Earlier quoted context omitted.
"They" is generally accepted as a singular gender neutral pronoun.
And has been since the Canterbury Tales! It's a modern development that it isn't considered "correct" English.
600 years is long enough for me
A Theory of Jerks (2014)
51–60 of 66 posts
Re: A Theory of Jerks (2014)
#52Is this article what a professor of philosophy considers work? I hope not. I skimmed it, seemed to have little to zero content.
1st half, longwinded exploration of semantics. 2nd half, making some random assertions based on no data.
Re: A Theory of Jerks (2014)
#53Is this article what a professor of philosophy considers work? I hope not. I skimmed it, seemed to have little to zero content. 1st half, longwinded exploration of semantics. 2nd half, making some random assertions based on no data.
Are you a jerk though?
Re: A Theory of Jerks (2014)
#54Earlier quoted context omitted.
feminists have totally discredited nice guy though, turning it into a passive-aggressive hanger on who hopes to get rewarded with sex from being nice.
Do you mean that interpretation of "nice guy" an actual term of modern feminist jargon? I hadn't known that. Or do you mean that it is a human eternal, the instinctive reaction of womens' inner bullshit detectors?
See the niceguys reddit https://reddit.com/r/niceguys for the full flowering of this interpretation of the "nice guy" trope.
The guy who thinks that "being nice" to women is what gets them relationships + sex & that they're being wronged when a women rejects them even after they've "been nice" is definitely a thing.
Re: A Theory of Jerks (2014)
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's known that "communication can only happen between equals." Otherwise it's order giving no matter the semantics.
There is no such thing as being equals; one party will always have at least a little bit more power than the other.
What about when they both think they're the more powerful, or both think they're the lesser?
Re: A Theory of Jerks (2014)
#56One interesting quip I've heard from a psychologist recently, is that communication only really works well going down the dominance hierarchy. (I think it can work across.) I see a lot of the outrage driven viral media of today as being "punching down" by aspirant upper-echelon socioeconomic people onto lower-echelon people. Also, if communication only really works well going down the dominance hierarchy, doesn't thi…
It's known that "communication can only happen between equals." Otherwise it's order giving no matter the semantics.
As far as I can trace it, this quote originates from the Illuminatus Trilogy and is actually "True communication...".
Re: A Theory of Jerks (2014)
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
> the waiter messed up because they're a jerk That's a subordinate clause where "jerk" is referring to the waiter, not the main subject, hence it's not circular.
And people think singular "they" is OK in writing. Try: the waiter messed up because he's a jerk.
If this is such a problem, do you think it's a problem too that English doesn't distinguish between singular and plural you?
Re: A Theory of Jerks (2014)
#58I found this article very insightful. However, let me make one important addition. The author says that the person who is not a jerk is a sweetheart. However, following Aristotle's theory of the golden mean, let me point out there is also a third type, namely someone who discounts their own perspective and always thinks the other person is right, and so goes around feeling guilty and inferior.
That seems to be a type of negatively expressed sweetheart, in these terms.
There is a magical center of action, greatly to be desired, where one neither runs over others nor lies down to be overrun.
Re: A Theory of Jerks (2014)
#59Is this article what a professor of philosophy considers work? I hope not. I skimmed it, seemed to have little to zero content. 1st half, longwinded exploration of semantics. 2nd half, making some random assertions based on no data.
As a recovering jerk, I found the article rather insightful and useful.
Re: A Theory of Jerks (2014)
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
> the waiter messed up because they're a jerk That's a subordinate clause where "jerk" is referring to the waiter, not the main subject, hence it's not circular.
And people think singular "they" is OK in writing. Try: the waiter messed up because he's a jerk.
Here's a short review on the use of the singular "they". It is OK. https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/singular-nonbi...