[Ads-l] Really?

[Jonathan Lighter]

> "natural gender"

You should be ashamed.

JL

On Wed, Jun 3, 2015 at 5:17 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Really?
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Wed, Jun 3, 2015 at 4:19 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > Because "Keren" could be a unisex name.
>
>
> True. Facebook's algorithm did its best with what it had.
>
> Personally, in the spirit of what's-her-face's nonsensical claim in that
> commercial for something-or-other that she's "bringing boody back," why
> don't we bring the Neuter back as a true specification of grammatical
> gender that is not known to be either Masculine or Feminine? Therefore:
>
> "47 friends posted on Keren's timeline for _its_ birthday."
>
> Needless to say, we 47 friends who care about her birthday are fully aware
> that "Keren" is a pronunciation-respelling of "Karen" foisted upon the poor
> woman at birth by her parents and that Feminine is her "natural gender" -
> is this term still used? - a fact of no interest either to those who don't
> know her or to Facebook. Hence, as far as strangers and Facebook are
> concerned, the grammatical gender of "Keren" is naturally Neuter.
>
> Of course, the sentence may now be misinterpreted to mean that we 47
> friends are acknowledging the *timeline's* birthday, instead of Keren's.
>
> Perhaps the problem is soluble only by forcing Facebook's participants to
> choose between "Male" and "Female" or other such Draconian measure.
>
> Youneverknow.
>
> BTW, why "unisex" and not "unigender"?
>
> --
> -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
>



-- 
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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