"chairman" gets neutered

Wilson Gray hwgray at GMAIL.COM
Sun Aug 7 21:44:25 UTC 2011


On Sun, Aug 7, 2011 at 9:28 AM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com> wrote:
> In my day, or so it seems to me, chairpersons were at least as likely to be
> "chairmen" as "chairs," regardless of sex.
>
> Or do I mean "gender"?
>

I'm in complete agreement with Jon. However, I realize that our
opinions on these matters have very likely aged out of relevance.

But, don't get biggety, young pepper-chests! Regardless of your
current youthful relevance, you, too, have irrelevance in your futures
and you'll be just as annoyed. My grandparents went to their graves
pretending that the "bicycle," as this form of velocipede was known in
my youth, was properly referred to only by the word, "wheel," to name
only one.

I, too, expect to go to my grave, annoyed by the manner in which
people young enough to be my great-grandchildren are, even as I type,
working to fuck up what was once a beautiful language, in the form in
which it was bequeathed to me, ca. 1935-1965.

--
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org



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