Sam Smith and They

Clippings from news sources involving fashion freedom and other gender equality issues.
rivegauche
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Re: Sam Smith and They

Post by rivegauche »

I have no problem with the principle of this. Someone I know changed gender and I would never dream of misgendering her but I still thought of her as him, and was fearful of saying the wrong pronoun out loud - I don't think I ever have. Calling someone it is just wrong. The French thing is a lost cause. The French Minister for Culture at one stage had a thing about retaining French over English. His name was Monsieur Toubon, and the French press delighted in referring to him as Mister Allgood. When a book he wrote on the subject started to sell well, the press announced this as "Le livre de Toubon est devenu bestseller". In English we have linguistic changes that raise hackles. One is the use of "innit". I would never use it myself except in jest, but I am relaxed about it - I regard it as an equivalent of the French "N'est-ce pas?" (Oh dear after al these years not confident I have spelt that correctly). The pronoun thing is way easier to understand than the gender terminology - the BBC has announced that there are over 100 genders. Four or five I might get my head round but more than 100? We live in interesting times. I may have a few decades left in me, and I can foresee a time when my language causes offence with absolutely no intention of doing so, just because I have lost touch with the latest conventions.
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Re: Sam Smith and They

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Pdxfashionpioneer wrote:It's offensive to call someone an "it." That suggests they're an object rather than a person and depending on the inflection you give it, perhaps a distasteful object.
Unless really pushed to the breaking point, that's not something I'd actually do, but it is linguistically more correct than "they" or "them". What I'm going on about is the overloading of extant words to mean something "new" in an annoyingly PC way. Overloaded words, like acronyms, cause needless confusion and frustration not only in communicating but also in comprehension. Communication can be difficult sometimes without it being anyone's fault; we would do well to not make it more complex.
It seems to me that it is only good manner to address a person as they wish to be addressed so long as you're not demeaning yourself. Is that really asking so much?
If the boxer in the clearing wants to be called "Fifi", then I'd be perfectly happy calling him Fifi. However, altering the meaning of the language carries other perils with it. Take, for instance, the modern redefinition of words like "conservative" and "liberal" to the point where we have essentially lost the use of the words because of the new meanings and the offence they cause. If we need a new word for an indeterminate-gender being, then we should create one or borrow something linguistically similar from another language that has those concepts (Which one?) already. (We already have one for neuter.)

Leaving the French out it for a moment, how are the Italians and the Spaniards dealing with the situation as their grammar lacks a neutral gender?
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Re: Sam Smith and They

Post by moonshadow »

crfriend wrote:Overloaded words, like acronyms, cause needless confusion and frustration not only in communicating but also in comprehension. Communication can be difficult sometimes without it being anyone's fault; we would do well to not make it more complex.
As for as the [LGBTQ+] acronym, I don't think anyone's intention was to be confusing, rather to just be inclusive, though I will admit the list is getting long... Which is why I'm personally starting to just refer to the group as "the queer community".

Websters New World Dictionary , 1974

queer:

1. Differing from what is usual or ordinary; odd; singular; strange

Yep... that pretty much sums all of us up.

And yes, further down, it list homosexual in a different number.

"Queer" covers it all man, and with fewer letters! Now if men in skirts were as common as women wearing pants, then no, we'd no longer be "queer", unless you fit one of the other meanings. But as of this writing, that does not seem to be the case.

Basically when it comes to the long acronym, it implies that we are stronger together and our diversity unites us against those "conformist" that would seek to control us and rule over our lives.
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Re: Sam Smith and They

Post by Gusto10 »

Moon, using Ze means that you know more Dutch than you have realised as "ze" is Dutch for "They".

Today I read somewhere, but I lost the source, that the new hype is using he, she, him and all other words that were abolished due to political correctness.
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Re: Sam Smith and They

Post by Pdxfashionpioneer »

In regards to calling someone an "it," Carl responded:
crfriend wrote: Unless really pushed to the breaking point, that's not something I'd actually do,


If you wouldn't do so, why did you advocate for such usage?

While we're at it, what would constitute your being "pushed to the breaking point?"
but it is linguistically more correct than "they" or "them".


