[net.nlang] he vs. she

willy (08/12/82)

In regard to all the controversy over the use
of "he" or "she" or "he/she" in articles:
Why not use the genderless "one"? (e.g., one sits
down at the terminal and posts a silly news article.)

"One" is not that hard to use, and does not imply
any stereotypes.  I do find the use of "he" or "she"
sexist, and "he/she" rather unwieldy.

		Bill Banze
		..morkcb!willy

death (08/13/82)

I understand that one might find "one should n 'his' x" sexist. But not
very easily.

I must admit that I am no longer current in language trends in foreign
countries, but when I was studying French and German (both of which
contain nouns with gender) I never heard cries for language reform
because certain words were of the masculine gender rather than some
neuter gender. Get rid of the Dative case, yes. Get rid of gender, no.
I am not aware of any movement in France to establish a neuter gender
for the pronoun 'on', nor a movement in Germany to make 'man' neuter
rather than masculine. 'Kindelein' (little child) is neuter in German,
as is 'Fraulein' (little girl). This to me does not imply any
statement about the ancient Germans' ideas about gender identification
as a function of age (especially considering that all -lein words are
neuter). It just happens to be neuter.

This 'sexism in language' cry I find particularly annoying. It seems
to be a purely American problem (excessive un-called for silliness).
It is "hardwired" in to the language from god-only-knows-how-many
years of god-only-knows-how-many-languages; and frankly,
there are a lot more important things to worry about regarding sexism
(TV advertisements, job acceptances (!!), laws (!!!!)) than
some linguistic usually-forgotten stupidity. Personally, I have
always thought gender in a language was particularly silly, but 
that hasn't seemed to affect it much.

                                  ==DD