"You guys"

[BadMotorhomeParent]

I hope it isn't only me, and of course, our team of women were fantastic (note: I am not really a football follower - but did watch lot of the match yesterday), BUT, I really hated it this morning when (R4) a message of support and congratulations was broadcast (by the writer of Bend it Like Beckham I believe) and I lost count of how many times she said "You guys"......

If there was ever less of an example of a bunch of guys, it would be when referring to a team comprised 100% of women!

Language evolves though, in the past guys was used to describe men but its interchangeable now. We have an older man in the office who refers to us as girls. I'm 44 and the other woman is 53! I find that far more annoying.

I use it as a gender neutral term. It’s say less offensive than people saying “manning the reception” or “since man discovered fire” or just the general snowman, fireman etc etc.

*Yes language matters. The message it sends is that men are the default and women just have to fit around that. It may seem trivial but it's not really.

It's this everyday sexism that's really hard to change as you can see from this post where people don't see that it's a bit deal.*

Thank goodness someone gets it.

and do you tell him? do you refer to him as "boy" to drive the point home? or do you just put up with it without making a fuss.

Because I certainly wouldn't accept that. Ever.

I don’t mind ‘guys’ personally

I get irrationally annoyed at ‘folk’ or ‘folks’ which is supposed to be a nice, gender-neutral term.

’Folx’ is even more 😡

I refer to everyone as guys, including groups of women only. I call my kids guys and have even from when they were little, they are not all male. Couldn’t give a shiny shit if someone is bored enough to be bothered by this, I don’t rely on tips or anyone having to be particularly agreeable in order to make it through the day in any aspect of my life.

To blow some minds, I’m even completely unfazed when people call me mate. If I get ‘thanks mate’, I respond ‘no problems/you’re welcome’, as opposed to the pearler I have only ever come across on here ‘I’m not your mate’. Because I’m not a dick.

"you" is enough. No need to add "guys" , "ladies" or anything else

But a guy is male. Folk is just people in general.

This might explain why my 10 strong all male sales team look uncomfortable when I say “right, ladies, what kind of week are you having?” 😂

I even find lionesses in itself a bit weird - in the sense of most female actors dodge the label "actress"

But that's because in previous generations being female used to be seen as being "less". But it isn't less, so there's nothing weird about being a lioness or an actress .

Classic

That's what I was just thinking; the word is probably extraneous, and it may usually be the case. I did intend to re-listen to the message she left for them (domestic drama stopped me through), but feel sure that the "you guys" wasn't really necessary at all; they , and listeners, would know who she was talking to and maybe as a writer, she could write a better message of congratulations for them.

No I don't tell him. It's a small team of 3 and it doesn't bother me enough to kick up a fuss to be honest. He has a lot of good points and I'm old enough to know what things to bother getting offended by, this isn't one of them.

I'm a teacher and a few years ago I got to thinking about 'right guys' as a phrase and how the girls respond to it in a way that the boys wouldn't if we used a term that is traditionally a girl term eg 'right girls/ladies/lases/gals (I know some of these are grim and you'd never use them) etc. I then started thinking about how, in our society, we expect girls/women to respond when we call them by words that were traditionally given to men. If I said, Right guys, look this way' the whole class would look this way but if I said 'right girls, look this way.' Only the actual girls would bother. I then got to thinking about how society and language are from very masculine/male root words, even when they don't need to be and women just accept this as part of the status quo. When I thought about the word 'guys' in these terms, it really irritated me as there are perfectly fine words that are both male and female in a way that there aren't for the word history etc. I try so hard not to use the word guys now and have retrained myself to say 'everybody look this way'. It now really grates on me when I hear it used to address a mixed group and think it is really lazy when used to address a group of women/girls. I hear it all the time in school though.

Just one example of a term associated with women morphing into gender neutral? Just one? Please?

@matthewstirling Very interesting to hear your perspective, and so much more eloquently put than my opening post - but, yes, that is essentially what is underpinning how I feel about it - and of course, so much "worse" to be used to address a group of female people. That is why it leapt out at me, even as a non-fan.
When people are saying that they hear it used on US shows, or actually on the US - that certainly doesn't make it right. We do not need to copy everything they do.

OK, I agree its ridiculous that males won respond to female terns. But all that stems from deep rooted societal sexism.

Guy is originally an American English term meaning fellow....fellow officially means a companion or comrade....its not gendered.
Many women are "fellows" of formal societies.
In English guy meant a poorly dressed person like a guy fawkes effigy

Originally those terms would have been limited to men not because they are male in nature but because only men were allowed to enter those societies and social situations where those terms were used.
It's like saying you can't use the word player for people on a sorts team because originally all players were male.

I like it - beats the shit out of 'Ladies'.