# Why is Female devolving into a derogatory? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 10, 2015, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363 "2015-04-10T19:58:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2015, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/21 "2015-04-10T21:27:38Z")
Any word can be a derogatory if you say it right and in the right context. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2015, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/22 "2015-04-10T21:29:46Z")
> [@Maggie\_the\_Ocelot](#): > > I know what the OP means, though, for one woman to be using it derogatorily to another in a specific kind of way. It kinda feels like there’s an implied “dog” in there
the speaker is basically saying “I’m too much of a lady to call her a bitch, but she totally is.” This is certainly nothing new. Inflection is everything in the arts and sciences of insult. ---
**Author:** ![Stuffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f17d59/32.png) [@Stuffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stuffy)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2015, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/23 "2015-04-10T21:32:00Z")
> [@cmyk](#): > > If she had used any of the synonyms for female instead (woman, girl, chick, lady, etc.) would it have stood out as much? > > It seems to me you’re getting hung up on semantics and not the context (i.e. she was upset he was with another woman, so no matter what word she would’ve used, it would sound as derogatory as if she’d said “bitch”). NO, just the opposite. In fact in context it sounded like she was in fact using it as a euphemism for bitch. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2015, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/24 "2015-04-10T21:33:57Z")
When I hear the word used to refer to women on the internet, I now assume the user is male, neckbearded, wears a fedora and is _way_ too invested in ethics in videogame journalism, IYKWIM. ---
**Author:** ![cmyk](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmyk/32/3353_2.png) [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2015, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/25 "2015-04-10T21:36:17Z")
> [@Stuffy](#): > > NO, just the opposite. In fact in context it sounded like she was in fact using it as a euphemism for bitch. If she used the right tone, any synonym would sound like a euphemism for bitch. Though perhaps there’s something trending about using the particular word “female”, since it’s dehumanizing and impersonal in that context. But that’s a very particular usage. ---
**Author:** ![tapu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/49beb7/32.png) [@tapu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tapu)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2015, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/26 "2015-04-10T21:38:36Z")
The linguist Robin Lakoff specializes in this: [https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&rlz=1C1ASUT\_enUS525US525&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#tbm=bks&q=robin+lakoff](https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&rlz=1C1ASUT_enUS525US525&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#tbm=bks&q=robin+lakoff) ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2015, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/27 "2015-04-10T21:47:32Z")
Previous thread (from 2006): [Do men who call women “females” come off as insulting?](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=396413) ---
**Author:** ![kanicbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/5f8ce5/32.png) [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2015, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/28 "2015-04-10T22:12:40Z")
There is no real female equivalent for the word guys. Gals doesn’t come close. female works for this, woman and lady both carry baggage of age suggestions. When a gender would be assumed and one wants to make it apparent that it is the opposite gender, male and female is commonly used. This has lead to a lot of male assumed positions, which by stating female clarifies it. It is still not that uncommon to hear the term male nurse. ---
**Author:** ![johnpost](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f17d59/32.png) [@johnpost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/johnpost)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2015, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/29 "2015-04-10T22:20:11Z")
female is a neutral term. because it might be used to indicate the gender in legal or scientific descriptions then people might think that those dispassionate uses of the word devalues all uses of the word. ---
**Author:** ![piepiepie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e47774/32.png) [@piepiepie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/piepiepie)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2015, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/30 "2015-04-11T12:17:10Z")
The people who I know who use “females” in a derogatory way just sadly affirm the type of misogynoir black women deal with and are willing to dole out. They won’t say bitches, but they’ll say “females” and you know exactly what they mean. Yet when you try to talk about men in that manner, it’s never good, and if someone does talk about men as “typical males” they’re usually called the friendly “-a” and not the hard R. (In that respect, look at PARTYNEXTDOOR’s song “Recognize” for the context. “You got niggas, and I got bitches,” no need for a “female” in this instance, but that’s exactly how someone would use it there. I kinda like the song though. /shrug) And yes I know it’s used by other people, but I’m black and most people I know are black so this is how I see it used. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2015, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/31 "2015-04-11T13:51:13Z")
After spending my entire adult life in the military or police I use the word female quite a bit. Almost as much as I use the word male. Good to know I’ll get in trouble for one and not the other. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2015, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/32 "2015-04-11T15:08:14Z")
William Safire did a series of On Language columns on this very subject when he got called out for referring to a “girl photographer.” He actually wrote that “referring to a woman as a ‘girl’ does not convey the negativity of referring to a Negro as a ‘boy’.” He got called on the carpet for that one–It means exactly the same. Anyway, it was reduced to using the adjective only when it is necessary (The patient requested a female doctor) or ambiguous (You’ll be speaking with Terry Wright, a man). These situations rarely come up. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2015, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/33 "2015-04-11T15:20:27Z")
