@NNewt84 Said
Now, if you read the title, I know what you're probably thinking. And no, I'm not a radical feminist. I don't believe in female supremacy over men. I believe in equality for everyone, regardless of sex, race, sexual orientation, handedness and similar criteria. I guess you could say I'm an egalitarian, then. I often identify as a feminist, although I'm certainly no radical. As for the title of this forum, well, I'll get to what I mean by that.
Every once in a while, I see the phrase "his/her" or "his or her" written somewhere, whether it be on the Internet, a legal document, or otherwise. While I understand that this is trying to be gender inclusive, and I wholeheartedly agree with their intentions, there is one detail that really bugs me: why are masculine pronouns always listed first?
And once again, I must stress that, as a man, I don't believe in female supremacy. (Yes, there exist male misandrists, but I'm not one of them.) For me, it's more to do with alphabetical order, i.e. "he/she" is fine because "he" precedes "she", but "his/her" or "him/her" are not. Whenever I write, I always ensure to list things alphabetically, to avoid any unfortunate implications. (And yes, I also use "their", in case you were wondering. I tend to alternate between "her/his" and "their", depending on whichever I feel like using.)
Now, I at least partly if a young boy writes "his/her", since, as humans, we tend to be self-centred and view our own demographics as the main ones. (When I was younger, I always thought of my home country, Australia, as being at the "centre of the world", so to speak - but as it turns out, the United States is probably the closest thing to that.) But it disheartens me when a girl or woman writes it, because I'm sure most girls don't want to be sidelined as the "second sex", if you will. As a philogynist, I always try to empathise with women and girls, to try and see things from
their point of view, to ask myself, "If I were a girl, how would I feel about/react to/want to see this?" Well, I probably wouldn't want to be listed second for no other reason than being a girl. To me, this just feels like a big slap in the face to all the bright young girls who feel confident about themselves. (Also, if you're a girl or woman reading this, feel free to correct me on anything I got wrong or overlooked, since I have no experience of being female, and thus it's highly likely I missed something.)
Now, I'm not the kind of person who forces their opinions onto everyone, but rather I like to express my views, expecting someone to agree with me of their own volition, and listen to other people's opinions in return, and try to see things from their point of view. However, I simply have to ask: am I really the only person in the world who ever thought of saying "her/his" instead of "his/her"? It's one thing to hold a minority opinion, but it's another to hold an opinion that's less than 1 per mille. Again, I'm not trying to shove my views down your throats here, I'm just asking for anyone who willingly agrees with me to step forward and make themselves known. I always thought most girls at a young age would write "her/his", because, again, children tend to think they're at the centre of the world, so it wouldn't surprise me if little girls view their own gender as the "first sex", and boys as the "second". (And once again, I refer you to the Australia example I mentioned last paragraph. But still, if you're a woman, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.) However, I recently did a Google search on "her/his", and it seems that nobody, and I mean
nobody, ever thought of using that term.
I'm also not trying to blame this all on a hypothetical "patriarchy" or anything that radical feminists spew out. If anything, this is more an artefact of a patriarchy that vanished a long time ago. (And yes, I'm aware of our dark and troubled history, so please don't remind me.) The best way I can explain this, is that it's like when a restaurant closes. While it cannot allow any new customers to enter, the old customers who entered earlier are welcome to stay until they've finished eating and paid the bill. It'd be rude to just kick them out right at closing time, right? So, the point I'm trying to make is, there do still exist these remnants of what was a terrible, terrible time for women, and they're slowly dying out - but someday, we might just get there. Personally, I think it's more likely that the radical feminists will take over the world and enslave mankind; but there do exist decent people in this world: some who do their part, some who should, and others who have more important things to worry about. And while this particular topic may seem minor, I just worry that it may subliminally affect girls in the long run, and only further cement them as the "second sex", and it just eats me up to think about it.
Well, that's about all I have to say for now. Feel free to voice your opinion, and if you have any questions, feel free to ask and I will try my best to answer.
You can look for the postive or negative in all things in life. Here is the postive for he she. The greatest honor is to protect someone 6 and be trusted to do so. Following is watching their 6. I try to look for the postive.