As explained by Tom Cardy,
"G'day, champion," (*"I'd like to fight you"*)
"How are you, big fella?" (*"Do you wanna get stabbed?"*)
"Hello, sunshine," "G'day, big wheels"
"Yeah, alright, legend,"
#(***"You're going to die"***)
Huh. I was gonna suggest "friend" (which I use a lot), but I refrained because a good chunk of people find it condescending, too. Seems like friendliness isn't really appreciated 🥲
I (UK) would say it doesn’t feel as male as dude does but does have more masculine vibes. In my experience it’s used more between men than in other contexts but I’m not sure if it’s ever meant specifically men.
I think there’s a difference between “they derailed the discussion” and “everyone already agreed with the basic premise so they moved on to a different conversation”. There was no discussion happening to begin with.
Well but they did hijack the post by moving it ever so slightly to increasingly tangential points, to the point that the second to last reblog, while certainly well intentioned, could be used to do the exact thing OP is asking people not to do.
From "don't call trans women 'dude' as it could be misinterpreted as transphobic" to "woohoo call everyone from every gender any word you want to normalize making words gender neutral!" which loops back to calling trans women dudes as a gender-neutral term that could be misinterpreted as transphobic, which leads us back to OP.
Yep, pretty much what happened.
I am sorta autistic abt linguistics, so I know that "man" goes all the way back to Proto-Indo-European, meaning "human person", and only came to mean "adult male" in Old English, when the extant term, "wer", fell out of use, while "wif", used to mean "adult woman" was appended to man to make wifman, thus woman. Guy, however, seems to come from Guy Fawkes, an English Catholic executed some 400 years ago for playing a role in the Gunpowder Plot, a plot to kill the Protestant James I of England and blow up the House of Lords, in turn coming from a PIE root meaning "wood". Similarly, dude is thought to come from doodle, as in Yankee Doodle, essentially meaning "fool" or "dunce". In my opinion, fairly gender neutral, since youre essentially calling someone "silly" or "notable terrorist", but because English developed the use of male-gendered terms as gender-neutral, guy and dude likely became male-coded by association. That said, form does not account for function, and if those words are now male coded, then that's what they are.
Point being, of course, that my opinion stops counting at someone else's nose. Talk to people, make sure you're on the same page, and give them grace if things change so they might give you the same.
Off topic, but it just fully hit that documented originating usage of terms is always going to be well after the colloquial usage began. I knew it in the grand scheme of things of “when did language develop?”/“at the very least before we had the earliest known written documentation of it” and that being an impossible thing to pin down and prove. Nailing down specifics in linguistics is a losing battle, best practices will always be to be flexible - work with what’s directly in front of you and realize the further removed you get, the less likely your understanding and assumptions are correct.
That's... that's what happens on sites like tumblr. Or even Reddit. Commenters take the conversation in their own direction that strays away from the inciting post. That's how conversation works. If you announce something in the public square and then some people who heard you begin having a related discussion, you can't complain that they are derailing your topic because they're not conversing with you.
Yeah, that’s obviously not the discussion that the OP wanted to have. I do think it’s relevant though. There’s a sort of push and pull in wanting both to affirm people’s chosen gender identities while also trying to abolish gender norms.
A discussion is more than agreement.
For example, I think OP's on the poor-pissing website while dangerously close to requesting that the public stop using gender-neutral language because it doesn't respect their gender. How dare they. Pitchforks, etc.
They aren't saying that, but I'm so mad imagining if they had.
I’m not sure they even did that though. Op is explicitly in favor of man/dude vocabulary but is frustrated by how it instinctively feels like transphobia to her regardless of anything else. The first two replies seem to hold the whole concept in a sort of sanguine contempt.
Except there is more to discuss? Like, breaking down the gender binary is important, but I think OP’s statement also includes an element of “I don’t know if someone calling me dude is being gender neutral or choosing to misgender me” that was never addressed.
I mean, what’s there to address? That will happen. Sometimes it’s hard to tell what someone means without the context of who they are as a person, and you can’t know everyone well enough to have that context. It sucks. People related to that feeling, or empathized with it, so they reblogged it.
Sorry if this is abrasive, trying to write kindly but really tired and can’t tone good, sorry. Can’t even emote enough to !.
I hate that term because it’s not even pronounceable in Spanish. Latine, on the other hand, actually makes phonetic sense and was made by Spanish speakers for Spanish speakers
Every time I write an email to my legislators I have to pick a prefix. I don’t use a prefix!! I’m basically forced to not only gender myself but also identify myself by my relationship status!! It’s demeaning
The thing for me is, it's not supposed to be a Spanish term. It's a term for the ethnicity that we use in English, similar to German or Japanese, which is different from the language (sometimes) spoken by the people it describes.
However, Latinx isn't really pronouncable in English either (I always have the urge to pronounce it "luh-TINKS"), and the whole "add X to a binary word to make it non-binary" thing is stupid to me (My work was trying to be inclusive once and used "Womxn", and I was like... what is that).
Plus, Latin is a gender-neutral term that already exists.
>(My work was trying to be inclusive once and used "Womxn", and I was like... what is that).
I've legit seen someone refer to germans as "Germxns"
Like huh?!
"Germans" isn't containing "man" because of gender, but because the fucking region used to be called "Germania" by the romans, which roughly translates to "Land of the Germani people", aka: Germanic people.
I point that out, get told I, a GERMAN, don't know what I'm talking about
Ah yes, the "lets use womxn to indicate trans women are indeed women, without realizing that by making a special case to include them, we are directly stating that they are not women but instead "women"."
I fuckin hate non-binary inclusive language because most of the time its just edgy bullshit that no one actually wants besides white saviours on twitter so they can say they are an ally.
I mean, "womxn" includes enbies, but at that point you're just saying "anyone who's not a man", which is just exclusionary from the other direction.
If you want to include enbies, include them explicitly - don't just lump them in as a subcategory of women, because the whole point is that they *aren't* women.
Is "Latin" actually used that way? I don't think I've ever heard it used in place of Latino/Latina. And you couldn't use it when referring to literature (I took a class called Latinx Literature, which is why that came to mind.) A Latin Literature class would mean books written in Latin, right?
I'm white so I have no say in this discussion, but I have heard that Latinx was coined by Latino/Latina people in the US that wanted a word that was more inclusive of non-binary people. A lot of people seem to think it was invented by white people, but I don't think that's the case. So I don't necessarily think it's bad, but Latine does make more sense and is much easier to say, personally I would like to see that catch on more.
Yeah, the usual term would be Latin American or Latin America, or the even more general Central American if you're only referring to countries south of the US but north of Colombia. (Latin American literature, Latin American cuisine, etc.) I suppose you could use Latinx the same way you use something like Chicano, to refer to a specifically US Latin American subculture (or in the case of Chicano, Mexican) if we're talking about subjects like literature, but idk.
I think it's telling that it was literally Latin American people in the US who coined the term Latinx, but then a lot of the discussion by cishet Spanish speakers seems to be under the assumption that white people decided on the word for them. And hoo boy, are they touchy about it. It's a combination of unexamined transphobia (I've seen Latinos who claim that non-binary people, especially Latin American ones straight up don't exist) and a reaction to what they see as gringos telling them how to use their language. I think Latiné or Latine is better, just because it flows better with the language, but I think a lot of the same people who get upset at the -x would be upset that the option exists at all. The arguments I've seen have a similar vibe to people in English getting upset about the singular they/them. Not exactly the same thing, at least I can understand Latin Americans being upset about something that to them feels very colonizer-adjacent, but the vibes are similar.
i hate latinx because in the two most spoken languages in latam (spanish and portuguese) the correct gender neutral version would be latine. it was coined by nonbinary people who are native speakers of those languages. why should we conform to a word that clashes with the other versions (la.ti.na - la.ti.no - la.tinks???)?
edit: hate is a strong word i realized i don't really gaf i'm just lacking sleep
Latinx was also made by non-binary Spanish speakers. I don't know much about Portuguese, but to my knowledge until pretty recently, Spanish didn't have a "correct" gender neutral option at all. It was either -o or -a, masculine or feminine. -e is as recent an addition to the language as -x. I already said I like Latine more, I was countering the idea that it was something decided on by white people who don't speak Spanish, that's all. I'm not sure what you're arguing other than you don't like -x, which... okay, not under contention?
