tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5961006065192244756.post4929464953678959412..comments2023-10-05T07:11:05.917-04:00Comments on Art at the Auction: Final Fours and "Women's" Final Fourspetplutohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01053307189721906583noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5961006065192244756.post-6415300294664708602008-12-04T21:49:00.000-05:002008-12-04T21:49:00.000-05:00Haha! She's usually right (I'm scoring points by ...Haha! She's usually right (I'm scoring points by saying that!), but in all fairness, she had no way of knowing what I meant by "he" until I explained the problem.jjfs85https://www.blogger.com/profile/03607101491416950570noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5961006065192244756.post-62013697584693356832008-12-03T18:47:00.000-05:002008-12-03T18:47:00.000-05:00JJ - On the one hand, I commend you for not automa...JJ - On the one hand, I commend you for not automatically assuming that the driver was female, as the "bad (or crazy) woman driver" is a well-known stereotype!<BR/><BR/>On the other, I think you just highlighted a problem with our world - that being that "male" is the default sex and "female" is the modified sex, especially in terms of language. I highly recommend Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex, as it examines (partially) this very subject.<BR/><BR/>That being said, I'm not sure if it was fair for Faith to yell at you for this particular incident. Others, I'm sure she's completely in the right!petplutohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01053307189721906583noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5961006065192244756.post-40261158436021369262008-12-03T15:56:00.000-05:002008-12-03T15:56:00.000-05:00This reminds me of a problem I have with English. ...This reminds me of a problem I have with English. English is (thankfully) a genderless language, meaning that the nouns in English do not explicitly have gender. Thankfully, this means that you don't need to change the end of every adjective to match the gender of the noun it's modifying. I'm really happy about that - but there is a problem that still exists in English concerning pronoun gender and it came up in conversation a few months ago. <BR/><BR/>Faith and I were walking down the main drag of our tiny city when I saw a driver who was doing something idiotic. The reflection of the blue sky reflected off the windshield blocking my view of the driver. I then said to her something like, "He has no idea how to drive". Then I proceeded to get yelled at because I assumed the driver was male. <BR/><BR/>Here's the problem: our language has no genderless third person singular pronoun (other than "it" which is unsuitable for referring to people). This means that to be PC, I would've had to say "He or she has no idea how to drive". That is much too long. Of course, when I said "He", my mind didn't decide that the driver had to male, I just used the male pronoun to mean person of unknown gender.jjfs85https://www.blogger.com/profile/03607101491416950570noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5961006065192244756.post-70972234613218107722008-12-02T17:57:00.000-05:002008-12-02T17:57:00.000-05:00Apparently the ball got dropped somewhere in the b...Apparently the ball got dropped somewhere in the beginning of the new millennium. I was at the XL Center the other night, and the UCONN banners that were hanging all specifically said men's or women's. One of the men's ones was from 1999. Then the lights when out, so I didn't really get the chance to figure out what year the switch occurred.Jesshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03997885576298350811noreply@blogger.com