From: rstevew@deeptht.armory.com (Richard Steven Walz)
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc,sci.skeptic,alt.censorship,alt.sex
Subject: Re: A gender neutral pronoun, was Fundamentalist Nightmare
Keywords: mindless,politically-correct,use,your,head
Date: 10 Nov 92 10:25:36 GMT
Organization: The Armory

In article <1992Nov4.094726.21497@newstand.syr.edu> greeny@top.cis.syr.edu (J. S. Greenfield) writes:
>In article <cH1NTB3w165w@cerianthus.pinetree.org> cowan@cerianthus.pinetree.org (Darin Cowan - root) writes:
>>
>>Expanding a language with new, useful words is a fine idea.  The problem 
>>is that politically correct types don't want to add useful words.  They 
>>want their own paranoias is self-centred goals to be given a place in 
>>history (oops, that's herstory for the politically correct who know 
>>nothing of the etymology of the word "history").
>> 
>>English does NOT need gender neutrality, womYn, and so forth.  What it 
>>needs is for people to THINK before they speak or write, and for readers 
>>and listeners to THINK while they read or listen, rather than sit back 
>>and look for imiginary insults to themselves or others.
>> 
>>I bet some of these people play records backward looking for sexist 
>>messages from Satan.
>
>I don't know why Mr. Cowan and others have been so quick to brandish this with
>the infamous "politically correct" mark.
-----------------------
(It's "brand", you dunce, not "brandish". And YOU want to change
english!)  It deserves the politically correct assignment. Simple.

>He seems to think that just because expressing ideas in a gender-nuetral form
>is popular among the "PC" crowd, gender neutral pronouns are, automatically,
>not "useful" words.  This is utter nonsense.
------------------
They aren't useful. The words aren't used in common parlance and
constitute the stilted insistence of an idealogue, like Bruce Varney's
perpetual "fetus=child" crap. Politically correct has exactly that
meaning: The stilted insistence of an idealogue about using words in a
way that the literate public at large has no use for and do not use.
It is also insulting to english speakers, as they decide as a whole
what path the language takes. If you wish to speak gibberish at them
instead of making a reasoned case, be my guest. They won't adopt your
ideas even if they happen to adopt your words as humor, and you will
discover that you can't change the way people think from the outside
in, a truth that is obvious to MOST thinking people.

>In essence, he suggests that, merely because gender-neutrality happens also
>to be pc, English speakers should rely on mind-reading rather than clear
>expression.  That is, I as a writer, should just choose gender-based
>terminology to express my gender-neutral ideas, and you as a reader, should
>just understand that I *really* mean to express a gender-neutral idea.
---------------------
It so happens that when a writer is speaking of a number of people and
their dialogue and responses in a story, that the more ways available
to distinguish them from one another, even sex, is useful if not
important, since much of what we write about IS the sexual
relationship and its dynamic. A reduction in pronouns which could
deliver more information simply slows english down to a crawl. We
already have gender neutral pronouns in english anyway. If one wishes
to use them to make a statement gender neutral, then they may, just as
I am doing at this moment! More gender neutral pronouns simply aren't
needed and are only an attempt to push an agenda on people from the
outside again rather than by reasoned argument from their insides. And
it's stupid and insulting to thinking people.

>And hell, as long as we're all such great mind-readers--well, you know.
-------------------------
That's the reason for distinguishing pronouns. We are NOT
mind-readers!

>While I am skeptical when I hear someone claim that there is no reason
>why a woman should feel strange being referred to as male (I wonder how
>comfortable they feel being referred to as female), that is not the essence
>of this matter.
--------------------------
I can't recall the last time I called a man a woman or a woman a man.
The laws are being written with  gender neutrality now without any
need for your odd looking pronouns that everyone stumbles on. The law
simple uses "one" or "a person" and "they, them, and their". A couple
other terms are used from time to time, but it isn't any longer and it
reads fine. I don't know why you're pushing this stupid agenda. If you
want to make your mark on the world go do something more useful.

>It is simply awkward in many cases to express an idea with reference to
>gender.  Let's take a look at the Japanese example of "older brother"
>and "younger brother."  Would any of you suggest that a feeling that some
>word to represent just plain-old "brother" should be created somehow
>represented an evil pc plot?
-----------------------------
Not evil, just ignorant and misguided. It is often useful to know
whether someone meant their older brother or their younger, as these
can serve to distinguish and automatically give us a picture of their
approximate age in our mental picture of the story. There are
well-understood things that imbue a work with the necessary color to
turn a string of text into a mental picture. Age and sex are a couple
of them. Humans regard these things as distinguishing. It needn't
mean that someone wishes to disparage a member of a class or by sex or
age. But if the author wished or needed to express that someone was
discriminating in precisely that way, the use of your "Korrect"
pronouns would confuse the reader completely as to what in the world
was going on, when anyone in the culture for whom it was written would
know if they were those characters and know implicitly, even if they
think such discrimination is wrong. Such use would be foolish in the
extreme.