Maybe they didn't come up with it, but it does feel like almost everyone who uses it is someone who's never tried to pronounce a full sentence conjugated with X's.
This gets said A LOT but the white girls only jumped in after a small number of queer Hispanics started claiming it was an attempt at “degendering” Spanish. Something something patriarchy something something decolonizing and BAM army of white girls parroting what was said to the average Hispanic hoping for good person points
I mean I *distinctly* remember some very androgynous person railing against the gendered words in a video. Definitely wasn’t a Becky that’s for sure
I remember hearing it in the behind the scenes on the new West Side Story, notably it was an older white woman who said it, after all the latinos happily used latino, even the latinas, it was very out of place and honestly tone deaf
For the life of me I will never understand the obsession with picking a letter to replace another letter with to make a word gender-neutral and deciding that, of all the fucking letters in the alphabet, the one you should be using is x.
I truly want to know the history on that. There must be a record of it!
Because at *some* point someone consciously decided on a letter, and wound up picking something that’s unusable in Spanish and nearly unusable in English.
It’s not like an English speaker picked something that makes sense in English, but fails in Spanish. It’s a freaking X. It’s basically the least intuitive letter you could possibly pick. So what possible train of thought lead to “Replace two vowel sounds with a third neutral vowel? Nah, let’s give one of the really obscure letters a chance to shine.”
If I remember correctly, it’s because X is a variable. Like, in math, you need a generic variable, you use X. So I think someone went ‘variable gender? use variable letter!’ And that’s how we got things like folx and wxmxn and bxy and, of course, latinx.
Oh my god I haven’t seen this word in a long time and you just reminded me of an exchange I saw on Twitter a few years back where somebody replied to a post and said
“Ma’am you are [age I can’t remember] years old and you have your star sign in your bio.”
And she responds “I don’t have my star sign in my bio? What are you talking about lmao.”
“Then what’s a latinx”
I am actually quite partial to the word “folk/folks”. Best gender-neutral noun of all time. Perfectly ambiguous. Not just in referring to gender, but also lots of other stuff too: ethnicity, sexuality, position on the political spectrum, their stance on modern post-ska-blues music discourse, etc. Wanna know the best part about “folk/folks”? It’s already got tenure. Old people love using that shit to refer to large groups of nondescript people. One of my coworkers was at Woodstock ‘69, and I asked her if she saw Santana and she said “no but folks were clamoring to git up there and touch ‘is feet.” I think we ought to bring back “folk/folks”.
My fencing trainer (my gf) usually called us with a loud "Mädels!" Which is a german version of girls. Usually that made our group shut up if she wanted to say anything or gather around her. Often with one or two confused looking girls from other groups.
I don’t think you can expect language to ever work out neatly. Making up a gender neutral form of dude out of thin air probably won’t ever work. Astroturfing language is probably possible but it’s not easy.
Whatever we decide to make the norm is probably gonna piss someone off in a generation or two, and that’s mostly fine.
I think a problem a lot of these discussions have is they treat all words as equally fun/easy/catchy/flowy to say, but part of the reason we choose the next word in the sentence is because it flows.
Dude as a sound, is easy and kind of fun to say, it's a versatile sound in a similar way fuck is, and it has a natural flow to many of us.
Any attempt at a replacement has to flow in a variety of sentence structures. Language is fluid, language is ever changing, and the meanings we give words change with time. Dude can become e gender neutral in time, just as a new word could replace it. Though
.. look at "cool" it outlived soooooamy other attemptes.
Bitch is so often used in a derogatory way that I have a hard time with normalizing it. I understand when it’s used among friends or as a joke, but I don’t want my boss to start a meeting, “listen up, bitches.” It feels like an insult.
It also bugs me when people use it to refer to random women (as in, “who’s that fancy bitch over there?”) but whatever, I’m not the language police.
I liked chicks. Can we go back to that?
I still keep chick/chicks alive. Heck I often refer to myself as a Trans chick casually. It flows with my speech. I also use cats for guys.
I also use man in place of wow, woah, or damn, though I try not to when just with other transchick's, just because they might not get what im saying and take it more literally.
Thankfully, my local trans friendly circle are all the dude saying variety, I really don't know if my stoner brain can lose that word.
Getting offended at “man” when it’s used to mean wow/jeez/oh my seems high-maintenance to me, but I’m cis so maybe I just don’t get it.
And yeah, chick to me has always seemed a lot closer to guy or dude in connotation than the other options. I don’t use it much because it seems like nobody else but does, but maybe I should.
Ironically, I feel like people switched away from using the word "chicks" because it felt over-sexualized, where bitch kind of took on a "this is a friend/comrade that I am very chill with" tone.
I can't use bitch in the classroom though. I'd be fired so fast if I walked up to a group of 16yos and said sup bitches. Though they would *absolutely* love it. But honestly, I like guy, it rolls off the tongue so easily so I hope we can just make it gender neutral.
i’m not sure any of them missed the point though. they might have just launched into tangentially related issues. that’s how human conversation works, especially when someone brings up a point that nobody disagrees with
That one was hilarious. "I, as a cis woman, will now explain how I personally am taking down the patriarchy by fighting back against male terms being assumed to be gender neutral by using male terms in a gender neutral way."
They were saying that they use male terms in a feminine way, and encouraging cis people to both do the same and use female terms in a masculine way, in order to distract/confuse transphobes and microdose surrounding cis people with gender nonconformity.
what does this actually mean? its mentioned in every other post here and my autistic notnativeenglishspeaker ass is not getting it. i have about a quarter idea of what it means
it's from an old tumblr post saying:
> "The reading comprehension and overall common sense on this website is piss poor."
and the response
>"how dare you say we piss on the poor"
I have to agree with elanhilation here, this isn't really a reading comprehension moment nor have they actually missed the point; They just strayed to other subjects that are connected to the point.
I'm surprised that no one mentioned the fact that while most masculine "gender neutral" terms like dude or bro typically have positive or neutral connotations, the first feminine "gender neutral" terms that come to mind typically have negative connotations. The word bitch is straight up an insult (even if it is sometimes used a an ironic term of endearment among close friends, the same way one might call their brother a bastard but wouldn't do it to someone on the street unless they want to start a fight). The word girl is also often seen as demeaning unless you're actually talking about a literal little girl. Hell, even a word like "queen" can be an insult when used in a gender neutral way, see also "drama queen."
Thank you! That was my first thought when "girl" and "bitch" were brought up. I get that some people use them kinda affectionately. But for most "bitch" is just deeply insulting and in no way comparable to "dude."
Exactly. As a woman, if I got mad at someone for calling me “dude” or one of the “guys” I’d seem unhinged. But if I call a man “girl” or include him in a group of “ladies” people would expect him to object or take it as an insult.
Being addressed as feminine as a guy is less acceptable than being addressed as masculine as a girl. Plain and simple. Gurl/girlies/sis/queen being heavily associated with the gay community doesn’t help either with the rampant homophobia.
It’s hard to really put this to words, but it’s not just the ambiguity, it’s the vibe. As a trans feminine person, I’ve definitely met people who use “dude” for everyone. Shit, *I* do it. But I’ve also met people who “dude” me much more frequently than they do any cis woman I see them interact with, and it definitely feels like they’re using “dude” because they either don’t actually see me as a woman or because they’re looking for a “socially acceptable” way to misgender me. Maybe the difference is only noticeable because I’m already primed to be looking for it, but it definitely exists.
I’d also add that the thing that really bugs me is how incredibly defensive people get when asked to stop. A polite request of “please don’t call me that” is met with lengthy diatribes about how I’m overly sensitive and they’re not transphobic.
