How can you be addressed as he/him she/her or they/them

I don't care about the newfangled pronouns or whatever but I also think this thread is useless. OP is making a mountain out of a molehill for no obvious reason than to whip up another outrage-fest about "Genz", "woke", "pronouns", etc.

The form is badly worded, yes, but what they're saying is clear to anyone who isn't a pedant so against this "woke bs" that they'd pick apart anything to have a go at it.

All this faux "It makes no sense", "I can't understand what they mean" seems disingenuous.

Exactly, when you don't know. Not when you do. Using it when you do know someone's sex is stupid.

Not this BS again. Singular 'they' has been used since Shakespeare's time to talk about someone when you don't know their sex.

This is surely a pisstake.
OP you can't possibly be serious.

Obviously not. In this case you'd swap your incorrect examples of 'they' to 'their'. Just like you wouldn't say 'I borrowed he pencil', you'd use 'his pencil'.

No, but yet again proper usage is generally for people of unknown sex.

Singular they has been common in the English Language since Chaucer. It’s not a new thing.

It's really about control and pushing a particular ideology that claims we are men,women,other according to an internal feeling rather than our biological reality
Get it wrong at your peril. You might find yourself in court facing a male doctor who claims to be female

Their/they is commonly used for singular people when you don’t know if male or female such as “Someone has left their coat. Can you drop it into lost property” or “We need to find a candidate to fill role x. They should have advanced excel skills and be familiar with Sage software”

It would be their, in that case. Non-gender specific. I only tend to use that if it's more than one person though.

how incredibly obtuse this question is

OP's right, though.
You may address me as:
Garlic
Ms Worth
Madam/Ma'am
You.

If you were being very formal & somewhat obsequious,
The lady.

If I were an aristocrat, you could use:
Your Ladyship
Your Highness
Your Majesty
or my title if appropriate, eg Duchess.

Plenty of options, even for a commoner! It'd be ridiculous to address me as she, he or they. Nobody does that.

It's rude to use a third-person pronoun in front of the person you're talking about.
"Pint of lager for you, and what does she want?"
"She (who is standing right here) wants a spritzer."
You'd immediately say "She can speak for herself, thanks", and you'd rightly be offended.

Preferred pronouns are cringe and stupid. Its had its day. Let's move on.

YANBU. i think this all the time when i see “my pronouns are”. I was raised to believe it’s rude to say he/she/they in front of people. As my mother would say “Who’s ‘she’ the cat’s mother?”

Well they're pronouns so obviously you wouldn't use them to directly address anyone.

someone did argue this - that's why i provided the link, lol

I also think we need to accept that language evolves, this is how "they" is used very commonly now. That means its part of lexicon and grammar already.

So we have been using they and their for years

"It is their pencil" "they went to the shop"

So for the people that do use preferred pronouns how does it work in reality different to how it worked 10 years ago as in before this became a thing

So can anyone write a scenario in the exact words we are to use that is different to the past?

Wouldn't have any impact on your life to refer to them by their preferred pronouns would it, if your colleague did it in purpose then they're a bit of a dick and if you find 'joy' in this then you're a bit of a dick too.

Did you skip the grammar bit of English at school?

Nobody's arguing about that. What hasn't been used in English until very recently is this:
I'm talking tomorrow to Alex in IT who helped me with this before.
Is that the one who brings his dog in with him?
Alex uses they/them pronouns. Yes, they bring their dog in with them.

In a case where you are talking about someone you know, it's normal and natural to use the pronouns for that person's sex.

Is your point that

(a) the term ‘address’ has been used on a government website when the term ‘refer to’ would be more accurate grammatically, and that’s funny because it’s a huge institution making a grammatical error

or

(b) letting people declare pronouns, especially ‘they/them’ is woke nonsense and it’s funny because everyone’s just male or female innit

I think you’re making point (a), which is a bit pedantic but ultimately you’re right - you address with a name when you’re talking or writing to someone directly, then subsequently the only appropriate pronoun in that situation is ‘you’, which is of course non-gendered. If speaking or writing in the third person you start with a name, and subsequently refer to the person you’ve named with a pronoun. This is where ‘he’, ‘she’ and ‘they’ come in. Silly government website.

It does seem though that a lot of posters think you’re making point (b). Could you clarify?

Would person work?

hello person
is person coming to the pub
excuse me person, did your know your penis is hanging below your mini skirt

Indeed, that's exactly how it's used. But you're forgetting that it's used when you don't know the sex of the person involved. When you do, you use the correct pronouns.

this just isn't correct, "they" or "their" has been used for a very long time to refer to a single person of either unknown or irrelevant gender
e.g. "im talking to a specialist tomorrow" "ok, hope they can help you" etc

https://www.oed.com/discover/a-brief-history-of-singular-they?tl=true