Always liked this one:
But this one is good too…
Not complaining or calling it out but I’ve seen the words in the 2nd applied to sooo many different comics. I think that’s actually kind of great that it’s so flexible 😆
In “who left their bag here”'s case, the gender of the person is not known because their identity isn’t known, so it doesn’t feel strange to use (for us old farts). It can take some effort to retrain your brain to use “they” when it’s a single person whose identity is known (speaking from experience as a Gen Xer).
Or the person might just be a transphobic asshole. But I like to think that most just need to educate themselves on using pronouns correctly.
One thing that might help it feel less strange is realising that you already use a grammatically plural pronoun to refer to individuals all the time: the word “you”. It’s always “you are tall”, not “you is tall”, same as “we” or “they” instead of “he” or “she”. This is because it was historically plural, and “thou” was the singular. Over time we started using the plural to be more polite, and then eventually always using it.
“Thou is tall” sounds weird though.
you already use a grammatically plural pronoun to refer to individuals all the time: the word “you”. It’s always “you are tall”,
This made my brain short circuit lol. Can’t believe I never noticed.
That’s because “is” is the third person conjugation of Be, not the second. Of course it sounds weird.
“Thou are”, and the actually correct “thou art” both feel much more natural.
Yeah but that’s because you see it in archaic contexts. How do you feel about ‘thou art tall’?
I’m joining in the “this blew my mind” sentiment and just want to say thanks for sharing this tidbit of info.
It only feels strange because of how it’s been used previously in my lifetime, not from historical usage. But as you’ve shown, language changes over time, and not having a singular neutral pronoun has proven to be a big omission in English (since “they” has only traditionally been used that way in certain limited cases). If it was good enough for “you,” it’s good enough for “they!”
Yeah it can take a while to get used to, especially if you knew the person before they changed their pronouns. But the point is it isnt incompatible with our language at all. I think the last panel would be better if it showed the (transphobic) guy and another person and he says “this activist said the craziest thing to me today” and then the second person says “oh yeah, what’d THEY say” because then the ‘they’ pronoun would be directly referring to the person who wanted to be called ‘they’ in the first place.
I mean, I’m mid 30s, and it took me a long time to internalize “he, she, they” rather than “he, she, it”. It’s just how they were used when I was growing up. Fortunately, I’ve had the opportunity to learn and grow. At the end of the day, just speak with respect and make sure you listen as much as, or more than, speak.
I agree. It’s hard to put myself back in the old mindset (and I was definitely not supportive of this type of thing back in pre-2014) but I really do think I used to use “his or her” more often than “their”, or at least in more formal settings.
I remember on Mark Rosewater’s Tumblr blog he ran a Q&A (he is the lead designer of Magic: The Gathering). Someone was asking about cards using “his or her” instead of “their” because not everyone uses he/she pronouns. His response was basically that the reason they did that was because they used the Chicago style guide and it said to use “his or her” when referring to a single person of unknown gender. Basically he said that he understood players have different genders, but it was just a style thing, and that the rules even said something about “his or her” referring to the player (regardless of gender). Since then, I believe Magic cards now use “their”, so it’s possible Chicago’s style guide changed (or at least Wizards’ policy did).
It’s a stupid excuse, use a different style guide going forward that uses “their” to refer to third person.
I’m glad they changed it, I’m still burnt out of the game because of design issues (board wipes, counterspells), repetitive cards with little innovation, and shitty business practices.
I remember as a kid the teachers were desperately trying to make “he or she” a thing and told us the singular “they” would never be acceptable.
I’m personally glad that movement failed.
looking back, some of my educators were monumentally stupid
OVERSHARING TIME
My body doesn’t burp; when I drink something carbonated I have to physically gag myself with something to get the air out. When I was a kid I didn’t know this and would get pain in my stomach and didn’t understand why.
Coke with my lunch two days in a row resulted in trips to my home room teacher to ask to see the nurse, or go home. My home room teacher crossed her arms and said, “this is the second day in a row you’ve done this to us,” and lectured me about trying to get out of class. I had no way of proving that I was actually in pain. I was angry and scared and couldn’t do anything about it. Do not give me the keys to the time machine or there will be violence.
I had a math teacher that was there to coach football… instead of the normal method for balancing equations and such he’d insist you use his wonky play call diagrams.
Which made all the other algebra and trig teachers have re-teach kids coming out of his last class.
Dude was a stereotypical jock that was going to give one of his athletes a free pass for stuffing a friend of mine into a locker. At least until i stuffed the tight end in his locker, instead.
