Jonluw said:
iDoom46 said:
Yeah, I'm all for equality- in fact I'm usually the one cheering these kinds of things on. I really do think we need to do something about changing the way we raise our kids to obey these gender stereotypes.
But I have to agree, some of this stuff is just too much. I like the things like putting the Legos near the kitchen (though I always considered Legos to be a gender-neutral toy) and not exposing kids to content that can be seen as enforcing gender stereotypes but, while in most cases gender-modifiers are a good thing (Police man/woman turned to Officer, waiter/waitress turned into server, etc.), getting rid of "him" and "her" seems a bit over the top.
If you read the article, you'll see that they aren't getting rid of 'him' and 'her'.
What they're saying, specifically, is that if for example a plumber is coming to visit, and they do not yet know their sex, they will refer to the plumber with a gender-neutral pronoun, the way I did in this sentence.
I'm sure they will still refer to Julie as 'her' and Jake as 'him'.
Oh, well that makes a whole lot more sense. Thanks for clearing that up. I really should have read the article, OP's sensationalist post really didn't convey that meaning at all. Sorry.
DoctorPhil said:
iDoom46 said:
getting rid of "him" and "her" seems a bit over the top.
Why?
Because while referring to a police officer as a policeman/woman conveys not only an unnecessary piece of information (all you need to know is that they are an officer of the law, nothing more) it also gives off the sense that there is a difference between a male and a female cop, when there isn't (and sexists, being who they are, will obviously assign a value of higher importance on one over the other).
Its the same as calling someone a "good black doctor". Its offensive because there's no difference between a "good black doctor" and a "good white doctor" so the issue dealing with the doctor's race is unnecessary information. They're just a "good doctor." Your gender doesn't affect your ability to do your job any more than your race, therefore it isn't necessary information.
But can you really say calling someone "him" or "her" is offensive? I, for one, don't. Yes, the words DO provide information on the person in question's gender, and that information may-or-may-not be important, but there is no implied predisposition that one sex is better than the other. Women and men are different, after all (see what I did there, I put "women" first for a change), and while that fact has no bearing on a persons ability to practice their profession well and efficiently, it is still fact.
Don't get me wrong, though. I'm not against having a third, gender-neutral term to refer to someone when you don't know their gender or the person's gender in context is a non-issue. In fact, I'd say it would be pretty damn useful. Another thing we really need to fix is the (predominantly male) mindset that a default human being's gender is male.
(Although, I always figured "they" or "them" were already gender-neutral terms that can be applied to a single person, as well as a group.)