Re: At peace with Debian (was: This is the last war...)
On Sun, 14 Jul 2002 17:24:39 -0700, David Wright wrote:
> > No professional in their right mind...
>
>Argh! "s/he" may be distracting but is at least arguably not
>gramatically wrong. "Professional" is singular; "their" is plural. You
>cannot use one as a substitute for the other.
>
>Guess what: no matter how much you agonized over it when you were young
>first discovered feminism, you can't eliminate the "generic masculine"
>construction in English without distracting your reader or being wrong.
"No professional in their right mind would use Debian on their business
computers..."
Actually the "their business..." jarred me. Making "professional"
plural would cure the "their problem," but asks, "Is the right mind a
collective one?" So how about: "No right minded professional would use
Debian on business computers...."
Just like programming, once you figure out what to write, it's all a
matter of syntax. :)
--
gt
It ain't so much what you don't know that gets you in trouble---
it's what you do know that ain't so.--unk
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