Twitter banning "gendered pronouns"

[JetsetJetlaggedJaded]

Long time lurker to this board but this is the first time I'm saying anything - apologies if there is already a thread about it - I had a quick look and couldn't see anything

It seems that the powers that be at Twitter HQ have decided that "gendered pronouns" (eg. His/him she/her) are no longer considered "inclusive language" and they're working on ways to replace them with they/them

When I saw this, (despite knowing that twitter is an absolute cess pit of misogyny against women who want to protect their sex-based rights), my jaw dropped. I mean... I'm lost for words to be honest.

Putting aside any GC arguments (of which there are many), how will certain tweets, with their limited characters, even be coherent if restricted to using they/them. It's so Orwellian! I just feel like my insides are on fire!

Anyway - I just thought you might want to know.

Mrs Jetset aka SHE because I'm a f*cking woman (- and doesn't my battered, post- pregnancy and childbirth body know it!)

twitter.com/twittereng/status/1278733303508418560?s=21

Twitter is overrun by paid bots and trolls nowadays anyway. So they/he/she haven't banned gendered pronouns, but they have banned the word "groomer", which is either an arbitrator or malign ban.

That's not inclusive language; it is utterly exclusive.......

@Justhadathought

That's not inclusive language; it is utterly exclusive.......

I still think it's an inclusive move.

Examples of generic "he" from lexico.com include:
'Every child needs to know that he is loved’
‘From the very beginning, love and nurture your child so he can begin to feel connected to others.’

Nowadays most people find "they" more inclusive.

Lexico's usage note states: "Until relatively recently he was used to refer to a person of unspecified sex, as in every child needs to know that he is loved, but this is now generally regarded as old-fashioned or sexist."

God, this is making me want to top myself. Or maybe just leave Twitter.

Lexico's usage note states: "Until relatively recently he was used to refer to a person of unspecified sex, as in every child needs to know that he is loved, but this is now generally regarded as old-fashioned or sexist."

'They' as a generic singular has been in use since Shakespeare.

God, this is making me want to top myself. Or maybe just leave Twitter.

Why? Of all the things we can complain about re twitter, using neutral language in their code surely isn't one.

The use of "they" to avoid the default of he or the clunky "he or she" or, in my view the even worse option of randomly littering text with alternative hes or hers has been encouraged for years. Anyone who has to write copy for promotional materials and the like and who has had any training on it will have been told that.

@ErrolTheDragon Sorry, skim read the post after 5 hours sleep. I thought they were going to enforce gender neutral language on Twitter, not in their code. My bad.

Wanna bet they ban people for using 'it'?

No worries, Rad - the OP had misunderstood what it's about.

I think this is more about removing what I would call 'blokey' language from coding.

I don't know much about coding, and I might be wrong, but I think I can imagine the kind of person who would come up with 'master' and 'slave' as technical terms, and I can understand why many people (including me) would not want to use them.

TehBewilderness

Wanna bet they ban people for using 'it'?

If referring to a person- why not?

Interesting that the engineers in a platform that allows self-identified paedophiles (MAPs) to advertise the age of their preferred child targets and that their DMs are 'always open' are so intensely concerned with the language they use as a priority.

The funniest one is replacing "grandfather" with "legacy".

So grandparents are bad, but inherited wealth is good.

The term "grandfathered" or "grandfathering" or "grandfather clause" has a particular origin in the history of American racial segregation ( en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grandfather_clause ). How well known the origin is is unclear but it's very different from saying "grandparents are bad".

@ErrolTheDragon

However, in the world of computers there's one area in which afaik sexed language still pertains. And yes, sexed not 'gendered', and hardware not software. Male and female connectors, which no one ever needs to have explained or gets confused about IME.

When I was in the army, we used to have a connector for radio related things tht was to connect to female connectors, it was called a "lesbian connector". They got rid of that quite a while ago now, but I find the new name less memorable.

Generally speaking though I think the idea of purging any language with any connection, or any perceived connection, to anything considered negative, is probably hopeless, useless, and time-wasting.

The funniest one is replacing "grandfather" with "legacy".

It's more weird they were ever using 'grandfathered' - 'legacy' is a standard term in the software industry.

So grandparents are bad, but inherited wealth is good

If you think 'legacy' equates to 'inherited wealth' in the software world, you've obviously never inherited responsibility for legacy code. It's sometimes more like having to look after an elderly three legged idiosyncratic donkey.

Generally speaking though I think the idea of purging any language with any connection, or any perceived connection, to anything considered negative, is probably hopeless, useless, and time-wasting.

It's impossible, and may lead to foolishness - but there are some things where there are easy alternatives so why not. 'Allow list' and 'denylist' are clearer and less idiomatic, which is of itself good given that not everyone working in software is a native anglophone.

@LastTrainEast

I remember when a couple of schools got overexcited about racist language and said we can't say blackboard. It was picked up on and then you had people saying "blackboard is illegal? That's bloody stupid" but it wasn't a widespread idea. Just a couple of well meaning but not too bright individuals.

And now Twitter will stop using blacklist for the same reason.

They couldn't fall any further in my estimation anyway.

Being non-NT and surrounded by friends who are divergent as well, we've never quite understood why the word blackboard was used in the first place, as all the boards we saw as children were dark green.

A couple of us had independently in our schools moaned so much about this that the staff called them chalkboards just to shut us up.

Perhaps this was the actual origin of the 'blackboard is banned' trope?

Ffs this is getting stupid now, sorry but it is are we to call everyone it,

This is really good news from Twitter engineering. The software industry has a huge problem with sexism. The overlooking of female user experience is still widespread. Default language that reinforces the engineering staff (who tend to be very male dominated anyway) to think of their entire world as being populated by men does not help at all. Within documentation that refers to engineers it’s even worse because of the contempt that many engineers have held women in and the way it encourages newer engineers to think of the male domination of the software industry as somehow natural.

I do wonder about the use of “they” instead of using “he/she” or alternating he and she. There are pros and cons with each approach. But any of the three is better than simply defaulting to male.

Being non-NT and surrounded by friends who are divergent as well, we've never quite understood why the word blackboard was used in the first place, as all the boards we saw as children were dark green.

They were black before they were green. I'm not sure why they changed.

I'm not racist, am not transphobic, I just cannot be spending time with all this pronoun/gender neutral stuff. Am so glad am off twitter. Idon't need one more challenge in my life to get exhausted by!