Pronouns???

[Wilford111]

I mean from the get go it was a nasty thread. The first response to op says it all, including the number of people who up voted it. They can try and cover up their bigotry with the "dev time" excuse, but I think we all know that's just a red herring at this point. Content continues to get cut without any inclusive things being done. As if adding an option to change he/she to they is something that would even take up much dev time.


sad!

"Bigotry".

Forgive us when we want to have the things we love not be corrupted by outside issues or politics. I feel like this game and the dev team has gone through great lengths to accommodate as many people as possible with this game, without going too far as to ruin it for everyone else. I'd like to keep it that way.

I think I'm not the only one who tends to treat everyone with respect regardless of who or what they are. But we can only be so accommodating when it comes to changing the things we love. Personally, OP's suggestion being implemented would leave a sour taste in my mouth. Does that mean I'm a transphobe? idk, I feel like the definition of that word grows broader and broader everyday.

Also, shame on you for necroing this thread XD

[SirCadogan]

I might be a clueless cis female, but isn't part of being transgendered is to be seen as the gender they transitioned to? At least that's what a lot of stories of transgendered people say. That they want to be seen as passing as much as possible of the gender they identify with. So, I'm a little confused. Also the majority of the time the WoL is either addressed by their first or last name. If not their race. It's very rare for them to use him/her unless the npc speaking isn't one to call you Warrior of Light/Darkness while also not being close enough to use part of the character's name.

Yeah but there are over 50 genders now, so listing them and updating them would be an issue. I’m not saying I’m against it or for it, just that right now the gender issue is changing daily. The only real option I can see going forward is “They” or “Them”. It’s just much to keep track of for anyone.

[Gobio]

How does this work on non English clients? Or only privileged people that understands English can enjoy 60+ pronouns?
How about Arabic? Russians? Chinese? Korean? Japanese? Thai? What is xer in Chinese? what is zher in Thai?

Acknowledge your privilege, and until your advance lifestyle spread to the unfortunate people that doesn't have all your pronoun, you should spend your time spreading your ideology to Russia, middle east, China, so they get 60+ pronoun, then maybe you get to have your pronouns in game. Equity for all!

[MilkieTea]

How does this work on non English clients? Or only privileged people that understands English can enjoy 60+ pronouns?
How about Arabic? Russians? Chinese? Korean? Japanese? Thai? What is xer in Chinese? what is zher in Thai?

Acknowledge your privilege, and until your advance lifestyle spread to the unfortunate people that doesn't have all your pronoun, you should spend your time spreading your ideology to Russia, middle east, China, so they get 60+ pronoun, then maybe you get to have your pronouns in game. Equity for all!

Are we talking about these languages having gendered language, or are we talking about them not having a singular they/them pronoun?

Also, let's say that no one is asking for extra pronouns to be added to the game, and only for a simple "he/she" switch.... then what's your problem? The game isn't written in Arabic, in Thai, in Russian. Pretty sure they already have he/she pronouns ingame for the languages it's written in.

[Lily_Skye]

So this was something I've been thinking about for a while but...how easy would it be to just be able to pick our pronouns at character creation? You could pick your sex to whatever and that'd be the physical aspect of it but pronoun choice would just differ the text.

The idea came to mind after a trans friend struggled to make a character they could be happy with. They went with a lady Lala but they didn't get past the cut scene before they were annoyed with being called a "lass".

I know it's not something people are asking for and I know there's going to be rude naysayers who will say it's not important, that you shouldn't let pronouns get in your way of gaming, but it seems like it'd be an easy thing to implement. A lot of games are going that way so why not???

no, go back to twitter.

[Awha]

Ahh this is a classic one thanks for the revival.

[Nothv13]

To be fair, and speaking just on your "very proper" usage of the english language - According to the Oxford English Dictionary, usage of the singular "they" has been traced back to the 1300s. Though, this shouldn't even matter as language is fluid and constantly evolving, for example: the debate on (Aks versus Ask, (in which Aks is the older form of the word Ask, and while it has evolved into ask, it is more natural for us to say "aks").

