Re: Pronouns (please bear with me)

[Per Bothner]

On 3/5/20 2:27 AM, Alexandre François Garreau wrote:
> Le jeudi 5 mars 2020, 03:40:33 CET Per Bothner a écrit :
> > Trust me: Nobody (*) in the US uses "per" as a personal pronoun.
> > I'm pretty sure the same is true in other English-speaking countries.
> >
> > (*) For all practical purposes.
>
> At least rms and her inventor, Marge Piercy, as stated there: https://
> stallman.org/articles/genderless-pronouns.html

As I wrote: Nobody, for all practical purposes.  Nobody if you round
to the nearest 0.001% of the population.

On 3/5/20 2:34 AM, John Darrington wrote:
> Singular they is extremely confusing, and just wrong.   When I see it I
> think who are these people that we're talking about.

It's only been used since before Shakespeare.  It is less confusing
than the alternatives.  Time to get used to it.

> There is a perfectly good gender neutral pronoun in the English
> language, viz: "one".   If that's not appropriate for any reason, then
> either choose "he" or "she" or if you want to be politically correct,
> write "he or she".

As you say, "one" is not always appropriate. For example:

   When you arrive, introduce yourself to the receptionist at the front desk.
   They will explain where to go.

"One" should not be used in this context.

On 3/5/20 3:52 AM, Jose E. Marchesi wrote:
> Using English is what we should do, IMO.  I personally use "she" in my
> documentation, which is traditional in GNU.  Using "he" should be right
> as well, why not?

In a gendered language, you use gendered pronouns to match grammatical gender.
It is near-impossible to to avoid unnecessary gender.   English does not have
grammatical gender, so gendered pronouns more strongly imply biological sex.
(We're not used to thinking of "the table" as "she".)  On the other hand,
that makes it much easier to avoid making gender implications.

> PS I have to add, as a non-native English speaker, the "singular they"
> is particularly confusing to me.

It's not really different from "singular you", which is similarly recent.
--
        --Per Bothner
address@hidden   http://per.bothner.com/