Not any longer.
What I'm going on about is the overloading of extant words to mean something "new" in an annoyingly PC way.


Biologists tell us that the most critical trait for a specie's survival is adaptability. One of the incredible strengths of the English-speaking people is how readily they adopt and adapt words from foreign languages and even wholly new words. That's not being "PC," it's adapting by staying up to date.

Which by the way is nothing new. English is a rich stew of French, German and Latin in an equally rich broth of the language spoken by the original residents of British Isle. And those are only the major influences. There are also words in common English usage from all over the globe.

If we're going to stunt the growth of English, maybe we'd do better to reset to better version. But which shall it be, American English or the King's? If the King's, which King? And by the way, Shakespeare is considered the greatest writer in the English language of all time. that being the case, maybe we should go back to a Queen's English … But let's not give Chaucer short shrift ... Or maybe we should, as a matter of example I remember reading a text that printed a snippet from The Canterbury Tales. It vividly illustrated the point that only serious (masochistic?) scholars can read Middle English any longer. Sorry Chaucer.

And once again, while we're at it, why are so many people put out about being asked to be respectful of others' feelings that they have to denigrate those efforts as being PC?

It seems to me that it is only good manners to address a person as they wish to be addressed so long as you're not demeaning yourself. Is that really asking so much?


If the boxer in the clearing wants to be called "Fifi", then I'd be perfectly happy calling him Fifi.


It sounds like you accord that courtesy to only those who hold physical power over you. Is that really how you want to live your life?
However, altering the meaning of the language carries other perils with it.


Perhaps, but failing to adapt and stay up to date carries even greater perils.

In another thread, a poster stated that the BBC has identified about 100 gender labels. Personally, I find the BBC to be a very credible, authoritative source, but they are way behind the curve on this one. One of the major US universities recently changed the gender question on their enrollment application from "He, She, Other" to a totally blank space so applicants could self-identify. The response was so astonishing that as an academic exercise, that university formally studied the submissions. They found that their applicants reported over 500 distinct identities! Maybe we should be grateful that most listings leave it at LGBTQ+.
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Re: Sam Smith and They

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Pdxfashionpioneer wrote:In regards to calling someone an "it," Carl responded:
crfriend wrote:Unless really pushed to the breaking point, that's not something I'd actually do,
If you wouldn't do so, why did you advocate for such usage?

While we're at it, what would constitute your being "pushed to the breaking point?"
I was pointing out that we already have a neutral non-gendered pronoun. It's just not typically applied to people as people have always been either masculine or feminine. The times, they are a-changin', and perhaps it's time to adapt the neutral one. However, in this case, I suspect a better tactic would be to either create a new word or adopt one from another language to serve the new need. "Ze" might work in this regard.

As far as what would "push me to the breaking point", that generally happens when somebody "gets in my face" and won't lay in spite of my initial polite reactions. My default position is one of civility and politeness, but in the face of persistent unpleasantness I get testy. I freely admit to having a streak of stubbornness in me (caused, in the main, by my relative reluctance to accept random change solely for the sake of it) and if somebody tries hard enough to bend me without good reason I'm entirely likely to snap at them.
If the boxer in the clearing wants to be called "Fifi", then I'd be perfectly happy calling him Fifi.
It sounds like you accord that courtesy to only those who hold physical power over you. Is that really how you want to live your life?
That was a humorous riff on the SImon and Garfunkel song and had precisely nothing whatsoever to do with raw physical power.
In another thread, a poster stated that the BBC has identified about 100 gender labels.
Great. Do I need to learn a hundred new words now, of which I'll perhaps only use one or two of for the rest of my life?
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Re: Sam Smith and They

Post by pelmut »

There is a lovely old Somerset word "Ur" which can refer to a person regardless of their sex - or even to an object if you can point to it.  Thus:
[Referring to a man] Ur's come in late again s'mornin.
[Referring to a woman] Ur's got my tea on the table.
[Pointing to a car] Ur's a good un an oi only bought un yes'erday.

