Re:Merriam-Webster declares ‘they’ its 2019 word of the year
by ghaff on Tuesday December 10, 2019 @09:38AM
(#21752805)
In an ideal world, we'd probably have a gender-neutral third person singular pronoun. Meanwhile, in the real world, that's such a political minefield that anything is going to get a lot of people up in arms and call all sorts of attention to itself. And just using "they" works pretty well in the vast majority of cases.
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Re:Merriam-Webster declares ‘they’ its 2019 word of the year
by EliRivers on Tuesday December 10, 2019 @09:45AM
(#21752897)
we'd probably have a gender-neutral third person singular pronoun.
Is not "it" the third person singular? Although that does carry its own overtones.
Re:Merriam-Webster declares ‘they’ its 2019 word of the year
by ghaff on Tuesday December 10, 2019 @09:51AM
(#21752958)
As you say, "it" carries its own overtones especially in non-binary sexual identity contexts where singular they is clearly relevant. "It" isn't really gender-neutral so much as it's explicitly non-gendered/not human. (I mean, you'll get people who object to those who would call their pet it.)