I feel, however, if someone asks you to kindly refer to them with a different set of pronouns, it's only polite to do so.

Edit Also, blame our favorite necroposter for this one, TeraRamis.

I have no issue with the singular they, but the very first example that articles gives Says "each man" inferring there are more than one, a group of them and the they refers to all of those singular "man" thus is not singular. This undercuts the entire article.

Language that evolves too fast is useless as a language as it loses all roots and ability to properly get idea across between those that use it.

[Kolsykol]

The funny thing is that in Sweden we've had a more specific gender neutral term since forever, but no one except for basically one newspaper who wants to sound progressive ever use it.
And it gets pretty ridiculous at times because they even use it when describing the perpetrator of a crime that the police are looking for and they know the gender.
They just REALLY insist on ALWAYS using it.

I think that '' they '' is a bit different, it never made sense as a gender neutral pronoun to me because it's used more like '' someone ''.
In Swedish the gender neutral pronoun is '' hen '', han ( him ), hon ( her ), hen ( gender neutral ).
That is the actual purpose of it.
They = de/ dom, it's used the same way as in English but doesn't make any sense to use as a gender neutral pronoun.

English isn't my first language and I dunno the history of it, but I somewhat doubt that '' they '' was actually used as a gender neutral pronoun?
By that same logic '' someone '' is the same because it's not directly gendering.
But the point of it isn't to be gender neutral and using it that way can just end up being confusing.

Whenever someone refers to themselves as '' they '' my first thought is always '' who? ''.
It sounds like you're talking about someone else or about yourself in third person.
Which wasn't uncommon either and I think had more to do with the old usage of it.

Especially considering that we're talking about people with even more rigid gender norms, I have a hard time believing they were using the term in a gender neutral fashion.

[HollowedDoll]

The funny thing is that in Sweden we've had a more specific gender neutral term since forever, but no one except for basically one newspaper who wants to sound progressive ever use it.
And it gets pretty ridiculous at times because they even use it when describing the perpetrator of a crime that the police are looking for and they know the gender.
They just REALLY insist on ALWAYS using it.

I think that '' they '' is a bit different, it never made sense as a gender neutral pronoun to me because it's used more like '' someone ''.
In Swedish the gender neutral pronoun is '' hen '', han ( him ), hon ( her ), hen ( gender neutral ).
That is the actual purpose of it.
They = de/ dom, it's used the same way as in English but doesn't make any sense to use as a gender neutral pronoun.

English isn't my first language and I dunno the history of it, but I somewhat doubt that '' they '' was actually used as a gender neutral pronoun?
By that same logic '' someone '' is the same because it's not directly gendering.
But the point of it isn't to be gender neutral and using it that way can just end up being confusing.

Whenever someone refers to themselves as '' they '' my first thought is always '' who? ''.
It sounds like you're talking about someone else or about yourself in third person.
Which wasn't uncommon either and I think had more to do with the old usage of it.

Especially considering that we're talking about people with even more rigid gender norms, I have a hard time believing they were using the term in a gender neutral fashion.

I mean people who talk about themselves in 3rd person are weird, but whenever gender is unknown people tend to use they for a single person, especially online where it's not obvious unless stated. Doubt the option will be added though, because other than just pronouns there are titles and special dialogues you get depending on gender, which again is a lot of work to go through.

[Iscah]

I have to admit that while I am fine with using "they" in theory, in practice there's something that jars about using it for a single specific person.

I think the older use of singular they makes logical sense in that it's not "a person" but "any one of a number of possible unspecified people". You can't picture exactly who is being talked about. It's like a placeholder-person.

So when it's being used to talk about a single known person, it doesn't seem to match that sense of ambiguity that the older usage has.

I'm sure it's a thing that you just need to settle into using, but it's not as simple as "it's already been singular for centuries". It's previously been a sort of infinite-singular; now it's specific-singular.