[ExI] Gender-Neutral Side Note

[Ben Zaiboc]

On 09/11/2025 13:59, John Clark wrote:
> On Sat, Nov 8, 2025 at 10:51 AM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat 
> <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
>         *>> It could be argued that "Lady Chairman" is
>         self-contradictory nonsense, unless you're talking about a
>         hermaphrodite. How about Chairwoman? I admit that doesn't
>         sound quite right but I think at least part of that is due to
>         the fact that the word "woman" has two syllables but the word
>         "man" only has one. *
>
>
>     /> It could. If you assume that words containing 'man' refer only
>     to biological males (they don't)./
>
>
> *It's ambiguous,sometimes it does and sometimes it doesn't refer 
> exclusively to a male, but it _NEVER_ refers exclusively to a female. 
> Do you think that sort of asymmetry and ambivalence is a good thing? 
> You've never spelled it out, what exactly is your objection to the 
> word "chairwoman", why does it make you so angry? *
> *
> *
> *John K Clark*
>
>


Angry? I'm anything but angry. Amused, maybe. Disappointed, certainly. 
Exasperated sometimes. But not angry.

There's nothing particularly wrong with 'chairwoman', it's just 
unnecessary, and as you pointed out, sounds a bit awkward. It's in the 
same category as 'saleswoman', 'businesswoman', 'sportswoman', etc. They 
strike me as rather silly. I wouldn't use them, but neither would I 
strongly object so someone else using them (although I might roll my 
eyes!). I certainly wouldn't make them central to my opposition to 
enforced PC language in general. That /does/ make me angry.

But "chair" on it's own just sounds stupid to me. And perhaps a bit 
insulting. Imagine calling a doorman a 'door', because some women start 
doing the job. Sure, use 'doorwoman' if you must, I don't really care, 
but I do care if someone starts saying I shouldn't or can't use 'doorman'.

I was always a fan of the Star Trek convention of using 'Sir' for senior 
officers, regardless of their sex. I thought that was quite inspired, 
doing away with "Ma'am", which always sounds awkward or at least 
old-fashioned, I think.

But against that is the decision to replace "...where no man..." with 
"...where no one...". Again, no great objection, at least it does make 
sense and doesn't sound artificial, but it still tends to draw the 
attention to these silly 'gender issues' that get people so riled up, 
and it's unnecessary. There are more important things to worry about.

-- 
Ben

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