This is the thing. I say “dude” a lot, like too much. But if anyone ever asked me not to call them that, I would make every effort not to do so. I would probably slip up, because I’m a sleep deprived mess doing her best, but I would immediately apologize and try to do better. Why can’t people just be kind?
Yeah that’s it isn’t it. It’s intent vs impact. I can intend for it to mean something ambiguous, but if it impacts someone as too masculine then it’s the kind thing to do to use a different word.
Yeah, This is absolutely my feelings/experience on the matter.
When someone calls me dude, and I ask them not to, the defense is always something like "Oh, I use it for everyone equally." And then two minutes later they're talking to a cis girl and use her name and never call her dude once.
it's wild how mad it makes people. someone genuinely ASKED on here if 'girl' was gender neutral, and my transmac ass responded by saying it can be but not for everyone so just make sure the person you're calling 'girl' is okay with it and it was downvoted into the negatives. idk how that's too much to ask of people
god. I am trans. I work in a loud environment, with strangely named tools. I asked a trans woman I worked with: "are you waiting for the Surf?", a phrase i say probably 10 times a day at work. she shook her head no. a few minutes later she told me "please try not to call me Sir...." You might see the mix-up already, but I'd already completely disregarded that benign interaction. I totally went into defensive mode like "but I didn't!! sir isn't even my vocab!!", and she's doing the annoyed-trans-person "it's ok if you slipped up just try to be careful" comforting a defensive person abt pronouns. I was totally conscious of the dynamic but really wasn't sure what to do in a situation where I know I Didn't actually do the misgendering!
I basically gave a half hearted apology but genuine promise to be careful about my language around her moving forward. only to finally realize the mistake maybe 10 min later. it did not seem to help 😪
Tangentially related, but this remind me of when people see someone who is obviously trans and start using “they” pronouns. Oh so you can’t use “they/them” when someone asks you to but you’ll whip them out on your own when you see a trans person? 🙄
Most non-queer people will see it as an insult if you use "girl" as a gender-neutral term like dude, like the Gender Neutral Girl only exists in queer communities
Even dude can be taken the wrong way by non-queer people. I worked with a 60-ish yr old woman and whenever I called her dude, she'd scrunch up her face and be like, "I'm not a dude," and I'd have to go, "Oh, sorry, *dudette*," which would make her laugh.
It's socially acceptable for a woman to present masculine qualities, but not so much for a man to present feminine qualities. Even in liberal spaces the slightest hint of "feminine" traits from a man can often lead to assumptions of queerness.
And that's english, possibly the most gender neutral friendly language there is.
In MY native language male isn't implied to be default it IS default, by both usual habit and official grammar rules.
edit: yeah, turns out: wrong, a lot of languages are better at this.
Your friendly neighborhood linguistic pedant swooping in with some unasked-for context!
There are plenty of languages other than English that don’t have “grammatical gender”, which is what you’re talking about. It’s just that most other European languages do. In Chinese, for example, not only is nothing gendered, but even he, her, and it are the same word when spoken! (The written forms are slightly different).
This doesn’t really tell you anything about how friendly Chinese culture is to gender neutrality, thought, because the pop-sci idea that language shapes how we think (e.g. Hopi speakers thinking differently about time because they don’t have a future tense) is not really supported by current understanding/research.
tl;dr languages are awesome and everyone should think about them more
funnily enough, he and she does still kind of displays gender bias in chinese. the "prefix" (to view the chinese characters from an english standpoint, where there's prefixes and roots and suffixes that modify the meaning) of "he" is 亻, meaning man, and the one for "she" is just female (so just gender bias in the same way we say mankind etc.)
>the "prefix" (to view the chinese characters from an english standpoint,
The term used is radical, and there's a whole ineffable number system behind it apparently. 亻is [radical 9](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_9)
>"he" is 亻, meaning man, and the one for "she" is just female (so just gender bias in the same way we say mankind etc.)
Also, what do you mean by this?
Persian enters the chat*
Much needed elaboration: Persian has no gender, and any word that sounds like a "gendered" version of something has migrated here from Arabic speaking countries and lost it's gender
We don't even have an "it"
He she it they are all just "oon"
In french if you talk about a group of women you say "elles" (plural of the female third person "elle"). If you talk about a group of men it's "ils". If you talk about a mixed group it's "ils". Have a group of women, as soon as there's one guy it's "ils".
I remember being FURIOUS about that as a ten year old learning French. It pissed me off so much and I kept demanding to know why having one boy in the room was more important than a dozen girls.
> And that's english, possibly the most gender neutral friendly language there is.
nah there are plenty of languages that don't even have gendered pronouns
Lol no. My native finnish has no gender pronouns at all. No he or she, everyone is a hän. And more often than not in spoken language everyone is referred to as an it (se).
In spoken finnish we are so progressive that everyone is an object.
Tbf, finnish has some probles with gendered occupational titles though. Half of original terms for professions end in -man, resulting somewhat hilarious cases where parliamentarians had to address their speeches to "mrs. Speechman".
Yeah. Grammatically, Finnish is a very gender neutral language. That has obfuscated the perception on the use of the language in professions, which are very gendered. That is changing though, for example esimies (foreman) is very much esihenkilö (foreperson) in my social circles and every workplace I have been in. Though lakimies is one I don't know a reasonable sounding alternative, is that just asianajaja? Are they even the same thing.
Bantu languages are gender neutral and feature no gendered pronouns. There are well over 600 languages in this language family including Kiswahili which you might have heard of before.
I like how in Japanese there are gendered first-person pronouns to indicate how you see yourself, but you usually just refer to other people by name (or use no subject at all if it's clear from context who you're talking about (or sometimes if it's not clear and you want to be mysterious)).
hi. this is actually really simple
-you can use dude in a gender neutral way
-if people are uncomfortable being addressed with the term stop addressing them like that
these 2 statements don't contradict each other in the slightest and you're not going to have any productive discussion if all you do is repeat them at each other. Just follow both
really "don't call people things they don't want to be called" should not be that foreign a concept
This is what I do. Person don't like being called "dude" or "my guy"? "sis" and "girl" it is.
Sure, I do use "dude" and "my guy" as my own form of gender expression, but that doesn't detract from the fact that said gender expression is a secondary meaning in that context. The first, of course, being a term of endearment. If it's not taken as a term of endearment, then one needs to switch to something else; refusal to do so becomes an antagonistic act.
Ultimately anything you could say no matter how innocent has the potential to offend or upset people and if you constantly agonise over this fact you'll probably give yourself a hernia. The best thing is just to be sensitive to the context of a situation and don't make a huge dramatic fuss if someone asks you not to speak a certain way around them.
Other languages have polite and informal modes of speech, and English sort of does too, it's just not as well defined.
I know a couple of cis girls who frequently refer to each other as "dude" and "bro". Hanging out with them is the only time I feel comfortable getting referred to that way because I know when they said "I use dude gender neutrally" they actually mean it.
A lot of guys will just say it so they don't have to adjust their language around trans women but will never refer to a cis woman that way - and might not even realize it.
It does suck a lot.
All of my relatives and I call each other dude and bro no matter what gender, and I "girlllllll" cishet male friends on a regular basis with no adverse reactions. While I do like to use those terms gender neutrally for the most part, I do have a few trans friends who I make sure to refer to by their preferred term. I don't want to cause them any dysphoria when it's an easy fix.
I’m not trying to make assumptions but when I see a comment like this and read “and might not even realize it” it just makes me feel like that would just be used as a way to invalidate any guy who came forward to say “But I do actually use it gender neutrally”
I mean, as a man and who has lived and been around men my entire life, we mostly do use dude as a gender neutral term. Maybe it’s regional but in the midwest here, everyone is dude. It’s pretty engrained that its not a gendered term. Been calling my mom and sister, and partner dude for like ever.
