman, and called me out for an opinion on abortion rights, saying something about me expressing myself too strongly for someone who’d never be there (and I’m very much pro-legalization, FWIW). A third poster got there before me, and told the other one that I wasn’t a man. First poster apologized and slinked off. Don’t remember who it was.
That’s is. That is the only time in more than 20 years of Dope-Fathom posting that having a gender sign next to my name would have saved anyone’s face, and it wouldn’t have been mine.
Of course not. Just because I like an idea, that doesn’t mean I think there should be a rule here forcing everybody to do it.
Yup. And I don’t think anybody’s arguing here that everybody should be forced to state their preferred pronouns.
But, if you like that idea, then you’re free, and should be, to use it yourself. As others are, and should be, free to state their pronouns if they want to.
Gender is a huge part of my identity, so I wouldn’t want the option to identify as a woman to be taken from me. That’s why I can’t get behind this “make everything neutral” stuff. My identity is not neutral. It means something very specific in this culture. It has shaped my life experience. Just because it may not matter to some people doesn’t mean the rest of us should lose something important to us.
I may be misunderstanding you, if I am, forgive me.