"Ee" is used when speaking directly to the person:
[Mother to daughter] Oi seed ee hanging aroun' with they lads from the village t'other evenin.
[Father to son] Can ee give oi a hand liftin' this!
...also:
[Pointing to a car] Ee can't be no good if you bought un off of thic scoundrel Jarge
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Re: Sam Smith and They

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pelmut wrote:There is a lovely old Somerset word "Ur" which can refer to a person regardless of their sex - or even to an object if you can point to it.
Well, there's another candidate!

I get that "it" could be considered a pejorative is US English, but there are currently no words that express the proper sentiment (even if "it" is lexically accurate). They/them is not lexically accurate, so I guess we need a new term, and stealing appropriating one from another language is a great way to solve the problem.

What's the derivation of the term? Much of the rest of the dialect as written is entirely intelligible, but the word in question leaves me without a clue.
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Re: Sam Smith and They

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Carl, the computing industry has "hijacked" more words in its time!!!! "Kernel" to mean the very heart of the Operating System. "Mouse" for that pointing device. Need I say more? In fact we were told in Compiler Theory course that the term "overloading" referred to using a word ( symbol? ) whose meaning depended upon its context.
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Re: Sam Smith and They

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Sinned wrote:Carl, the computing industry has "hijacked" more words in its time!!!!
That's putting it mildly. The computing industry has used ("overloaded") the same word so many times that communication within the industry is now difficult at best because so many terms can have different meanings depending on context.

A case in point: A few days ago a co-worker (as opposed to a cow-orker) queried me on a problem that was bothering him at home where he was trying to set up something fancy and used the term "domain" in three adjacent sentences where the term had three discrete meanings. (He's in way over his head.) He dumped about five sentences on me when I stopped him and said, "Let's deal with these one at a time." He then did the same thing, at which point I stopped him -- again -- and pointedly asked about the precise meaning of "domain" for each of the three competing instances. And, guess what, he started off on the spiel again. Unfortunately it wasn't a short conversation after that; it took me twenty minutes to extricate myself from it, in the process losing all the context (CS jargon for "detail") I had that was allowing me to get my job done. I even tried the, "Just tell me what you're trying to do, without jargon." tack which met with no success leading me to believe that he, himself, didn't properly grasp the problem.

I felt like banging my head on my desk afterwards. The computing field has gotten maddening, nay, infuriating, with what it's done to itself. I'm especially torqued off at the idiot at Intel that let an obscure supercomputer concept -- NUMA -- escape into the real world of industry. If somebody does not understand what NUMA ("Non-Uniform Memory Access") is -- and what its implications are -- then one has no business having access to it.

Don't -- please don't -- deploy one word in manners that can have multiple meanings depending on sometimes uncertain context. If you insist on having multiple meanings for a term, then please communicate the context before you write or utter the term.
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Re: Sam Smith and They

Post by pelmut »

crfriend wrote:
pelmut wrote:There is a lovely old Somerset word "Ur" which can refer to a person regardless of their sex - or even to an object if you can point to it.
[...]
What's the derivation of the term? Much of the rest of the dialect as written is entirely intelligible, but the word in question leaves me without a clue.
I suspect that "Ur" is a version of "Her" and "Ee" is a version of "He", but they, and "Un" (One? It ?) seem to the uninitiated to be used indiscriminately for people and objects.  In actual fact they aren't completely interchangeable; there are some rules of grammar which I've known from childhood but can't explain and which would catch out any non-native speaker immediately.
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Re: Sam Smith and They

Post by K_Highlander »

I have no opinion, but here is an interesting take on the topic of use of "they".
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyl ... story.html

If you cannot access, let me know.
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Re: Sam Smith and They

Post by crfriend »

K_Highlander wrote:I have no opinion, but here is an interesting take on the topic of use of "they".
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyl ... story.html

If you cannot access, let me know.
It's behind a paywall for anybody using advanced anti-advert technology, but t can still be read, albeit somewhat painfully, by reading the raw HTML.

If we're to throw English grammar and structure to the wind, I suspect it's time for me to find another language that doesn't play fast and loose, because at some point the "new grammar" (if any) ("New Math", anyone?) will be impossible to comprehend and properly use.
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Re: Sam Smith and They

Post by FranTastic444 »

I'd have thought that one of our NI correspondents would have picked up on my Van the Man joke :laff:

Here is a bit more background reporting from the Beeb.
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Re: Sam Smith and They

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