Berkeley bans gender specific words (1 Viewer)

Optimus Prime

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I may be wrong but to me this is what people mean when they talk about when they talk about PC culture run amok

When did political correctness go from let’s not call mentally/physically challenged people retards anymore to let’s change the term manhole

Has anyone in the history of the world ever complained about the term manhole?

And getting rid of he and she causes some issues

“The lawyer went to consult with her client” turns into what?

The lawyer went to consult with their client?

That won’t work there is only one lawyer
=======================

BERKELEY, Calif. (AP) — There will be no manholes in Berkeley, California. City workers will drop into “maintenance holes” instead.

Nothing will be manmade in the liberal city but “human-made.” And students at the University of California, Berkeley, will join “collegiate Greek system residences”rather than fraternities and sororities.

Berkeley leaders voted unanimously this week to replace about 40 gender-specific words in the city code with gender-neutral terms — an effort to be more inclusive that’s drawing both praise and scorn.

That means “manpower” will become “human effort” or “workforce,” while masculine and feminine pronouns like “she,” ‘‘her,” ‘‘he” and “him” will be replaced by “they”and “them,” according to the measure approved Tuesday by the City Council...........

 
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I may be wrong but to me this is what people mean when they talk about when they talk about PC culture run amok

When political correctness go from let’s not call mentally/physically challenged people retards anymore to let’s change the term manhole

Has anyone in the history of the world ever complained about the term manhole?

my favorite was a proposal to change "seminar" to "ovular" because of the inherently implicit patriarchy in the term "seminar" - because of the etymological connection of 'seminar' to 'semen'

it never went anywhere, thankfully, but the objection was one I was shaking my head at. But maybe I just don't get it.
 
It's one city in America, that's sort of famous for stuff like this.

Meanwhile, we have entire states that are still doing things like trying to outlaw abortion, prevent gay marriage, limit birth control, and otherwise trying to control all sorts of aspects of people's lives under a banner of "Freedom," whilst turning a blind eye to massive and systemic inequalities of justice and opportunity that they actually would prefer to maintain.

I agree with you that Berkeley's city government can often go off on preposterous symbolic progressive tangents, and this is absolutely one of those.

But let's preserve our collective outrage for the more target-rich environments, amirite?
 
It's silly, but I don't live in Berkeley, and it's not meaningful enough for me to be concerned with.

It's not like someone's rights are being violated. First they came for the manholes....
 
I noticed the other day on my Lyft profile there is a section for "Pronouns" - you can choose between "they/them/theirs," "she/her/hers," "he/him/his," "my pronouns aren't listed," and "prefer not to say."

I chose "prefer not to say" because its kind of awkward to insist on Your Majesty everywhere I go
 
And getting rid of he and she causes some issues

“The lawyer went to consult with her client” turns into what?

The lawyer went to consult with their client?

That won’t work there is only one lawyer
I looked at the City of Berkeley document linked from the article, and they saw that one coming. It finishes with a screenshot of the Merriam-Webster definition of 'they' with this highlighted:

entry 1 sense 2 —often used with an indefinite third person singular antecedent
- everyone knew where they stood— E. L. Doctorow
- nobody has to go to school if they don't want to— N. Y. Times

They also put a load of "They/Them shall indicate a singular individual, unless the context indicates the contrary" in there as well.
 
I'm a strict adherent to plurality/singularity when it comes to pronoun:antecedent agreement

we all have our lines in the sand...
 
so will they be Themholes, Theyholes, or Androgynousholes?
 
I remember in the late 90s certain groups were pushing for changing words like "herstory" instead of history and "ovulars" instead of seminars.

And the world kept spinning and I found both joy and sadness and I have faith we will survive this crisis together through strength and force of will.
 
I may be wrong but to me this is what people mean when they talk about when they talk about PC culture run amok

When did political correctness go from let’s not call mentally/physically challenged people retards anymore to let’s change the term manhole

Has anyone in the history of the world ever complained about the term manhole?

And getting rid of he and she causes some issues

“The lawyer went to consult with her client” turns into what?

The lawyer went to consult with their client?

That won’t work there is only one lawyer
=======================

BERKELEY, Calif. (AP) — There will be no manholes in Berkeley, California. City workers will drop into “maintenance holes” instead.

Nothing will be manmade in the liberal city but “human-made.” And students at the University of California, Berkeley, will join “collegiate Greek system residences”rather than fraternities and sororities.

Berkeley leaders voted unanimously this week to replace about 40 gender-specific words in the city code with gender-neutral terms — an effort to be more inclusive that’s drawing both praise and scorn.

That means “manpower” will become “human effort” or “workforce,” while masculine and feminine pronouns like “she,” ‘‘her,” ‘‘he” and “him” will be replaced by “they”and “them,” according to the measure approved Tuesday by the City Council...........


This whole thing has become absolutely ridiculous and just plain stupid.
 
Isn't "man", when used in the generic sense, short for "mankind" or "human"? Aren't women and "other" gender types part of mankind? Aren't they humans?

English is a dynamic language, the same word can have different meanings. Should we not refer to cranes (the lifting machines) as "cranes" because cranes (the birds) don't want there to be confusion?

I'm going to start calling them humanholes.
 

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