We have previously discussed how some schools are abandoning the use of traditional pronouns to reflect a growing list of possible genders for students. Brown University has pushed these changes even further in its acceptance letters this year by using “they” as the “gender-inclusive” pronoun. Thus the letter refers to “their” achievements when referring to the singular admitted student. For many, the use of such plural pronouns for a single individual is confusing and ungrammatical. However, the Associated Press recently adopted the use of “they” as a preferred pronoun in recognition of transexual and other individuals who may not be comfortable with traditional genders.
These new designations have led to an equally elastic list of pronouns. So at the University of Vermont, students can choose “he,” “she,” “they,” and “ze,” as well as “name only.” Other options are captures on the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee card given to faculty and students:
“zim”, “vis”, “pers”?
When did English become harder than German or Latin? When I want to flunk a language, I’ll take one of those classes.
Right! I’d be interested to learn whether Spanish, Italian and French now have non-binary adjective endings as well as the -o and -a! What a pain! LOL!
Hmmm. Let me try my “word substitution” choice and see if it works:
Congratulations,
TheyFREAK Have Been Accepted at Brown University.Yeah, that works for me!
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
This is just more of the the fallout created by supporting laws that change the definition of marriage to disregard gender. When we deny gender as a reality of nature and attempt to force the world to pretend that there is no such thing as gender diversity, we are inviting civil chaos.
When we changed the proper word, “sex” to the PC word, “gender” is IMHO when the slide started. I still use “sex” and still like it as well!
There are 2 worlds, academia and the real world. Never has the chasm between the two been larger. Liberals keep doubling down and Rep keep winning elections.
I don’t believe the trend is based on solely accommodating trans students. Using “their” or “they” in place of “his or her” been going on for quite some time. My federal government office had a meeting on that some years ago, when we received some draft regulations written by the agency’s communications department. The document read as having been written by semi-literates: “An employee will ask their manager…” It wasn’t that difficult for us to edit this to “Employees will ask their managers” and so forth. It’s just a lazy way of avoiding the use of “he” in referring to everyone, as there are ways of writing in an inclusive manner without butchering the English language.
Historically gender was of great importance – to the extent that in some languages nouns were given genders. On the news recently a general recently referred to an aircraft carrier as “she”. As machinery replaced muscles and birth control became available, gender differences have become much less relevant to human life. Since using “they/them” for an individual or using new words is confusing, why not just use people’s names?
Doglover – historically ships have been referred to as ‘she.’ Is that something you have a problem with, because you are going to have both the Navy and Marines to fight with. 🙂
Historically they have been. More recently, most people would not refer to them that way. The point is that perceptions are changing.
Maybe your “perceptions” are changing, but I’d like to stay perceptive, thank you very much!
Doglover – I watch NCIS and they still refer to ships as she.
And botanists and master gardeners at times refer to plant specimens as “she.”
You appear to have a limited view of language and language development. But, then, that seems to be the way for a section of our society. In their self-righteousness, they have lost sight of the reason for words. Between being called one of the many types of bigotry or potentially insulting someone by referring to them as black, brown, male, female, it, etc., they are stripping words of their meaning. If doglover is right, will we be reduced to grunts?
I can assure you Doglover, my shipmates have always and will always refer to our ships as She.
Did the enrollment application package eliminate gender as well? Why is this being accommodated for such a small percentage of the population? Is there some economic driver for this?
Because: political correctness. That’s pretty much it. Though I have had legitimately transgendered friends, I suspect most of these kids are probably just suffering from youth (and in Berkeley, privelage). Why do we keep handing so much power to children? Because: greed. It is insanity, and I thank my lucky stars that the worst of it is currently relegated to such insular places. They will take my electoral college over my dead body.
The applications ask for one’s birth gender and what gender identity pronoun one prefers. Absurd!
Provides more fodder for those who wish to rail at supposed bigots.
This makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. To omit the ‘his or her’ gender reference in place of using an ‘its, they, whatnot’ for someone who may feel left out is absurd. The objective of including everyone in society should not be predicated on reducing everyone to the moronic simplicity of eliminating references to any and all differences. However, these people do serve a purpose; illustrating imbecility as it permeates society. It also stands to reason that those who spend their entire lives on one specific road to a higher level, would be oblivious to almost all that makes up the world in which we live. We have a prime example of that nonsense in the White House at the present time.
But wait. There’s more….Meet the “Rappin Lawyer” Court room @ 2:51 mark
Some African Americans resent folks who are black who refer to themselves as brown. Brown University is a case in point. Or a point after. I think I will call it Black Guy U. This is to piss off all the women who go there.
I have a friend born And raised in South Africa who is confused when he has to use “African American” to refer to African immigrants who are not US citizens and black Americans who’ve never set foot in Africa. Meanwhile, he’s just a “white guy.”
