4 ms·

Why does the author keep referring to the player as 'her'? This neither seems in line with the traditional use of 'he/him' in English texts, or even the neutra

Why does the author keep referring to the player as 'her'? This neither seems in line with the traditional use of 'he/him' in English texts, or even the neutrality of 'he/him and or she/her'. It reads more like a stunted attempt to virtue signal. I'm quite confident that Civilization games skew to male players, rather than female. What a great way to alienate readers. More so when gender was not a central feature of the article at all.

Sevaris 5y ago
Sorry, why do you care? Why does it matter? "He/she" is simply unwieldy in writing text meant to be read by other people. Pick whatever pronoun you want to use. It. Does. Not. Matter. What I don't understand is complaining about how somebody else is not using your preferred generic pronoun.
- mdp2021 5y ago
  Some languages use the form also used for masculine as generic - officially, as part of their grammar, long before the political matter about what is appropriate exploded. To find that the English language does not follow this rule ("he" as generic) leaves some confused, and even unconvinced: 'she' looks like a modification of 'he', so 'he' looks generic. In fact, their "close" relation is just apparent: it seems that 'he' comes from variations from the demonstrative 'ki' ("this/here"), but 'she', while still coming from a demonstrative, comes from a different demonstrative, 'so' (feminine 'seo') - the source of 'the' -, which came into use to disambiguate as original feminine 'heo' collapsed into 'he' in spoken language.
UncleMeat 5y ago
Referring to abstract actors as "she" and "her" only alienates a very specific kind of reader. Consciously using female pronouns in these contexts is a very small way of pushing against the norm of everything being male, which is commendable. You'll see it more and more in CS papers nowadays. I cannot possibly imagine being upset by this.
- torstenvl 5y ago
  It alienates everyone who cares about accuracy and everyone who is sick of politics infiltrating every last corner of our lives. You may not fall into either of those two camps, but let me assure you, it's a lot of people. For reference, the gender-neutral singular in English is "they/them/their" they /T͟Hā/ pronoun 2. used to refer to a person of unspecified gender.
  - UncleMeat 5y ago
    I think you'll find that the set of people who complain about using "she/her" in abstract contexts also complain about using "they".
  - saalweachter 5y ago
    > You may not fall into either of those two camps, but let me assure you, it's a lot of people. I think thou'st meant "Thou may not fall into either of those two camps, but let me assure thee, it's a lot of people." The commenter thou art replying to is a singular person, not a group, and as we know, while other words may come and go, the use of pronouns in a language does not change over time.
    - torstenvl 5y ago
      Singular "they" dates back to the 14th century. "Thou" fell out of use in the 17th century. https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/200700 https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/200700 https://www.etymonline.com/word/thee#etymonline_v_10720 https://www.etymonline.com/word/thee#etymonline_v_10720
  - xboxnolifes 5y ago
    > For reference, the gender-neutral singular in English is "they/them/their" Let me also assure you that "they" hasn't always been (and still isn't to many) accepted as a singular pronoun. Crazy how things change.
- mdp2021 5y ago
  > pushing against the norm of everything being male The perception some have is instead that of inserting gender where it was irrelevant. (Those "some" do not associate 'he' and masculine, probably also for cultural reasons as expressed nearby.)
BeetleB 5y ago
> Why does the author keep referring to the player as 'her'? Although less common, this is nothing new. I've seen texts that use "her" as the primary pronoun since the 90's. (And yes, people have been pointlessly complaining for that long).

Sevaris 5y ago

Sorry, why do you care? Why does it matter? "He/she" is simply unwieldy in writing text meant to be read by other people. Pick whatever pronoun you want to use. It. Does. Not. Matter. What I don't understand is complaining about how somebody else is not using your preferred generic pronoun.

mdp2021 5y ago
Some languages use the form also used for masculine as generic - officially, as part of their grammar, long before the political matter about what is appropriate exploded. To find that the English language does not follow this rule ("he" as generic) leaves some confused, and even unconvinced: 'she' looks like a modification of 'he', so 'he' looks generic. In fact, their "close" relation is just apparent: it seems that 'he' comes from variations from the demonstrative 'ki' ("this/here"), but 'she', while still coming from a demonstrative, comes from a different demonstrative, 'so' (feminine 'seo') - the source of 'the' -, which came into use to disambiguate as original feminine 'heo' collapsed into 'he' in spoken language.

UncleMeat 5y ago

Referring to abstract actors as "she" and "her" only alienates a very specific kind of reader. Consciously using female pronouns in these contexts is a very small way of pushing against the norm of everything being male, which is commendable. You'll see it more and more in CS papers nowadays. I cannot possibly imagine being upset by this.

torstenvl 5y ago
It alienates everyone who cares about accuracy and everyone who is sick of politics infiltrating every last corner of our lives. You may not fall into either of those two camps, but let me assure you, it's a lot of people. For reference, the gender-neutral singular in English is "they/them/their" they /T͟Hā/ pronoun 2. used to refer to a person of unspecified gender.
- UncleMeat 5y ago
  I think you'll find that the set of people who complain about using "she/her" in abstract contexts also complain about using "they".
- saalweachter 5y ago
  > You may not fall into either of those two camps, but let me assure you, it's a lot of people. I think thou'st meant "Thou may not fall into either of those two camps, but let me assure thee, it's a lot of people." The commenter thou art replying to is a singular person, not a group, and as we know, while other words may come and go, the use of pronouns in a language does not change over time.
  - torstenvl 5y ago
    Singular "they" dates back to the 14th century. "Thou" fell out of use in the 17th century. https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/200700 https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/200700 https://www.etymonline.com/word/thee#etymonline_v_10720 https://www.etymonline.com/word/thee#etymonline_v_10720
- xboxnolifes 5y ago
  > For reference, the gender-neutral singular in English is "they/them/their" Let me also assure you that "they" hasn't always been (and still isn't to many) accepted as a singular pronoun. Crazy how things change.
mdp2021 5y ago
> pushing against the norm of everything being male The perception some have is instead that of inserting gender where it was irrelevant. (Those "some" do not associate 'he' and masculine, probably also for cultural reasons as expressed nearby.)

BeetleB 5y ago

> Why does the author keep referring to the player as 'her'? Although less common, this is nothing new. I've seen texts that use "her" as the primary pronoun since the 90's. (And yes, people have been pointlessly complaining for that long).