Re: At peace with Debian (was: This is the last war...)
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On Sunday 14 July 2002 06:14 pm, Ron Johnson wrote:
> On Sun, 2002-07-14 at 19:43, Derek Gladding wrote:
> > On Sunday 14 July 2002 05:36 pm, Colin Watson wrote:
> > > On Sun, Jul 14, 2002 at 05:24:39PM -0700, David Wright wrote:
> > > > 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.
> > >
> > > So let's improve English so that you can (not necessarily using a
> > > plural form; other ways have been suggested). It's not like it's a
> > > dead language, after all.
> >
> > Well, "their" has been acceptable for both neuter and plural usage (||
> > not &&) for most of the history of the language, so it's more a case of
> > "rolling back a buggy patch" than improvement. I personally find it no
> > more distracting than seeing "colour" spelt wrongly ;-)
>
> Hmmm. My (female) grammar teachers would have deducted major points
> for mixing pluralities. I like Colin's idea of improving the language.
> What are some words for "gender-neutral 3rd-person" in other languages?
Real names come to my mind. Having the name that I do, and a spouse who is
named "Pat" has made my life a little more interesting (in an overtly
positive way). It exposed an obvious bias in my own rearing that I was
oblivious to for many years. After thoroughly reflecting on words like "him"
and "her," I realized how ridiculous the whole concept of mentally and
textually segregating a sex is. We can communicate very effectively without
willfully identifying whether a gender is male or female, or even whether a
gender is clearly distinguishable at all. Give it some thought, if you will,
because it is absurd. Further, I don't care if an individual is fat or bone
skinny. I don't care if they glow in the dark like a Gonset radio or are as
black as my cool wool cap. It just has no bearing (globally speaking of
course) in this particular case.
Mr. Rogers, for example, may like being called Mr. Rogers, but I personally
don't care what lurks behind the clothes that hides this being's hips. On
television, I see an interesting person that is also quite entertaining to
little people and larger ones too. If something dangles, or not, is not what
stirs my interest in this being.
The above paragraph is a simple one that removed words like "him," "his," and
"he." The only sexual identifier is of course "Mr." The only reason I see
for using pronouns is that many educators demand that students use different
words to spice up thiner writing. Most pupils naturally default to the
sexual pronouns, typically by direction.
My original statement was simple observation: "What an odd statement." I
still think it is an odd statement. I don't care whether a recipient of my
electric correspondence is male or female, and that is my simple point.
Gender has no bearing on how I will reply. I don't think specifying a gender
is wrong, but it is a standard that I am now aware of, and after reflection,
am changing about my own oblivious demeanor.
I think the suggestion of building a better language is indeed one that needs
further attention. The more I learn to think and speak, the more I wonder
about the merits of falling into the same mind shrouding thought patterns.
This is, however, just me being me.
And the beat goes on . . .
- --
Jaye Inabnit\ARS ke6sls\/A GNU-Debian linux user\/ http://www.qsl.net/ke6sls
If it's stupid, but works, it ain't stupid. I SHOUT JUST FOR FUN.
Free software, in a free world, for a free spirit. Please Support freedom!
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