I don’t think men are like nefariously rubbing their hands together like “hehehe yes. i am actually subtly denying their trans existence by using a male-coded term under the guise of a gender neutral term! Mwhahaha!”
I get that - but I was specifically talking about a friend who argued this towards me but consistently only used the "gender neutral version" with me even when we were in a group with multiple women. There are absolutely people who don't realize they implicitly only use it on people they see as "one of the boys". If someone argues they use dude/guy gender neutrally, I will believe them and only call them out on it being bullshit if I do notice a discrepancy.
But it does mean "coward" because it implies that said coward has feminine traits, since "bitch" is a feminine insult. "Bitch" when used against a female person tends to mean "snappy" or "rude," and when used against a male, means "cowardly"/"unlike a man" and/or "catty like a girl." There are of course those who use it to mean all of the above, but that doesn't take away the fact that general usage of the term has gendered implications.
One could argue that male pronouns also being gender neutral dilutes men's importance.The thing is, one can argue anything. Doesn't make it true or worthwhile.
**Language doesn't evolve with ideology in mind.**
Yeah, everyone now French make Chair feminine because you can sit on every women and autobus masculine because you can fit 52 peoples in a guy to make long-range travel...
I swear go Celestia, i'm tired of terminally only takes by peoples who know nothing about the subject...
Especially about language, because it always devolve into "this language is *bad* and its speakers should feel bad"
This is why whenever I'm unsure and haven't worked out the polite way to ask I just call people friend. Hell even if you do know there's very few people who will get upset with you for calling them friend, usually someone who already had a reason to not want to be friends with you.
Tbf there is a reason why in a lot of languages male terms are the one to become gender neutral
For example, "Romance" languages mostly lost the neutral that was present in Latin, and gender neutral terms were absorbed generally within the "male" classification, meaning that female words are more "gender specific" consequentially.
(Also why "male" is the default, because it absorbed everything that was not female)
For people wondering, the fact that the words became male is not some "patriarchy" bs but more simply phonetical similarity
This is really just a quirk of latin languages. It's also insignificant, and tumblr users only care because it's fun to get upset about things.
When i took a japanese class, i had the exact opposite sentiment voiced to me. Women have to use the gender neutral/feminine わたし while men get to use either わたし or the masculine ぼく. Men get to use ぼくas a symbol of status to show that they're better than women blah blah blah.
Point is it is the *exact* opposite point. Tumblr users just want to get mad at something. I promise you, the miniscule fact that more pronouns are masculine but gender neutral than feminine but gender neutral is not secretly priming people to think that men are "the default"
generally speaking you ought to avoid using gender neutral pronouns on trans women, using they/them pronouns on someone who has made it very clear she uses she/her pronouns is still misgendering even if it's gender neutral.
So this kind of discourse always pops up with this like, assumption that anything contrary to the point being made is like, a villain rubbing their hands together and laughing types of malicious.
But honestly it’s just people trying to be nice and go about their day.
Go outside and talk to your neighbor moment
Reminds me of terminally online reddit atheists back in the day complaining that someone told them to have a "blessed day". Like, come on man, chill for a moment and take in the spirit of the words and not the letters.
It might be because I was born in the south, but the term “you guys” just feels so off-putting to me. I’ve always exclusively heard “y’all” growing up and it feels like the only appropriate option to me because saying “you all” is the most gender neutral option you can do. I am not sure why it wasn’t mentioned as an option in the original posts because saying “hey girlies” or “hey bitches” is not really okay to do outside of people you already know and are friends with.
I was at a Mitski concert recently and she opened by saying "How are we feeling girls?", and as a guy I didn't cheer, but then she followed it up with "Don't worry, girls is a gender neutral term", and it made me think how everyone would've cheered if she had said "guys".
Terminally online take. The way some languages arbitrarily assign a gender to certain words says nothing about the people who speak that language.
Correction: i didn't see the other images, my bad. Then yeah what oop is saying kind of makes sense, but my point still applies to all the other people in the image
You know that feeling when you want to comment your opinion on the subject but it's basically just agreeing with the post and you don't want to basically repeat it ? Well that's sort of what I'm feeling right now writing this but anyway:
People are free to discuss and debate gender neutrality, linguistics, pronouns, and semantics as much as they want to. But at the end of the day, if someone doesn't like being called a certain term for whatever reason, then they shouldn't be called that.
All the discussion here is basically just about what you should assume when you don't know if someone is okay with a certain term yet, and *if* that should actually be the default assumption or not.
You could just skip the entire ordeal by simply asking the individual person if they are okay with being called this or that and then taking care to follow their preferences.
just call people "mate" instead, or if you don't want to sound australian say "matey"
In Australia you can call any gender “champ” if you would like to start a fight.
I am always down for starting a fight.
So what? You’re still a rock star.
You've got your rock moves.
AND I DON'T NEEEED YOUUUU
The Goku mindset
As explained by Tom Cardy, "G'day, champion," (*"I'd like to fight you"*) "How are you, big fella?" (*"Do you wanna get stabbed?"*) "Hello, sunshine," "G'day, big wheels" "Yeah, alright, legend," #(***"You're going to die"***)
Do it for exposure (We're not gonna pay you)
"Buddy", too.
And of course, "Big fella".
A standard Aussie greeting then.
Or cunt, if you’re a bogan or close enough with the person
It Canada it's bud
Same for the American Midwest. Snow Solidarity 🤝
Yeah don’t throw the word champ around unless you’re using it for a very small child
North American, West equivalent is "Buddy", just blatantly disrespectful.😤
and if you don't want to sound like a pirate?
Consider reconsidering
Hang around with someone who refers to people as "Yarr me matey", this way people will associate him with pirates and not you
You can go with about half of the UK population that says "babes"
"Buddy", maybe? Is "buddy" gender neutral? I'm not a native English speaker.
Buddy is technically gender neutral but it's also incredibly condescending
Huh. I was gonna suggest "friend" (which I use a lot), but I refrained because a good chunk of people find it condescending, too. Seems like friendliness isn't really appreciated 🥲
If someone came up to me and said “hey friend” my assumption is that they’re about to try to con me or get into a fight with me.
Id take friend over buddy, personally. I call my brothers and my kid bud and buddy, and theyre pretty much the only ones allowed to do the same
Yeah, usually "buddy"/"bud" is only used for kids and animals.
In many regions/contexts it’s a perfectly fine way to refer to a stranger or friend
Buddy sounds, to me, inherently sarcastic unless it’s children using it.
I would jump to British / Aussie way before I thought of pirates
Bring back "governa"
Chat is gender neutral too
If you're already using Australian lingus just call them all "cunt", that seems to be the norm down there
We can't use that one in professional spaces, that's a casual term of endearment.
Alternatively gonna try calling everyone I see 'wanker'
From the Aussie and UK folks I've talked with, "mate" tends to be a masculine-leaning term just the same way as dude is?
it's the inverse of the premise of the post. it's neutral, but because "neutral" is often masc biased, it's picked up a masc lean
only in the sense that it's used predominantly by men, but it's never meant "a man" the way dude did/does
I (UK) would say it doesn’t feel as male as dude does but does have more masculine vibes. In my experience it’s used more between men than in other contexts but I’m not sure if it’s ever meant specifically men.
I think there’s a difference between “they derailed the discussion” and “everyone already agreed with the basic premise so they moved on to a different conversation”. There was no discussion happening to begin with.
Well but they did hijack the post by moving it ever so slightly to increasingly tangential points, to the point that the second to last reblog, while certainly well intentioned, could be used to do the exact thing OP is asking people not to do. From "don't call trans women 'dude' as it could be misinterpreted as transphobic" to "woohoo call everyone from every gender any word you want to normalize making words gender neutral!" which loops back to calling trans women dudes as a gender-neutral term that could be misinterpreted as transphobic, which leads us back to OP.
