Quote Originally Posted by Gun-Cat View Post
girls are for some reason gender neutral (das Mädchen). Again this is only my point of view comparing a few languages I know if you have any other experiences I would love to hear them!
...I know that this is totally not adding to the discussion at hand, but just on the off-chance that someone is intrested in why "Mädchen" is gender-neutral in german: "-chen" is a special diminutive ending that you can put together with a noun. It automatically makes the word "gender-neutral" or at least gives it gender-neutral pronouns/the gender-neutral article "das" ("der Fisch" - "das Fischchen").

"Mädchen" is most likely derived from the word "die Magd" (maid; but also just a young, unmarried woman) - so: Die Magd - Das Mä(g)dchen. And it just ended up sticking as the word we're using for girls now.

But you're correct - everything in german is highly genderd, even when it makes little sense... our dogs are all male (der Hund), cats are all female (die Katze) and children simply have no gender (das Kind).
Gender-neutral options pretty much dont exist - sometimes I envy the english language for having "they". Not so much because of the topic at hand but more so because that way I can refer to people ingame without knowing their gender. Personally it doesnt bother me when someone refers to me as "he", but I may also not react to it, because as female I'm obviously not used to being adressed as "he" ("Oh, you were talking about me? Yeah, sure, sure can do that")