So. How about this. We swap the keys and go all strangers on a train?
I had this exact same problem growing up. When I started drinking excessive amounts of beer the pressure became enough to break through, and I finally started burping. That somehow fixed my body completely, and I’ve been able to burp normally ever since, but my God I’ll never forget the pain of being unable to burp. Literally the worst pain of my life
While we’re oversharing, I had a similar issue:
I had bad asthma as a kid and stress would bring on an asthma attack. An inhaler wasn’t enough, I had to go to the nurse and use this loud, ugly machine called a nebulizer. Obviously, one of the most stressful times in school is during a test, so taking a test could easily trigger an attack. Teachers always begrudgingly wrote me a pass to the nurse and made it clear to me that they “knew” I was faking to get out of the test.
Not one of them got the idea into their heads to just make me take the test with me. I would have been able to take it just fine while breathing through the stupid nebulizer. It’s not like I enjoyed being hooked up to the damn thing or enjoyed not being able to breathe well.
The good news is I only have to have an inhaler now, which takes care of the asthma when it comes up maybe once or twice a year. And that’s only if I have a cold. I hear others are not so lucky.
jesus
that sounds awful.
I love how teachers take it personally that you don’t want to do mandatory work lol. anyway. glad you made it out of there.
I learned English at school and the first time I encountered singular they was when my teacher explained it to us. Sometimes non native speakers are less prescriptive than native speakers
Someone correct me, but “you” was originally plural. The correct way to address a singular person is “thou”.
Yesn’t. Actually no.
The singular was thou for subject and thee for object and the plural was ye/you. In formal speech the plural was used and the subject pronoun was replaced by the object but I can’t tell you in which order.
The þ-thing didn’t effect the pronoun but some surnames and the article. I think some pubs have names like “ye old”. They used to be “þe(=the) old” and have nothing to do with þe old pronoun, even tho it is written the same.
Other commenters have already covered the you/thou thing, so to cover the printing press bit: that did happen, but with a different word. “Ye” as in “Ye Olde Village Inn” is the one. The “ye” here is “the”, and it was pronounced as “the” too. It would have been spelled “þe” before, and in blackletter style (𝔱𝔥𝔦𝔰 𝔰𝔱𝔶𝔩𝔢 𝔬𝔣 𝔩𝔢𝔱𝔱𝔢𝔯𝔦𝔫𝔤), “y” and “þ” looked awfully similar. If your press came from a country that didn’t use the thorn - and many presses in Europe did - and therefore didn’t have that character available, then you’d just use the y since they were close enough anyway
A similar thing happened with the letter yogh (ȝ) in Scotland. It wasn’t in most presses, but it looks close enough to a z, so just use a z, and now the name “Menzies” is spelled that way despite being pronounced “ming-iss”
That this “ye” is spelled the same way as the second person plural subject pronoun “ye” is a total coincidence
Stop. You are making some of the senseless things in English make sense. How I’m I supposed to feel superior because my first language is read the way it is written? 😩
Thou was singular subject and thee was singular object.
https://activeenglishcee.blogspot.com/2020/10/thou-thee-thy-thine-ye-meanings-usage.html
Also singular they is older than singular you. So any idiots who complain that “they” should only be plural should only be using thou/thee for second person singular.
Yeah. And Y'all also used to be plural. Now it can be singular and we use All Y'all to clarify when we need people to know we mean plural. Language is bonkers.
I have never heard y’all used singular, growing up in the American South. Instead, as I understand it:
-
Y’all: You all, referring to a group of people (Can potentially be a subset of a larger group, e.g. talking to one couple at the table among a group of friends). “When are y’all having the wedding again?”
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All y’all: shorthand for “all of y’all” Explicitly referring to “all of the members of the group in question”, requiring that at least one member of said group is being addressed by the speaker. The difference is there are no exceptions (apart from exaggeration) “Ain’t a single one of you innocent, all y’all had a hand in this” or “All y’all need to put on your seatbelts, I ain’t going to jail for any of y’all’s comfort”.
Roses are red Violets are blue The singular “they” Pre-dates singular “you”
The singular “they” Pre-dates singular “you”
The same way rights were ore-dated by no rights?
‘older’ is not always ‘better’. Make your point, but don’t hinge it on a false comparison.
The point isn’t to say that the singular they is somehow better than the singular you, it’s to point out that it is not a modern invention. People that dislike usage of the singular they often argue that it is an unnatural change being forced upon the language, when in fact it has been in use for so long that it was used by Shakespeare