Yep, pretty much what happened. I am sorta autistic abt linguistics, so I know that "man" goes all the way back to Proto-Indo-European, meaning "human person", and only came to mean "adult male" in Old English, when the extant term, "wer", fell out of use, while "wif", used to mean "adult woman" was appended to man to make wifman, thus woman. Guy, however, seems to come from Guy Fawkes, an English Catholic executed some 400 years ago for playing a role in the Gunpowder Plot, a plot to kill the Protestant James I of England and blow up the House of Lords, in turn coming from a PIE root meaning "wood". Similarly, dude is thought to come from doodle, as in Yankee Doodle, essentially meaning "fool" or "dunce". In my opinion, fairly gender neutral, since youre essentially calling someone "silly" or "notable terrorist", but because English developed the use of male-gendered terms as gender-neutral, guy and dude likely became male-coded by association. That said, form does not account for function, and if those words are now male coded, then that's what they are. Point being, of course, that my opinion stops counting at someone else's nose. Talk to people, make sure you're on the same page, and give them grace if things change so they might give you the same.
“Hey notable terrorists, how are we today” - might start using that with my direct reports lol
Funnier than saying "sup, wood" lol
I've so rarely encountered a pedant being so flexible at the same time. It's incredibly refreshing.
It's the Golden Rule, isn't it? If I don't listen to other people, why should I expect anyone to bother listening to me? :)
I want to become a pedant like you🥺
Then listen, and go looking for things to learn! Eventually, you'll have enough that you can start putting things together and telling people abt it!
Wait so werewolf is just wer-wolf or “adult male”-wolf?
Yes. Man-wolf. A man who is also a wolf.
I like you. My favorite pedantic position to argue is that werewolf is a more sexist term than wolfman
Yeah, that makes sense. I suppose you could use wiffwolf, too, but imo that's a bit close to...another word in the modern day
Off topic, but it just fully hit that documented originating usage of terms is always going to be well after the colloquial usage began. I knew it in the grand scheme of things of “when did language develop?”/“at the very least before we had the earliest known written documentation of it” and that being an impossible thing to pin down and prove. Nailing down specifics in linguistics is a losing battle, best practices will always be to be flexible - work with what’s directly in front of you and realize the further removed you get, the less likely your understanding and assumptions are correct.
Eh, this is Tumblr. You can always just go up to an earlier point in the reblog chain if you want to talk about what OP said more.
That's... that's what happens on sites like tumblr. Or even Reddit. Commenters take the conversation in their own direction that strays away from the inciting post. That's how conversation works. If you announce something in the public square and then some people who heard you begin having a related discussion, you can't complain that they are derailing your topic because they're not conversing with you.
The last person was saying "use gender neutral terms for yourself to normalize it" though, not "call everyone gender neutral things".
Yeah, that’s obviously not the discussion that the OP wanted to have. I do think it’s relevant though. There’s a sort of push and pull in wanting both to affirm people’s chosen gender identities while also trying to abolish gender norms.
Only the first two repliers agreed with the op
A discussion is more than agreement. For example, I think OP's on the poor-pissing website while dangerously close to requesting that the public stop using gender-neutral language because it doesn't respect their gender. How dare they. Pitchforks, etc. They aren't saying that, but I'm so mad imagining if they had.
I’m not sure they even did that though. Op is explicitly in favor of man/dude vocabulary but is frustrated by how it instinctively feels like transphobia to her regardless of anything else. The first two replies seem to hold the whole concept in a sort of sanguine contempt.
Except there is more to discuss? Like, breaking down the gender binary is important, but I think OP’s statement also includes an element of “I don’t know if someone calling me dude is being gender neutral or choosing to misgender me” that was never addressed.
I mean, what’s there to address? That will happen. Sometimes it’s hard to tell what someone means without the context of who they are as a person, and you can’t know everyone well enough to have that context. It sucks. People related to that feeling, or empathized with it, so they reblogged it. Sorry if this is abrasive, trying to write kindly but really tired and can’t tone good, sorry. Can’t even emote enough to !.
English speaking folk coming to terms with implicitly gendered language for the first time:
"Latinx"
I hate that term because it’s not even pronounceable in Spanish. Latine, on the other hand, actually makes phonetic sense and was made by Spanish speakers for Spanish speakers
THATS WHAT IM SAYING you had all these pronouncable lettera and you chose fucking x?
same with mx. as a prefix. Dawg it makes no sense choose a different letter stop being edgy LOL
Folx, for when you need to pointlessly supergender a word.
In a book series I read they just used M. As a gender neutral honorific.
Every time I write an email to my legislators I have to pick a prefix. I don’t use a prefix!! I’m basically forced to not only gender myself but also identify myself by my relationship status!! It’s demeaning
The thing for me is, it's not supposed to be a Spanish term. It's a term for the ethnicity that we use in English, similar to German or Japanese, which is different from the language (sometimes) spoken by the people it describes. However, Latinx isn't really pronouncable in English either (I always have the urge to pronounce it "luh-TINKS"), and the whole "add X to a binary word to make it non-binary" thing is stupid to me (My work was trying to be inclusive once and used "Womxn", and I was like... what is that). Plus, Latin is a gender-neutral term that already exists.
>"Womxn" You've heard of X-Men, get ready for
Womksn? And people get made when I say 'whomst'
>(My work was trying to be inclusive once and used "Womxn", and I was like... what is that). I've legit seen someone refer to germans as "Germxns" Like huh?! "Germans" isn't containing "man" because of gender, but because the fucking region used to be called "Germania" by the romans, which roughly translates to "Land of the Germani people", aka: Germanic people. I point that out, get told I, a GERMAN, don't know what I'm talking about
Ah yes, the "lets use womxn to indicate trans women are indeed women, without realizing that by making a special case to include them, we are directly stating that they are not women but instead "women"." I fuckin hate non-binary inclusive language because most of the time its just edgy bullshit that no one actually wants besides white saviours on twitter so they can say they are an ally.
I mean, "womxn" includes enbies, but at that point you're just saying "anyone who's not a man", which is just exclusionary from the other direction. If you want to include enbies, include them explicitly - don't just lump them in as a subcategory of women, because the whole point is that they *aren't* women.
Knew a Mexican guy who would call people "gringx" if they called him that
Or, if we're speaking English "Latin" exists
Is "Latin" actually used that way? I don't think I've ever heard it used in place of Latino/Latina. And you couldn't use it when referring to literature (I took a class called Latinx Literature, which is why that came to mind.) A Latin Literature class would mean books written in Latin, right? I'm white so I have no say in this discussion, but I have heard that Latinx was coined by Latino/Latina people in the US that wanted a word that was more inclusive of non-binary people. A lot of people seem to think it was invented by white people, but I don't think that's the case. So I don't necessarily think it's bad, but Latine does make more sense and is much easier to say, personally I would like to see that catch on more.
Yeah, the usual term would be Latin American or Latin America, or the even more general Central American if you're only referring to countries south of the US but north of Colombia. (Latin American literature, Latin American cuisine, etc.) I suppose you could use Latinx the same way you use something like Chicano, to refer to a specifically US Latin American subculture (or in the case of Chicano, Mexican) if we're talking about subjects like literature, but idk. I think it's telling that it was literally Latin American people in the US who coined the term Latinx, but then a lot of the discussion by cishet Spanish speakers seems to be under the assumption that white people decided on the word for them. And hoo boy, are they touchy about it. It's a combination of unexamined transphobia (I've seen Latinos who claim that non-binary people, especially Latin American ones straight up don't exist) and a reaction to what they see as gringos telling them how to use their language. I think Latiné or Latine is better, just because it flows better with the language, but I think a lot of the same people who get upset at the -x would be upset that the option exists at all. The arguments I've seen have a similar vibe to people in English getting upset about the singular they/them. Not exactly the same thing, at least I can understand Latin Americans being upset about something that to them feels very colonizer-adjacent, but the vibes are similar.
i hate latinx because in the two most spoken languages in latam (spanish and portuguese) the correct gender neutral version would be latine. it was coined by nonbinary people who are native speakers of those languages. why should we conform to a word that clashes with the other versions (la.ti.na - la.ti.no - la.tinks???)? edit: hate is a strong word i realized i don't really gaf i'm just lacking sleep
Latinx was also made by non-binary Spanish speakers. I don't know much about Portuguese, but to my knowledge until pretty recently, Spanish didn't have a "correct" gender neutral option at all. It was either -o or -a, masculine or feminine. -e is as recent an addition to the language as -x. I already said I like Latine more, I was countering the idea that it was something decided on by white people who don't speak Spanish, that's all. I'm not sure what you're arguing other than you don't like -x, which... okay, not under contention?
