[OJFord]

Yeah that's clearly the first case I gave then, it's just wrong, it's not even about not liking 'woke' or 'PC gone mad' or whatever.

At least, that's what I was taught at a private school, in a Conservative-voting area, ~25 years ago.

(I've always disliked the 'unknown-she/her' for 'important' roles too, for the same reason: it's fighting wrong with opposite wrong. Matt Levine for example will write 'if you ask someone on the front desk I feel like she will tell you' - it's an abstract person, they will tell you. Grr. Anyway.)

In this particular case I might actually say 'it' anyway. But in general I think to native English speakers (because we don't gender most things) it's pretty clear it should be 'they' if the sentence is more mundane and bias-free, like 'find someone to ask for directions, and if they don't know [...]' - it's just weird if you substitute '(s)he doesn't' isn't it?