If I had written “their” for “his” or “her” back in the day it would have been a grammatical blunder costing me ten points on anything and marking me out as an ignorant person.
That was my first thought this morning. Don’t ask me why. Maybe a flashback from Facebook, “Dude has updated their status.”
It struck me soon after that we can legislate (in the social sense) sensitivity in this way and still think it’s OK for, well, anyway. I don’t want to enumerate atrocities. It was 4:30 in the morning and I decided to go back to sleep. That was a good call.
In additional trivia, we have gray skies today and the promise of snow — not much, 1/2 inch, but, as Bear frequently points out, “They’re wrong a lot.” They are wrong a lot about snow coming at all and they’re wrong a lot about how much we get. The mountains to the west and east tend to scrape most of the snow out of the storms (which is why the San Luis Valley is a desert) but sometimes… The best storms are those that come straight north from New Mexico, maybe starting in the Gulf of California, those wonderful hurricanes that used to dump snow on my house in Descanso. They’re rare.
The snow that’s promised isn’t coming from that direction. It’s the usual, heading east from California/Utah. I’m sure it will be scraped pretty clean by the immense San Juan Range, but who knows? Later this week, temps will hit the high 40s F/4-5C, clearly Mother Nature is blundering and lost, wandering around in abject confusion about the fact that all she really has to do for the next couple of months is drop 3 to 6 inches of snow on Monte Vista a couple of times a month. Not a lot more, that’s plenty.
https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2020/01/27/rdp-monday-blunder/
“Summer is the season of inferior sledding” - Inuit proverb 
Even though it makes me cringe, I’m trying to be fine with it. I do get it. Why should the world have to know what’s under our clothes because we give out our name? So many names can go either way now too.
Well, apparently what’s under our clothes doesn’t reveal anything about us, either. 😀 I will never be fine with it, I will not use it, but I know it is the way of the future and that’s OK.
There, their, they’re, its all going to be okay.
I can understand wanting a gender neutral pronoun that still recognizes that one is creature as opposed to a thing. No problem with that at all. Nobody wants to be referred to as an “it.” I feel the same way about being referred to as a group of people
Way back when dinosaurs ruled the Earth, Feminists decided that wanted a title that indicated gender but did not reflect marital status. So instead of appropriating a word in common usage they came up with Ms. That was a perfectly good solution. Not that all women used it. A majority of women of all ages that I meet still go by Miss or Mrs., but with Ms often being used only for professional relationships. Or the title being skipped completely.
Technically an unmarried male would be titled “Master” but that fell out of favor long before feminism kicked in. All males are still referred to by Mister which is the equivalent of Ms.
I have always thought that lack of a personal gender neutral pronoun was shortcoming of the language, almost every language in fact. I am unaware of any language that has a gender neutral singular pronoun. Does that tell us Rather than grabbing some off the shelf that already have clear meanings as *plural pronouns* one would think it better to simply create a new pronoun. It would be easier and doesn’t have the burden of being confusing to most people and of driving grammar checking software nuts.
I really see it as a control issue, rather than a real attempt for gender neutrality. Creating a new word in one thing. Allowing words to naturally evolve is similar. But redefining words by fiat is positively Orwellian.
While it may become common for they/them to be used in niche groups, I don’t see it catching on the the general population. It is confusing to have pronouns with multiple definitions. No school I have subbed for is teaching it. Pronoun agreement is still what is being taught in grammar today.
I came from the dinosaur period, Fred. 😉 I think Ms is OK but I didn’t care. I don’t care about they, them, their either just as I don’t care about anyone’s plumbing and how they use it (or don’t) or which restroom they like to use. And think yeah, redefining a word like that is rather “Orwellian” and sign of society’s inability to deal with real problems.
I so agree!
I smirked through this. I read some online comics that are written by individuals with non-traditional gender identities. There are too many made up determinations – Ne/Nem, Zie/Zim, Sie/Sim, Ey/Em, Ve/Wer, Tey/Ter, and E/Em… just to name a few. It gets very confusing. Not only do I have to try to remember a name but now I have to attempt a pronoun too. At least I can now plead old age mental frailty and mostly get away with it. If there was a single neutral designation I might be able to get behind it and actually remember it – alas that is not the current situation!
Facebook isn’t even consistent. They just told me a female friend had updated HER status. 😀