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Steve, you used the word "they" yourself up above: > They've been writing their own operating system... Not criticizing, just pointing it out. I read it and w

• steveklabnik 14y ago
  > I read it and wasn't sure why you had used "they". I actually used 'they' because I generally don't try to gender someone unless I know what pronoun they wish me to use. It's just default speech for me. You'll note that I replaced it with 'someone with schizophrenia' and tend to use "Terry" rather than 'he' even; "Terry" can certainly be a woman's name. That said, something about the above sentence tripped my othering-detector, so I had a moment of 'ugh,' but as I said, it went away. I don't think it was incorrect/wrong usage, I was just sharing a strange moment that happened in my own head. I don't know why my brain parsed it as "those people can't have a normal conversation" instead of my usual genderless usage.