[dTal]

>I'd gander that if I were to find myself in New York and strike a conversation with a blue collar local and say something such as “A beautiful city isn't it? all these millions of men, working as an organized beehive.”, that he'll not interpret me wrongly or even think much of it.

Actually I think there's a very good chance she'll object.

The problem is that in your mind, males are the "default" human, and using sexist language reinforces this. This is not a recent opinion confined to "raging identity politics aficionados" or "weblogs" - at this point it's the wrong side of history for the better part of half a century. Consider this piece of satire by Douglas Hofstadter, written in 1985, which substitutes racist language for sexist language in a precisely analogous way:

https://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/cs655/readings/purity.htm...

[Blikkentrekker]

> Actually I think there's a very good chance she'll object.

If you mean to suggest that this position runs across gender lines, then I very much object and find that a naive, but common, assumption.

It reminds me of a Canadian act that sought to introduce the word “fisherwoman” as a sign of good faith to the female fishermen, but it revealed that, overwhelmingly, the fishermen, male or female, did not like this change and found the word to sound silly.

I have noticed no correlation with the gender as to what position one takes on this, as many females as males seem to either favor, or object to, innovations such as “chairwoman” or “councilwoman”.

> The problem is that in your mind, males are the "default" human

No, that would be in the mind of those that read the word “man” and must compulsively attach a gender to a statement containing it.

I've certainly noticed that those so interested in gender language police invariably seem incapable of abstractly thinking of a person without attaching a gender thereto.

> and using sexist language reinforces this

The sexist history is to use the word that has always simply meant “human” and giving it a gendered, ageist meaning. — you reverse the history of the word here.

> at this point it's the wrong side of history for the better part of half a century.

What would you mean with “wrong side of history”? It is undeniable that the meaning of the word “man” to mean “human” is the original meaning of the word and that the secondary usage to mean “adult male human” is a later innovation.

[dTal]

No, you missed the point entirely. The point is that you pictured this "blue collar local" as a man, as evidenced by your use of the pronoun "he". Don't tell me that it's about the word "man" and its historical role to mean "human".

>I've certainly noticed that those so interested in gender language police invariably seem incapable of abstractly thinking of a person without attaching a gender thereto.

The irony. Next time say "they" instead of "he".

[Blikkentrekker]

> No, you missed the point entirely. The point is that you pictured this "blue collar local" as a man, as evidenced by your use of the pronoun "he".

No I didn't. The pronoun “he” in English is also very often used to refer to an indeterminate, hypothetical person of irrelevant and unspecified sex.

I didn't picture him as anything in particular, given that I am partially aphantastic and never draw mental pictures about such scenarios.

> The irony. Next time say "they" instead of "he".

There is no irony here; you infer that he is male because of the pronoun and I find such usage to not be universal at all.

The pronoun “he” has a very long history in English for use with a hypothetical person, from which the listener is not meant to infer any particular gender. It is also true that some use the pronoun “they” in that case, but that is not a universal behavior and either may be encountered.

Use of “she” for such hypothetical persons has also seen recent use, and was probably innovated deliberately; some auctors deliberately alternate both in even distribution.

All of this is how the English language is used by different speakers. I am not telling you which is better and how you should use it; I am telling you that if you are denying that all have currency, you are but certainly being willfully ignorant because you do not like the descriptive truth about how English is used by it's speakers.

[hluska]

You’re an excellent writer!! Again, while sad, this has been a wonderful thread, full of amazing writing.

(I’m on your side but that’s an aside. You’re a really beautiful writer.)