Xref: utzoo sci.bio:3740 alt.romance:5245 soc.men:23580 soc.women:29661 soc.singles:72107 Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!timbuk!cs.umn.edu!uc!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!rpi!mirror From: mirror@pawl.rpi.edu (Robert W. Alatalo) Newsgroups: sci.pschology,sci.bio,alt.romance,soc.men,soc.women,soc.singles Subject: Re: Are Humans Naturally Monogamous? Keywords: linguistic quibble legitimate Message-ID: Date: 28 Oct 90 14:01:14 GMT References: <1990Oct24.175532.9407@pmafire.UUCP> <1990Oct24.233638.1774@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu> <1990Oct25.131109.28884@athena.mit.edu> <1990Oct26.010447.24735@midway.uchicago.edu> Organization: Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy NY Lines: 40 chi9@quads.uchicago.edu (Lucius Chiaraviglio) writes: >In article <1990Oct25.131109.28884@athena.mit.edu> bjohnson@athena.mit.edu >(Brett W Johnson) writes: >>In article <1990Oct24.233638.1774@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu> >>wp6@cunixa.cc.columbia.edu (Walter Pohl) writes: >>>In article <1990Oct24.175532.9407@pmafire.UUCP> reiser@pmafire.UUCP (Steve >>>Reiser) writes: >>>>begun to wonder what man's true nature really is. I have nothing against >>> ^^^ >>> >>> When I read this article, at first I was confused as to whether you >>>meant "male" or "person". All possible ambiguity would be removed if you >>>used "person" in place of "man". >> >>"Man" is used correctly here. "Person" would NOT have been correct. >>God, I hate feminist quibbling about de-sexing the English language. > Actually, what would have been suitable here would be one of >"peoples'" or "humanity's." > What you call "feminist quibbling" is in fact a perfectly legitimate >attempt to remove discrimination. After all, the original sentence really >does (even if that was not the intent of the poster) give first place to men >and leave women out. The use of the masculine where neuter should go has >evolved for centuries to give supreme linguistic representation to men, and >would do so even had that not been the original intent, simply due to the >definitions of the words involved. > By the way, of the newsgroups in the header, I only get sci.bio. I >realize that sci.bio is not the most appropriate newsgroup for this subject, >but the issue of sexism in language is important enough that I had to >respond. >-- >| Lucius Chiaraviglio | Internet: chi9@midway.uchicago.edu I agree, women have just as much right to be non-monogamous as men. And they DO. -Rob