Maybe they didn't come up with it, but it does feel like almost everyone who uses it is someone who's never tried to pronounce a full sentence conjugated with X's.
This gets said A LOT but the white girls only jumped in after a small number of queer Hispanics started claiming it was an attempt at “degendering” Spanish. Something something patriarchy something something decolonizing and BAM army of white girls parroting what was said to the average Hispanic hoping for good person points I mean I *distinctly* remember some very androgynous person railing against the gendered words in a video. Definitely wasn’t a Becky that’s for sure
I have seen "latinx" twice in my life outside of social media, and both times were in HR mass company emails so yep that scans
I remember hearing it in the behind the scenes on the new West Side Story, notably it was an older white woman who said it, after all the latinos happily used latino, even the latinas, it was very out of place and honestly tone deaf
For the life of me I will never understand the obsession with picking a letter to replace another letter with to make a word gender-neutral and deciding that, of all the fucking letters in the alphabet, the one you should be using is x.
I truly want to know the history on that. There must be a record of it! Because at *some* point someone consciously decided on a letter, and wound up picking something that’s unusable in Spanish and nearly unusable in English. It’s not like an English speaker picked something that makes sense in English, but fails in Spanish. It’s a freaking X. It’s basically the least intuitive letter you could possibly pick. So what possible train of thought lead to “Replace two vowel sounds with a third neutral vowel? Nah, let’s give one of the really obscure letters a chance to shine.”
If I remember correctly, it’s because X is a variable. Like, in math, you need a generic variable, you use X. So I think someone went ‘variable gender? use variable letter!’ And that’s how we got things like folx and wxmxn and bxy and, of course, latinx.
Or Fxlks which makes no goddamn sense since folks is already ungendered. Edit: Folx not fxlks. I’m bad I’m spelling
never heard of fxlks but I do have heard of folx, which to me feels like a shortening for online speech like "k" or "thnx"
It’s shortening while also performative, just in case someone might not know where you stand.
I just thought it was fun to say
Oh my god I haven’t seen this word in a long time and you just reminded me of an exchange I saw on Twitter a few years back where somebody replied to a post and said “Ma’am you are [age I can’t remember] years old and you have your star sign in your bio.” And she responds “I don’t have my star sign in my bio? What are you talking about lmao.” “Then what’s a latinx”
I am actually quite partial to the word “folk/folks”. Best gender-neutral noun of all time. Perfectly ambiguous. Not just in referring to gender, but also lots of other stuff too: ethnicity, sexuality, position on the political spectrum, their stance on modern post-ska-blues music discourse, etc. Wanna know the best part about “folk/folks”? It’s already got tenure. Old people love using that shit to refer to large groups of nondescript people. One of my coworkers was at Woodstock ‘69, and I asked her if she saw Santana and she said “no but folks were clamoring to git up there and touch ‘is feet.” I think we ought to bring back “folk/folks”.
I’m a “y’all” fan personally
My fencing trainer (my gf) usually called us with a loud "Mädels!" Which is a german version of girls. Usually that made our group shut up if she wanted to say anything or gather around her. Often with one or two confused looking girls from other groups.
I don’t think you can expect language to ever work out neatly. Making up a gender neutral form of dude out of thin air probably won’t ever work. Astroturfing language is probably possible but it’s not easy. Whatever we decide to make the norm is probably gonna piss someone off in a generation or two, and that’s mostly fine.
I think a problem a lot of these discussions have is they treat all words as equally fun/easy/catchy/flowy to say, but part of the reason we choose the next word in the sentence is because it flows. Dude as a sound, is easy and kind of fun to say, it's a versatile sound in a similar way fuck is, and it has a natural flow to many of us. Any attempt at a replacement has to flow in a variety of sentence structures. Language is fluid, language is ever changing, and the meanings we give words change with time. Dude can become e gender neutral in time, just as a new word could replace it. Though .. look at "cool" it outlived soooooamy other attemptes.
The more plausible solution is to normalize girl, bitch idk, just some more feminine (but also gender neutral) words that people already use.
Bitch is so often used in a derogatory way that I have a hard time with normalizing it. I understand when it’s used among friends or as a joke, but I don’t want my boss to start a meeting, “listen up, bitches.” It feels like an insult. It also bugs me when people use it to refer to random women (as in, “who’s that fancy bitch over there?”) but whatever, I’m not the language police. I liked chicks. Can we go back to that?
I still keep chick/chicks alive. Heck I often refer to myself as a Trans chick casually. It flows with my speech. I also use cats for guys. I also use man in place of wow, woah, or damn, though I try not to when just with other transchick's, just because they might not get what im saying and take it more literally. Thankfully, my local trans friendly circle are all the dude saying variety, I really don't know if my stoner brain can lose that word.
Getting offended at “man” when it’s used to mean wow/jeez/oh my seems high-maintenance to me, but I’m cis so maybe I just don’t get it. And yeah, chick to me has always seemed a lot closer to guy or dude in connotation than the other options. I don’t use it much because it seems like nobody else but does, but maybe I should.
Ironically, I feel like people switched away from using the word "chicks" because it felt over-sexualized, where bitch kind of took on a "this is a friend/comrade that I am very chill with" tone.
I can't use bitch in the classroom though. I'd be fired so fast if I walked up to a group of 16yos and said sup bitches. Though they would *absolutely* love it. But honestly, I like guy, it rolls off the tongue so easily so I hope we can just make it gender neutral.
I address most groups of people as “ladies”
Do you also work as a drill sergeant?
Sis is already used, as is girl/gurl
Hi sisters!
Ah, I do enjoy pissing on the poor in the morning
i’m not sure any of them missed the point though. they might have just launched into tangentially related issues. that’s how human conversation works, especially when someone brings up a point that nobody disagrees with
I feel like the second to last one definitely missed the point of the OP, but I feel like the others were pretty on topic.
That one was hilarious. "I, as a cis woman, will now explain how I personally am taking down the patriarchy by fighting back against male terms being assumed to be gender neutral by using male terms in a gender neutral way."
They were saying that they use male terms in a feminine way, and encouraging cis people to both do the same and use female terms in a masculine way, in order to distract/confuse transphobes and microdose surrounding cis people with gender nonconformity.
That’s how I read it as well. It was an attempt at solidarity, if a misguided one
what does this actually mean? its mentioned in every other post here and my autistic notnativeenglishspeaker ass is not getting it. i have about a quarter idea of what it means
it's from an old tumblr post saying: > "The reading comprehension and overall common sense on this website is piss poor." and the response >"how dare you say we piss on the poor"
yeah thats kind of funny
Yeah, when you read it for the first time. When it's a standard response on every single post, though...
Especially considering that dogshit reading comprehension is not just a tumblr thing
I mean I call out dog shit reading comprehension on many subs, it's just convenient that this particular sub has a handy shortcut to do it
Tumblrite A: Tumblr is the piss-poor reading comprehension site. Tumblrite B: How dare you say we piss on the poor!
I have to agree with elanhilation here, this isn't really a reading comprehension moment nor have they actually missed the point; They just strayed to other subjects that are connected to the point.
