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knightly@pawb.social ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

Sadly, many educational institutions still teach a prescriptive form of English that fails to acknowledge this, but singular “They” is centuries older than using “You” instead of “Thou”. It was already in common use way back in Shakespear’s time. If thou thinkst this confusing, change thyself before demanding others change for thine own comfort.

Also, some people are plural, so the ambiguity of “they” is inclusive to them.

Also-also, the only other pronouns in common use that aren’t explicitly gendered are “it/its”, which works just fine for me but some people find dehumanizing. Nonbinary and agender folks often prefer “they/them” over "it/itsx or neopronouns.

Also-also-also, “picking new words to use” is extremely non-trivial for pronouns because it requires the entire English-speaking population to relearn fundamental communication habits. It’s much easier to simply accept the fact that singular they is extremely common.

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