> [@Sam\_Lowry](#): > > I forgot to mention that the term “females” to refer to women does seem to be in some American dialects as a neutral thing. And another commenter said it’s used in the Marines, since a lot of things are more clinically referred to there. > [@johnpost](#): > > because it might be used to indicate the gender in legal or scientific descriptions then people might think that those dispassionate uses of the word devalues all uses of the word. > [@Loach](#): > > After spending my entire adult life in the military or police I use the word female quite a bit. Almost as much as I use the word male. Good to know I’ll get in trouble for one and not the other. That is another aspect of the usage – very often in operational communications you use attributive adjectives by themselves, rather than nouns, for the sake of objective specificity, and end up with phrasing like “suspects are two adult caucasian females”, or, “one male juvenile detained”, or “God help you maggots if you’re found trying to sneak into the grounds of the females’ barracks”. In other contexts, however, people don’t want to feel they are having an operational report filed on them or that they are being described clinically by an external observer. As was mentioned above, it sounds to them like a nature documentary(\*). “Objectivity” becomes conflated with “objectification”. You then also have the “address me as what I call myself” principle that has been in place for some time. But it \*can \*be annoying that any perfectly objective phrasing or usage that some individual or group may use “with implications” can in that manner become deemed “derogatory” and removed from use in \*any \*context. OTOH it can be as simple as reinserting the noun into the construction, and adopting the usage “female (persons/students/troops/staff)” seems a perfectly workable compromise. Because sometimes, damnit, you have to describe. (\* In Puerto Rican Spanish, the modern trend is to use the nouns “varĂłn” and “fĂ©mina” to mean a male or female person in descritptive context, and relegate “macho”/“hembra” to refer to nonhumans.) ---
**Author:** ![Stuffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f17d59/32.png) [@Stuffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stuffy)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2015, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/34 "2015-04-11T16:45:06Z")
> [@piepiepie](#): > > The people who I know who use “females” in a derogatory way just sadly affirm the type of misogynoir black women deal with and are willing to dole out. They won’t say bitches, but they’ll say “females” and you know exactly what they mean. Yet when you try to talk about men in that manner, it’s never good, and if someone does talk about men as “typical males” they’re usually called the friendly “-a” and not the hard R. (In that respect, look at PARTYNEXTDOOR’s song “Recognize” for the context. “You got niggas, and I got bitches,” no need for a “female” in this instance, but that’s exactly how someone would use it there. I kinda like the song though. /shrug) > > And yes I know it’s used by other people, but I’m black and most people I know are black so this is how I see it used. I’ve never heard the song but this sounds like what I mean. FWIW, I mentioned this thread to a woman acquaintance of mine last night. She’s familiar with it too. Her response was that, it was a way of insulting them without the other woman being able to come back wanting to fight. If you call them bitches, you’ve disrespected them. Off to YouTube! ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2015, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/35 "2015-04-11T16:52:37Z")
Using “females” as a noun hits my ear the same way as “illegals” as a noun. ---
**Author:** ![dogbutler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dogbutler/32/428_2.png) [@dogbutler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dogbutler)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2015, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/36 "2015-04-11T17:36:33Z")
> [@Drunky\_Smurf](#): > > Any word can be a derogatory if you say it right and in the right context. 🆒 _Belgium_ ---
**Author:** ![marshmallow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@marshmallow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/marshmallow)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2015, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/37 "2015-04-12T01:42:53Z")
[This chart might help.](http://blogs-images.forbes.com/kashmirhill/files/2013/02/whatCallGroupStyled4.png) It doesn’t get much more neutral than “female.” If that’s too offensive then “human with two X chromosomes” is the next step. Kinda joking there, I know what you mean. In casual every day conversation it is a little weird. Is it just me or is its usage most prominent in black and Hispanic communities? “Check out those two females!” Most white guys I know don’t talk like that. A lot of words referring to women have negative associations. Ladies: Chivalric chauvinism, nowadays associated with fedora tipping. And this might just be me, but if you go up to a group of women and say something like “good morning, ladies” in a neutral tone you sound like a police officer making his rounds. Girls: Infantilizing, diminutive, patronizing. It’s not true men don’t call each other boys. “What are we doing tonight, boys?” is perfectly standard. But calling someone you don’t know a “boy” can be disrespectful, especially if it’s a white guy saying it to a black guy. Them’s fighting words. “Girls” is a word that seems more acceptable once you know someone. Then “sup, girl?” is fine. Before then, it sounds like a come on. Gals, folks, y’all: Only works if you have Southern charm. Or you’re the POTUS. I know certain segments of the language police flip their lids when women are referred to as “guys” but to me “guys” really is a generic gender neutral term. I’ve never gotten a stinkeye irl using it to refer to mixed or women only groups. I think most younger people see it this way, but I could be wrong. ---
**Author:** ![WotNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e19b73/32.png) [@WotNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WotNot)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2015, 9:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/38 "2015-04-12T09:08:26Z")
> [@Sam\_Lowry](#): > > And language always evolves. Some terms that were acceptable 50 years ago are now derogatory, and vice versa. Maybe “females” and “males” will become words that can be nouns or adjectives. But for now, it most cases, I’d say it’s not the best choice of word to use for noun. I’d agree it’s generally not the best choice when you’re referring to a person, but both “female” and “male” have been nouns since the 14th century. This isn’t a change that might happen in the future, it’s one that happened before the language we’re currently using even came to exist. ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2015, 10:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/39 "2015-04-12T10:43:44Z")
Well I guess its more of a scientific classification than anything. So if I say “the females at work” rather than “the women at my work” I’m sounding kind of judgmental like I’m looking at them as specimens instead of individuals. We dont call it a “Female room” do we? ---
**Author:** ![Ibanez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/a4c791/32.png) [@Ibanez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ibanez)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2015, 1:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-is-female-devolving-into-a-derogatory/717363/40 "2015-04-12T13:08:07Z")
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