There was a controversy at my law school when a white male whose grandparents left Germany in the 1930s and moved to Argentinia applied as a Hispanic under the school’s affirmative action program. In another instance, a white female Stanford grad also applied as a “Spanish surname” special admit student because her divorced 50 y/o mother had married a Spanish tennis player “boy toy” while the girl was in college, and the girl conveniently adopted her “step-father’s” last name prior to applying to law school. There are a lot of scams going on in the world of racial identity, because the government has chosen to reward those who have what I call “most favorable race status.”
Of which the most famous example is Elizabeth Warren.
accommodate a relatively small percentage of students who do not adhere to traditional genders.
It’s actually a miniscule percentage of students who are head cases, and they are ‘accommodated’ as a component of the witless status games higher education employees play with each other. This is another indication, in case you needed one, that the culture of higher education is set by hollow men. Question: why have we allocated the function of sorting the labor market to hollow men?
Not just higher education. This starts in High school. I know for a fact teachers and administrators in my area have been held hostage to this demand to be called “They”. I would bet that the leverage for this accommodation is the IEP for a 504. I would also wager everyone of these trans students have either.
“or” a 504
What is an IEP and a 504?
“Individual Educational Plan” and 504 is the statute requiring same for those with “educational dysfunction.”
Something like gaming the system, then?
ffs – it is more like leveling the playing field.
Uh, what did Orwell say about controlling the language? Oh, yeah, that’s right… now, I recall.
We have a similar problem here in Alabama and the South conjugating “ya’ll”.
Ya’ll
Ya’lls
All ya’ll
All ya’lls
But that’s intuitive!
This is crazy! In Sweden they have no sexes. Looks like a plan to try to implement it here. Their society is more homogeneous than the US and it will never fly here except with the FAR left. Someday these people will grow up?
“In Sweden they have no sexes.”
Oh, my.
And maturity is in the eye of the beholder.
Sweden WAS more homogeneous…..until they wanted to show how liberal they are and invited 50,000 Middle Eastern and African Muslims to settle in their country. Hmmmmm…..I wonder how that’s working out? Hahahaha.
Probably just how we think it has. As well as it has worked in other European countries that are as stupid as Sweden. People don’t want to blend in anymore but use every bit of western helping hands then attack and kill as many foreigners as possible. The few ruin it for the many. Some western countries even let them establish sharia law in their communities so the people cannot escape even by leaving their country of origin. Sad…
I pray for their English 101 instructors, who is going to grade their first essays. I think it is time to stop looking at the AP as a style manual and think of it as a cutting edge political manual.
An active verb shows action. A passive verb shows passion.
🙂
This is getting out of hand.
Next it will be grammatical gender, found in many languages such as those derived from Latin, being labeled as oppressive. Noun genders must I suppose now be more than Masculine, Feminine, or Neuter.
Wait til this generation become parents and they have to teach 17 pronouns to little kids.
“Wait til this generation become parents and they have to teach 17 pronouns to little kids.”
As I read this, I tried to imagine the same parents explaining sex and where babies come from to their “youngsters” and where all these various pronouns fit in. Words are meant to clarity. Somehow, I don’t see this conversation having any clarity.
Definition of gender in my dictionary; The properties that distinguish organisms on the basis of their reproductive roles The other option has to do with gender and grammar.
You know, they’re overthinking this. Is it really so hard to at least arbitrarily pick one?
Can you imagine putting out a missing person report, where the gender descriptor is “inclusive?”
Ma’am, what is the missing person’s name?
Pat. And don’t call me “Ma’am”, that’s gender assumptive.
Um…OK. And is Pat a man or a woman?
Pat is non binary.
Right, so would you describe him as looking mannish or womanish?
Excuse me! How patronizing! I already stated that Pat is non binary, and goes by the pronoun “they”. Pat has a medium build, medium height, brown eyes, and medium length brown hair.
Good luck with that.
From the Reporting Party’s attitude, Pat is probably missing by choice–just to get away from that hot mess.
I may have allowed my opinion of the SJW crisis profiteer to color my example.
I admit nothing. 😀
Many people don’t look either male or female. Their appearance is somewhere in between. So how would sexual identification help in identifying them?
Are all of these indeterminate people missing, Dog?
Well, in the worst case scenario, an unidentified body in the morgue is identified by gender. Also, ambiguity is not helpful when details matter.
Insanity!
I’ve got nothing against USA higher education but I wouldn’t want my kid to form a partnership with one – not even a Nevada LLC.
It’s not my job to learn all the slanguage that constantly pops up. It’s your job to learn English if in USA and Spanish if in USM and Portuguese if in USB. I really don’t have time to waste figuring out what you thought you meant, if anything, I will go by what you say and if it’s illiterate? You don’t get my time nor my business. nor would I hire you. I’d rather sponsor some students from Mexico who are truly bilingual or trilingual
Do you know what that USA, USM, USB signifies? US is the same in every case. The A M and B are three principal languages of the Western Hemiisphere. Learn two great. Learn three own half the world. Duuuhh
Besides 2050 if we don’t legally list English as the language of the country the latino majority will do it for you…ne c’est pas?
Well said.