[156857] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: guys != gender neutral
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Jo Rhett)
Thu Sep 27 20:33:53 2012
From: Jo Rhett <jrhett@netconsonance.com>
In-Reply-To: <2DE28166-3AEB-451D-80E6-FA00331D8D45@delong.com>
Date: Thu, 27 Sep 2012 17:33:31 -0700
To: Owen DeLong <owen@delong.com>
Cc: NANOG mailing list <nanog@nanog.org>
Errors-To: nanog-bounces+nanog.discuss=bloom-picayune.mit.edu@nanog.org
It's not suitable to refer to a single person of either gender.
On Sep 27, 2012, at 11:34 AM, Owen DeLong wrote:
> When did "people" stop being an acceptable gender-neutral substitute =
for {guys,gals}?
>=20
> Owen
>=20
>=20
> Sent from my iPad
>=20
> On Sep 27, 2012, at 1:10 PM, Jo Rhett <jrhett@netconsonance.com> =
wrote:
>=20
>> On Sep 27, 2012, at 9:20 AM, Jim Mercer wrote:
>>> On Thu, Sep 27, 2012 at 12:12:50PM -0400, Patrick W. Gilmore wrote:
>>>> Many. Although in fairness, some people use "guys" in a =
gender-neutral manner.
>>>=20
>>> some people use it in a globally-neutral manner.
>>> "those guys over there" pointing at a rack full of servers.
>>=20
>>=20
>> Guys seem to think that it's gender neutral. The majority of women =
are used to this, but they have indicated to me that they don't believe =
it to be very neutral. Using "guys" is not gender neutral, it's flat out =
implying the other gender doesn't matter. *
>>=20
>> Given the lack of truly neutral terms in english, I have taken to =
alternative my pronouns interchangably when I write.
>> "Those guys are chewing on that, but these gals are doing the vector =
calculations." (pointing at different racks of gear)
>>=20
>> Or when actually referring to persons of mixed gender, here's a quote =
from something I posted in a private forum (my own journal) which is =
safe for export:
>>=20
>>> Because frankly, we're all in this together and honestly everyone =
loves the competition. The guys I race with often come find me =
afterwards and tell me where they got past me, or ask me how I kept =
passing them. The really fast girls rarely want more than a beer to go =
out on the track and give you a detailed breakdown on what you are doing =
wrong. We all help each other.
>>=20
>>=20
>> In this situation I'm leaving it up the reader to grasp that I'm not =
saying that the girls are all faster than the boys, but I believe it's =
understood in context as the topic was about how peers help each other =
out.
>>=20
>> I really wish that english had better pronouns for this.
>>=20
>> * As evidence of the nasty side effects of this, the bible was =
translated from a language which understands gender neutral terms to =
english, and was in translating reduced it to "man". Which is now used =
by only-english-speaking preachers to justify the "proper placement" of =
women in society.
>>=20
>> If for no other reason than that the use of a single gender pronoun =
confuses less intelligent types to assume that women aren't important in =
technology (and god knows this completely baseless assumption is widely =
held) do your part to mix it up!
>>=20
>> --=20
>> Jo Rhett
>> Net Consonance : net philanthropy to improve open source and internet =
projects.
>>=20
>>=20
--=20
Jo Rhett
Net Consonance : net philanthropy to improve open source and internet =
projects.
