Singular they rule
Singular they rule
ALT TEXT:
- Panel 1: A person with the text "Singular 'they'" written on them smiling with open arms.
- Panel 2: "Singular 'They'" beaten up by others who said, "Singular they is ungrammatical. It's too confusing," "How can anyone use plural pronouns for singular," and "Every pronoun should only have one purpose."
- Panel 3: "You" hiding from the mob who was beating "Singular 'They'"
- Panel 4: "German 'Sie'" hiding with even more fear next to "You"
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How do you do that in France when even table has a gender…
* Der Tisch betritt den RaumIt's actually an even worse mess politically than singular they! French is much worse in terms of gender, not only because the translation for plural they is gendered (any group containing something male is "ils", any group of only female stuff is "elles"), but adjectives are also heavily gendered!
My nonbinary friends I know irl just go for either bc it's easier. Some people use newly (ish) invented pronouns like "iel" or "ielle" which... I personally don't like because they don't fit the phonology very well and they're a mix of the two instead of a separate thing. Apparently some dialects used to/use "ul" and "ol" which are much nicer imo, but that still leaves the question of adjectives.
Ofc, all this also has the whole aspect of "the wokes going crazy", plus also France is very against the anglicization (however you spell that) of language and culture so there's that extra aspect (ironically, the right use "le wokeisme" which is a horrible anglicism, while railing against anglicization).
See my rant on German, same thing here:
In Slavic languages too