>Mr. Cowan also neglects an important distinction between this issue, and a
>question like whether the spelling of "women" and "woman" should be changed to
>"womyn."
>
>In this case, we are trying to add a new semantic entity, that allows us
>to express an idea not currently expressable (or at least, not expressable
>in any convenient and concise manner).  In the case of "womyn" no change
>of semantics is being suggested--merely a change in spelling.  So, while
>Mr. Cowan may reasonably argue that the change from "women" to "womyn" is
>not useful, the same can not be said about adding gender-neutral pronouns.
---------------------------
Fuck your change in spelling. We already say "wimmin". That's a spelling
that a first grader could understand, phonics! We pronounce the
singular "wumin". If you would like to change english spelling to
reflect pronunciation, then I could see some merit to your quest, as
that is useful, even though I doubt it would fly. A language is like a
drifting continent. It moves much more slowly than you would like and
not necessarily in the direction you want. How much harder is it going
to be to change the spelling of women just to reflect your anti-men
bias. A man is just a man, but a woman has a womb and gives birth to
other humans. I think that makes her more already. I don't see
anything wrong with that. Womyn means what? Does it do away with
discrimination? No. Does it do anything? No. It's pronounced the same
way. There is even a danger that the term will be adopted to describe
a woman that no one can get along with because of her attitude about
the whole issue. Your word would serve to widen a gap in human
contact, not improve it.

>It is only Mr. Cowan's knee-jerk response that prevents him from recognizing
>this distinction.
--------------------
I have no ill-considered reflexive reaction to your distinction. I
doubt if Cowan does. The points he made were terse and only as
offensive as your ilk deserves. No one should buy what you're trying
to sell because it has no content. Come back when you can say
something that stirs people toward real change and not symbolic crap
that simply won't do anything and won't even fly. English is a language
that you can already say anything with that you can think of. I
recommend you learn how to use it. The people you really ought to
reach won't take your attempt to manipulate their minds without giving
them a good reasoned logical argument. All your call for spelling
changes does is irritate the open wounds in this society, it won't
heal them, just make them itch or burn. You're trying to use deoderant
on a cut, bud. Wrong choice.

>The matter is quite simple.  We are dealing with some ideas (gender-neutral
>ideas) that all of us can conceive, but that we cannot express to one
>another in English, except in a very awkward manner.  For the life of me,
>I can't understand why anyone would be outraged by the idea of adding terms
>to express ideas that we all can conceive.
-------------------------
Yeah, like maybe we need more TLA's (three letter acronyms:smirk)
[you nit-wit].

>One individual suggested that we already have the word "they."  Fine, but
>let's recognize that suggesting that an old word be used is not
>fundamentally different than suggesting that a new word be used.  The point
>is, you agree that there is a meaninful concept to be expressed, and that
>there should be some convenient way to express it in English.
--------------------------
I mentioned above the typical words used already quite simply in modern
law. They read with familiarity and without ambiguity. People have
been writing things that way a long time. I can't believe that you
think your generation is the first. And what's wrong with "they"? It
doesn't even discriminate against multiple personalities! :)

>I may happen to find the use of the plural "they" awkward (particularly when
>used with singular forms within the same sentence) but if this were to
>become an accepted use--fine.  Right now, it is still considered gramatically
>incorrect, and therefore, I find it rather awkward to use when writing.
---------------------------
If someone came up to you and hit you, would you hit them back?
(Gee, works fine to me; isn't even awkward.)

>As for these jokers who claim that there is no reason why one should even
>want to express a gender-neutral idea--this claim makes about as much
>sense as the claim that there is no reason why anyone should ever want to
>refer to an age-neutral brother.
----------------------
"Gee, my brother. How old is he again? I forget. Oh that's right, I
don't have a brother. I have a sister. Well even if I had a brother
I'm sure they could remember their age all by themself."
[more nit-witism above the quote]

>I think that any intelligent person can recognize that a knee-jerk reaction
>opposing anything that could possibly be pc (in addition to whatever
>knee-jerk reaction that might support anything purporting to be pc).
-----------------------------
One would think, wouldn't one? - Bugs Bunny
[Now, if only J.S. were intelligent.]

>Pays to use one's brain now and then.
-----------------------------
When are you going to start?
- Steve Walz

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