• CarrotsHaveEars@lemmy.ml
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    3 months ago

    Dear native English speakers, would you mind inventing a new word either for gender-neutral third-person singular pronoun, or one for what “they” mean to foreign English speakers since you are so insisted in differing its meaning from the text books you shipped us decades ago?

    English is so inconsistent at this point. Only the third-person pronouns have gender in singular form, the plural form has no gender and now you are telling us the gender-less form can be singular now? How confusing!

    English is widespread partly because it has simple alphabet and relatively easy grammar. I don’t mind someone being in LGBT+ group at all, but could you please don’t mess with the language?

    • samus12345@lemm.ee
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      3 months ago

      As the comic shows, “they” (“their,” in this case) was already used as a singular when the gender was unknown. The only change is it’s now also used if the person’s gender is known and isn’t “he” or “she.”

    • OneWomanCreamTeam@sh.itjust.works
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      3 months ago

      Others have addressed some of your other points, but

      would you mind inventing a new word either for gender-neutral third-person singular pronoun, or one for what “they” mean to foreign English speakers

      We actually have that. Xe / Xem / Xyrs. It isn’t very widely used though, and is generally considered a neo pronoun.

      Honestly I don’t really expect it to get mainstream use anytime soon, in part because people are already accused to the singular They / Them / Theirs (except for when a nonbinary person asks to be refered to as such).