I don't want to use "she" or "her"

on Saturday, November 3, 2007 at 5:44pm

(Open to any discussion and criticism)
I don't like to use these two words because
I think part of discrimination comes from the usage of different names. Gender is nothing but a attribute like the color of your hair. The physical genetical physiological gender may usually seems like dichotomy, but one's behavior, thought, costume, and other all details should be free......

So, if you see me using he to express both male and female third person, please don't blame me and remember that I just mean a third person without specifying his gender.

• •  this is a pitfall called 'ignorance'
    

    November 3, 2007 at 6:07pm · 
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    You may certainly have something there. My first reaction was, "but that's just a standard descriptor". Then I got to thinking about my own past thoughts about when it's appropriate to use a certain type of descriptor.
    
    
    My own conclusion is that--addressing ONLY the purpose of identifying someone--a descriptor is valid and useful if 1. it's a distinguishing feature and 2. its use isn't predicated on malice (as best as one can tell).
    
    Specifically, as an example: When describing someone to someone else, I think it's OK to identify a member of a minority in a population by using non-malicious ethnic descriptions, while shirking such specifiers in describing someone belonging to the majority group since, being part of the majority, they are the more "expected" general ethnic type.
    
    This is, of course, easier to do the bigger the differences are in proportions between a majority group and minority groups.

    
    
    
    
    

    November 4, 2007 at 1:58am · 
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    When it comes to sex, the general expectation is a roughly 1:1 ratio of one sex to the other, so my line of reasoning results in the difficult case of there being virtually NO majority or minority group. In this case, I think it's OK to describe individuals of both groups specifically using a gender-specific descriptor in daily conversation (as in the example above)--but, again, I've only decided this is valid when you're simply IDENTIFYING someone to someone else. (I haven't thought about other cases.)
    
    In Tagalog (Filipino), there are no sex-specific pronouns, either, so you'll likewise hear Filipinos confusing "he/she" and "him/her" all the time.
    
    Having said all this, you should know that in an older form of English, the normative third-person term to use was "they"; you can still use this word today with some degree of conversational normality. I actually try to do it as often as I can,; I share your general sentiment of not needing to specify sex unless it aids the conversation.

    
    
    
    
    

    November 4, 2007 at 1:03am · 
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    So, for example, if the gender of a subject in a sentence is ambiguous, as in
    
    
    "Have you seen Professor Hill?",
    
    
    you could just answer like this
    
    "Nope; what class do they teach?"
    
    instead of this
    
    "Nope; what class does he teach?"
    
    and still get away with a normal-sounding conversation.
    
    Hope this helps, and sorry to be verbose, but I like to think about things a lot! =DDD
    

    
    
    
    
    

    November 4, 2007 at 1:06am · 
  • Thank you very much for very constructive suggestion~^^