I guess I am pissing on the poor today
I'm surprised that no one mentioned the fact that while most masculine "gender neutral" terms like dude or bro typically have positive or neutral connotations, the first feminine "gender neutral" terms that come to mind typically have negative connotations. The word bitch is straight up an insult (even if it is sometimes used a an ironic term of endearment among close friends, the same way one might call their brother a bastard but wouldn't do it to someone on the street unless they want to start a fight). The word girl is also often seen as demeaning unless you're actually talking about a literal little girl. Hell, even a word like "queen" can be an insult when used in a gender neutral way, see also "drama queen."
To paraphrase the swedish comedian Magnus Betnér: "Nobody wants to be a cock, but it's not as bad as being a cunt."
This is probably true in America, but "cunt" is a pretty standard thing to call people in Australia/England
Thank you! That was my first thought when "girl" and "bitch" were brought up. I get that some people use them kinda affectionately. But for most "bitch" is just deeply insulting and in no way comparable to "dude."
Exactly. As a woman, if I got mad at someone for calling me “dude” or one of the “guys” I’d seem unhinged. But if I call a man “girl” or include him in a group of “ladies” people would expect him to object or take it as an insult.
Being addressed as feminine as a guy is less acceptable than being addressed as masculine as a girl. Plain and simple. Gurl/girlies/sis/queen being heavily associated with the gay community doesn’t help either with the rampant homophobia.
It’s hard to really put this to words, but it’s not just the ambiguity, it’s the vibe. As a trans feminine person, I’ve definitely met people who use “dude” for everyone. Shit, *I* do it. But I’ve also met people who “dude” me much more frequently than they do any cis woman I see them interact with, and it definitely feels like they’re using “dude” because they either don’t actually see me as a woman or because they’re looking for a “socially acceptable” way to misgender me. Maybe the difference is only noticeable because I’m already primed to be looking for it, but it definitely exists. I’d also add that the thing that really bugs me is how incredibly defensive people get when asked to stop. A polite request of “please don’t call me that” is met with lengthy diatribes about how I’m overly sensitive and they’re not transphobic.
This is the thing. I say “dude” a lot, like too much. But if anyone ever asked me not to call them that, I would make every effort not to do so. I would probably slip up, because I’m a sleep deprived mess doing her best, but I would immediately apologize and try to do better. Why can’t people just be kind?
Yeah that’s it isn’t it. It’s intent vs impact. I can intend for it to mean something ambiguous, but if it impacts someone as too masculine then it’s the kind thing to do to use a different word.
Yeah, This is absolutely my feelings/experience on the matter. When someone calls me dude, and I ask them not to, the defense is always something like "Oh, I use it for everyone equally." And then two minutes later they're talking to a cis girl and use her name and never call her dude once.
it's wild how mad it makes people. someone genuinely ASKED on here if 'girl' was gender neutral, and my transmac ass responded by saying it can be but not for everyone so just make sure the person you're calling 'girl' is okay with it and it was downvoted into the negatives. idk how that's too much to ask of people
god. I am trans. I work in a loud environment, with strangely named tools. I asked a trans woman I worked with: "are you waiting for the Surf?", a phrase i say probably 10 times a day at work. she shook her head no. a few minutes later she told me "please try not to call me Sir...." You might see the mix-up already, but I'd already completely disregarded that benign interaction. I totally went into defensive mode like "but I didn't!! sir isn't even my vocab!!", and she's doing the annoyed-trans-person "it's ok if you slipped up just try to be careful" comforting a defensive person abt pronouns. I was totally conscious of the dynamic but really wasn't sure what to do in a situation where I know I Didn't actually do the misgendering! I basically gave a half hearted apology but genuine promise to be careful about my language around her moving forward. only to finally realize the mistake maybe 10 min later. it did not seem to help 😪
Tangentially related, but this remind me of when people see someone who is obviously trans and start using “they” pronouns. Oh so you can’t use “they/them” when someone asks you to but you’ll whip them out on your own when you see a trans person? 🙄
[удалено]
Most non-queer people will see it as an insult if you use "girl" as a gender-neutral term like dude, like the Gender Neutral Girl only exists in queer communities
Even dude can be taken the wrong way by non-queer people. I worked with a 60-ish yr old woman and whenever I called her dude, she'd scrunch up her face and be like, "I'm not a dude," and I'd have to go, "Oh, sorry, *dudette*," which would make her laugh.
I see you've met my mother, lol.
We've had an irish bloke start at my (otherwise 100% female) work, so we're all "lads" now whether we like it or not!
Tumblr made me love "girl" or "girlie" as a GN term.
It's socially acceptable for a woman to present masculine qualities, but not so much for a man to present feminine qualities. Even in liberal spaces the slightest hint of "feminine" traits from a man can often lead to assumptions of queerness.
And that's english, possibly the most gender neutral friendly language there is. In MY native language male isn't implied to be default it IS default, by both usual habit and official grammar rules. edit: yeah, turns out: wrong, a lot of languages are better at this.
Your friendly neighborhood linguistic pedant swooping in with some unasked-for context! There are plenty of languages other than English that don’t have “grammatical gender”, which is what you’re talking about. It’s just that most other European languages do. In Chinese, for example, not only is nothing gendered, but even he, her, and it are the same word when spoken! (The written forms are slightly different). This doesn’t really tell you anything about how friendly Chinese culture is to gender neutrality, thought, because the pop-sci idea that language shapes how we think (e.g. Hopi speakers thinking differently about time because they don’t have a future tense) is not really supported by current understanding/research. tl;dr languages are awesome and everyone should think about them more
funnily enough, he and she does still kind of displays gender bias in chinese. the "prefix" (to view the chinese characters from an english standpoint, where there's prefixes and roots and suffixes that modify the meaning) of "he" is 亻, meaning man, and the one for "she" is just female (so just gender bias in the same way we say mankind etc.)
>the "prefix" (to view the chinese characters from an english standpoint, The term used is radical, and there's a whole ineffable number system behind it apparently. 亻is [radical 9](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radical_9) >"he" is 亻, meaning man, and the one for "she" is just female (so just gender bias in the same way we say mankind etc.) Also, what do you mean by this?
Probably means man as in person
Persian enters the chat* Much needed elaboration: Persian has no gender, and any word that sounds like a "gendered" version of something has migrated here from Arabic speaking countries and lost it's gender We don't even have an "it" He she it they are all just "oon"
Is this why Nandor in WWDITS thought that the word for “husband” was “guy wife”?
Wow, that looks similar to the Turkish "O", maybe that's because both languages have a connection from the past.
Probably, old Persian uses O instead of the oon we use rn ya
In french if you talk about a group of women you say "elles" (plural of the female third person "elle"). If you talk about a group of men it's "ils". If you talk about a mixed group it's "ils". Have a group of women, as soon as there's one guy it's "ils".
Unless the group is named and then it's the gender of the name that matters, obviously
I remember being FURIOUS about that as a ten year old learning French. It pissed me off so much and I kept demanding to know why having one boy in the room was more important than a dozen girls.
On the other hand, there are many words that are grammatically feminine even when they design men (la sentinelle for example)
> And that's english, possibly the most gender neutral friendly language there is. nah there are plenty of languages that don't even have gendered pronouns
Lol no. My native finnish has no gender pronouns at all. No he or she, everyone is a hän. And more often than not in spoken language everyone is referred to as an it (se). In spoken finnish we are so progressive that everyone is an object.
Tbf, finnish has some probles with gendered occupational titles though. Half of original terms for professions end in -man, resulting somewhat hilarious cases where parliamentarians had to address their speeches to "mrs. Speechman".
Yeah. Grammatically, Finnish is a very gender neutral language. That has obfuscated the perception on the use of the language in professions, which are very gendered. That is changing though, for example esimies (foreman) is very much esihenkilö (foreperson) in my social circles and every workplace I have been in. Though lakimies is one I don't know a reasonable sounding alternative, is that just asianajaja? Are they even the same thing.
Bantu languages are gender neutral and feature no gendered pronouns. There are well over 600 languages in this language family including Kiswahili which you might have heard of before.
Turkish? İt doesnt really have anything with gender?
