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Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site looking.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!looking!brad
From: brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Startide Rising and Gender terms - Re: Saying It Nicely
Message-ID: <341@looking.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 1-Sep-85 00:00:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: looking.341
Posted: Sun Sep  1 00:00:00 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 2-Sep-85 04:35:57 EDT
References: <130@decwrl.UUCP> <2722@sun.uucp> <501@lasspvax.UUCP>
Reply-To: brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton)
Organization: Looking Glass Software, Waterloo, Ont
Lines: 25
Summary: 

In article <501@lasspvax.UUCP> norman@lasspvax.UUCP (Norman Ramsey) writes:
>
>David Brin, in his _Startide_Rising_, created (?) the following usage:
>
>   people are "men"
>   male people are "mels"
>   female people are "fems"
>   doplhins are "fen" (one dolphin is a "fin")
>
>Not beautiful, perhaps, but it works... so some people *are* doing something
>about it.

I found this use quite fascinating.  There was one scene that really hit
home.   (SPOILER) In this scene, a fem officer makes a broadcast to all
the various nasty aliens.  We then get some dialogue from an alien viewpoint.
One says, "there is a man broadcasting so and so."

Two things hit me.  First, from an alien viewpoint, males and females
simply would be seen as men, with no sex distinctions.  Secondly, I did
assume male when the alien said "man" and thus did a doubletake, so I
was a bit disappointed in myself for not being as sexist as the alien.


-- 
Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd. - Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473