Couch 177: I Get a Strange Magic - ELO

I don't understand how this problem can occur.

In English, I can write "Dear Stopdog" without knowing Stopdog's gender. And in a gendered language, Stopdog reveals her gender the moment she uses an adjective to describe herself.



PS: If you don't know the gender, you can skip "Dear Stopdog" and write "Salutations!".

Why dont you just use "they"? Kids nowadays prefer that anyways, dont THEY?

Mon cheri, non! In a gendered language, the gender belongs to the noun, not the the possessor.

I always liked kurt vonneguts solution, dear citizen stopdog

Ma cherie, oui!

Anyone one who writes "Je suis intelligente" can be addressed as "Chere".

But there are citoyens and citoyennes. So you still need to know the gender.
And the same for "Dear applicant", too, as well.

Because I will not call someone I have never met by their first name, it is tacky (to me) to use the first name and last name both, and that leaves me with Mr./Ms.

Some of us still believe in formality and Amy Vanderbilt. Just because others are relaxing their standards in a world increasingly designed for the lazy doesn’t mean I have to.

Здравствуйте (Hello)

In that case "citizen" or "applicant" would work fine.

Doesn't anyone close with "Your brother/sister in Christ" any more?

I’ll bring you-know-who down on my head if I start calling foreign nationals citizens.

And I remember way too many impersonal letters addressed to me as “applicant.”

Pardon my ignorance--who is Amy Vanderbilt?

"Dear foreigner", then.

ETA: "In the name of the Prophet, blessings be upon him, may peace be with you."

Perfect! Pretty sure you-know-who would approve!

A Miss Manners.

Wrote a book on etiquette back in the 50s. Distant relative of the Cornelius Vanderbilts.

That would look better as Cornelii Vanderbiltes.

Yes but anybody who writes that should probably be rejected!

Eta - can i help write the rest?!

How did you find out you were wrong?

They showed up for their interviews.

What a sneaky trick! Underhanded, I call it.

But, gender expression doesn't equal gender identity always -- maybe you really did have it right, you know?

P.S. (I can't help but ask) Were these my countrymen?

AND WHY SHOULD IT MATTER???

I hope everybody gets paid the same! And the best people get chosen for the job!

Yes, your fellow citizens.

(Assuming you're not totally joking + not presuming to speak for ATAT) Coz as humans, we pretty much suck at objectively identifying 'best-ness'?

Be best! (Okay, now im joking).

And of course @@ can pick the best - she picked me, dint she?

Eta - hey in the 70s, we thought it would be EZ.

I don't actually even know my gender. I often get Mr. because I have an unusual name that people take for masculine, and that feels wrong, but so does Ms. I am kind of like Cher, though, in that I don't really need a last name, so I would prefer the use of my first name only in an address, but no one who doesn't know me would guess that on their own.

Honestly though, it really does throw me to get a gendered address now that I'm thinking about it. It grates at me to think someone would presume to box me in by gender.