So, what you're saying is that you have at least an X chromosome? ;)
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>I don't understand whether its a man or a woman answering my questions in C/C++.
Why does it matter?
>I might end up referring you by "she" even if you
>are a man in case you don't answer this question.
Your solution is inefficient. By asking everyone's gender, you have to remember them all. And that list will only cover a fraction of this forum's members, so your solution isn't very effective either. Why not just refer to someone by name when you feel the need to use a gender-dependent pronoun?
Not really. Since the gender imbalance is huge, all he has to do is to remember the two or three women among the active posters.
He could just go with my solution and call everyone "he" unless being explicitly corrected. The gender imbalance also means that this won't happen often. (This needs adaption, of course. On another board there's mostly women, so my default stance there is "she".)
I perfer the completely PC approach of "he/she" as apposed to "he-she", which I'm sure is just a silly approach from a statistical perspective.
As noted before there's also the possibility of fleeing from the issue altogether, depending on how the phrase is constructed.
"Xpact logged in. It's in their right to do so."
>Since the gender imbalance is huge, all he has to do is [...]
Of course, you have to know the genders to realize there's an imbalance, and it still doesn't protect you at all from insulting a new or less active member that you haven't encountered. I still claim that it's inefficient (because you have to remember more than with a simple guideline of avoiding gender pronouns) and ineffective (because the approach doesn't take unknowns into account).
>On another board there's mostly women, so my default stance there is "she".
Is it a programming board?
Oh the humanity, that just ruined my week :(
On a lighter note, in Modern English, he/him/his is also the neuter. So unless the gender of the article is relevant to the discussion, it is perfectly correct to use he/him/his when the gender is unknown.
That makes me wonder if perhaps there isnt a gender imbalance among programmers, but maybe just self segregation on to male and female websites
Some people who are actually she can take offense at being called he. Happened once here on cboard, as I saw it. Probably happened more times, as well. Might even work the other way around.
So the golden rule is: don't assume gender; use gender neutrality.
Yes. I could take offense at people taking offense of such a common blooper.
But my position on these things is to never take them seriously, even at the face of an angry mob if needed be. I will never understand that kind of people. Male or female. Who cares if someone takes me for a female? I will not fell less a man if it happens.
Don't feel you owe anything to someone who gets offended if you make such a mistake.
Does the quality of the answer somehow change if the person has certain anatomy? Makes me wonder whether we should trust hermaphrodites now... *nervous look*Quote:
Originally Posted by Corbin Dallas
A confirmed internet female faces heavily stacked odds.