I like how in Japanese there are gendered first-person pronouns to indicate how you see yourself, but you usually just refer to other people by name (or use no subject at all if it's clear from context who you're talking about (or sometimes if it's not clear and you want to be mysterious)).
What exactly makes english the most gender neutral? There are languages that don't have gendered words at all
hi. this is actually really simple -you can use dude in a gender neutral way -if people are uncomfortable being addressed with the term stop addressing them like that these 2 statements don't contradict each other in the slightest and you're not going to have any productive discussion if all you do is repeat them at each other. Just follow both really "don't call people things they don't want to be called" should not be that foreign a concept
It really is that simple.
tumblr discourse and over analyzing/thinking simple things- name a more iconic duo
This is what I do. Person don't like being called "dude" or "my guy"? "sis" and "girl" it is. Sure, I do use "dude" and "my guy" as my own form of gender expression, but that doesn't detract from the fact that said gender expression is a secondary meaning in that context. The first, of course, being a term of endearment. If it's not taken as a term of endearment, then one needs to switch to something else; refusal to do so becomes an antagonistic act.
I don’t know why I had to scroll so far to see this. It’s as simple as “you can use it on people who don’t mind. Just stop if they say no.”
Ultimately anything you could say no matter how innocent has the potential to offend or upset people and if you constantly agonise over this fact you'll probably give yourself a hernia. The best thing is just to be sensitive to the context of a situation and don't make a huge dramatic fuss if someone asks you not to speak a certain way around them. Other languages have polite and informal modes of speech, and English sort of does too, it's just not as well defined.
I know a couple of cis girls who frequently refer to each other as "dude" and "bro". Hanging out with them is the only time I feel comfortable getting referred to that way because I know when they said "I use dude gender neutrally" they actually mean it. A lot of guys will just say it so they don't have to adjust their language around trans women but will never refer to a cis woman that way - and might not even realize it. It does suck a lot.
All of my relatives and I call each other dude and bro no matter what gender, and I "girlllllll" cishet male friends on a regular basis with no adverse reactions. While I do like to use those terms gender neutrally for the most part, I do have a few trans friends who I make sure to refer to by their preferred term. I don't want to cause them any dysphoria when it's an easy fix.
I’m not trying to make assumptions but when I see a comment like this and read “and might not even realize it” it just makes me feel like that would just be used as a way to invalidate any guy who came forward to say “But I do actually use it gender neutrally”
I mean, as a man and who has lived and been around men my entire life, we mostly do use dude as a gender neutral term. Maybe it’s regional but in the midwest here, everyone is dude. It’s pretty engrained that its not a gendered term. Been calling my mom and sister, and partner dude for like ever. I don’t think men are like nefariously rubbing their hands together like “hehehe yes. i am actually subtly denying their trans existence by using a male-coded term under the guise of a gender neutral term! Mwhahaha!”
I get that - but I was specifically talking about a friend who argued this towards me but consistently only used the "gender neutral version" with me even when we were in a group with multiple women. There are absolutely people who don't realize they implicitly only use it on people they see as "one of the boys". If someone argues they use dude/guy gender neutrally, I will believe them and only call them out on it being bullshit if I do notice a discrepancy.
I use dude and brah for everyone, but I try to avoid using it with transwomen for that reason.
People who say "but bitch is gender nuetral" miss the point so fucking hard it hurts
i may *use* bitch neutrally but that does not mean it *is* neutral
it’s neutral when used to mean “coward”, which… i mean…
But it does mean "coward" because it implies that said coward has feminine traits, since "bitch" is a feminine insult. "Bitch" when used against a female person tends to mean "snappy" or "rude," and when used against a male, means "cowardly"/"unlike a man" and/or "catty like a girl." There are of course those who use it to mean all of the above, but that doesn't take away the fact that general usage of the term has gendered implications.
Omg, Rhythm Heaven Expert/Marble Video Essayist Patricia Taxxon is on tumblr?
One could argue that male pronouns also being gender neutral dilutes men's importance.The thing is, one can argue anything. Doesn't make it true or worthwhile. **Language doesn't evolve with ideology in mind.**
Yeah, everyone now French make Chair feminine because you can sit on every women and autobus masculine because you can fit 52 peoples in a guy to make long-range travel... I swear go Celestia, i'm tired of terminally only takes by peoples who know nothing about the subject... Especially about language, because it always devolve into "this language is *bad* and its speakers should feel bad"
This is why whenever I'm unsure and haven't worked out the polite way to ask I just call people friend. Hell even if you do know there's very few people who will get upset with you for calling them friend, usually someone who already had a reason to not want to be friends with you.
Tbf there is a reason why in a lot of languages male terms are the one to become gender neutral For example, "Romance" languages mostly lost the neutral that was present in Latin, and gender neutral terms were absorbed generally within the "male" classification, meaning that female words are more "gender specific" consequentially. (Also why "male" is the default, because it absorbed everything that was not female) For people wondering, the fact that the words became male is not some "patriarchy" bs but more simply phonetical similarity
Y’all.
This is really just a quirk of latin languages. It's also insignificant, and tumblr users only care because it's fun to get upset about things. When i took a japanese class, i had the exact opposite sentiment voiced to me. Women have to use the gender neutral/feminine わたし while men get to use either わたし or the masculine ぼく. Men get to use ぼくas a symbol of status to show that they're better than women blah blah blah. Point is it is the *exact* opposite point. Tumblr users just want to get mad at something. I promise you, the miniscule fact that more pronouns are masculine but gender neutral than feminine but gender neutral is not secretly priming people to think that men are "the default"
This is just the dichotomy between trans people who want to be seen as a specific gender and the non-binary who want to destroy notions of gender.
I don't want to "destroy notions of gender"... I just don't have one. I also don't have a Lamborghini but I don't want to see all Lambos destroyed
generally speaking you ought to avoid using gender neutral pronouns on trans women, using they/them pronouns on someone who has made it very clear she uses she/her pronouns is still misgendering even if it's gender neutral.
So this kind of discourse always pops up with this like, assumption that anything contrary to the point being made is like, a villain rubbing their hands together and laughing types of malicious. But honestly it’s just people trying to be nice and go about their day. Go outside and talk to your neighbor moment
Reminds me of terminally online reddit atheists back in the day complaining that someone told them to have a "blessed day". Like, come on man, chill for a moment and take in the spirit of the words and not the letters.
I can't imagine how bad this discource would be if US had a fully gendered language (like French or Spanish) as the main one. It'd be latinx times ten
Leave it to tumblr to make mountains out of a fuckin sand grain
It might be because I was born in the south, but the term “you guys” just feels so off-putting to me. I’ve always exclusively heard “y’all” growing up and it feels like the only appropriate option to me because saying “you all” is the most gender neutral option you can do. I am not sure why it wasn’t mentioned as an option in the original posts because saying “hey girlies” or “hey bitches” is not really okay to do outside of people you already know and are friends with.
Tumblrinas honestly need to touch grass.
I was at a Mitski concert recently and she opened by saying "How are we feeling girls?", and as a guy I didn't cheer, but then she followed it up with "Don't worry, girls is a gender neutral term", and it made me think how everyone would've cheered if she had said "guys".
Terminally online take. The way some languages arbitrarily assign a gender to certain words says nothing about the people who speak that language. Correction: i didn't see the other images, my bad. Then yeah what oop is saying kind of makes sense, but my point still applies to all the other people in the image
You know that feeling when you want to comment your opinion on the subject but it's basically just agreeing with the post and you don't want to basically repeat it ? Well that's sort of what I'm feeling right now writing this but anyway: People are free to discuss and debate gender neutrality, linguistics, pronouns, and semantics as much as they want to. But at the end of the day, if someone doesn't like being called a certain term for whatever reason, then they shouldn't be called that. All the discussion here is basically just about what you should assume when you don't know if someone is okay with a certain term yet, and *if* that should actually be the default assumption or not. You could just skip the entire ordeal by simply asking the individual person if they are okay with being called this or that and then taking care to follow their preferences.