About those pronouns, is there already a thread?

[WheatenLover]

I do think the fact that this thread has caused a lot of discussion on this topic is a positive thing. Clearly, many are opposed to these preferences in pronouns (and I said earlier I don't understand it either), but perhaps it has made us all think about how the world is changing.

I am a pragmatic person, and the way I look at this is that I need to learn as much as I can about current and future trends because this younger population will be the powering our economy when I am much older (if I make it) and possibly providing care for me. With the world changing at such a fast pace, IMO this is no time to hide our heads in the sand and wish for the olden days. They are not coming back.

I read a nonfiction book about the olden days. They weren't that great, just we only think of the good things. I remember ads being in the help-wanted section by gender. Female Help Wanted - must be young and pretty. Male Help Wanted - must be smart and a real go-getter.

I remember my father telling me I didn't need to go to college because all I'd be doing was getting my MRS. To be fair, he had changed his tune by the time my half-sister was born. She is 25 years younger than I am. Anyway, that's how I ended up working and paying for college myself.

I remember working in the 1990s, and I'd say something about a case, and the males clustered around me and disagreed with me, but took the kudoos when one of them came up with exactly what I had said. I did not take this lying down, believe me.

I also remember tons of racial discrimination; especially the KKK. When we moved to the US from Germany, we were not prepared for that. My mother was German, and I had lived there for 5 or 6 years. We lived on integrated bases until we lived off-base for awhile in a small town near Montgomery, AL. My mother explained everything to her kids, and we were horrified. She did extensive research first, because she had never heard of the KKK.

And then, of course, there was the Vietnam War. More besides that; after all, someone wrote a book about it.

 

[OneEyedDiva]

I've noticed that people used pronouns incorrectly way before the trans issues came about. One of my pet peeves was always when someone would be complaining about a person to me and use the word "you" when referring to that person. "You mean you couldn't pay me back but bought a car?!" It especially bothered me if we were within earshot of others because I'm sure it was perceived that the person was talking telling me off. "They" has been used in place of he/she seemingly to make a point. "They thought they were so smart".

 

[Em in Ohio]

I don't quite get it myself. A young lady (21) that walks by my place stops and chats a bit. She told me she is non-binary (?) and had changed her name to one that was A-****** (?) I just nodded and changed the subject. I did a little research and got the gist of it. When I told my daughter about the girl and said I would have a hard time, at my age, remembering to keep all that together, she said it would be disrespectful if I didn't. I responded and said that I would prefer to be addressed as an evolved primate going forward. Ended that one.

Loved your post and agree - At my age, it's like the push to make us use metric in the USA. I had a hard enough time learning the old way to handle numbers. We are frequently asked to "un-learn" nowadays. My declining brain is already un-learning - and I have no hope for it to adapt and learn new ways and means!

 

[Em in Ohio]

So do we now not use he/she and instead use they/them? How can one person be "they" or "them"?

What am I missing?

It's not you. I had 18 years of schooling that insisted that I speak and write correctly. Now, doing so is incorrect! Sorry world - I'm destined to be (subject we can't say here) *********** INCORRECT!

 

[HoneyNut]

Quite off topic but related to language changing, did anyone learn to use 'whom'? When I was in school they wouldn't teach us the proper use of who and whom because they said it no longer mattered, that the word 'whom' didn't need to be used anymore. Who (or whom?) took the word 'whom' away from us? I still feel disgruntled that they wouldn't teach us.

 

[Wontactmyage]

We human beings never fail to amaze me.

May be use just “human”. Why two or three different terms?

 

[Gary O']

Who (or whom?) took the word 'whom' away from us? I still feel disgruntled that they wouldn't teach us.

Well, undis that gruntle

 

[dseag2]

Quite off topic but related to language changing, did anyone learn to use 'whom'? When I was in school they wouldn't teach us the proper use of who and whom because they said it no longer mattered, that the word 'whom' didn't need to be used anymore. Who (or whom?) took the word 'whom' away from us? I still feel disgruntled that they wouldn't teach us.

I will still sometime address an email "To Whom It May Concern" if I am sending it to a company with no particular contact. I don't use it in everyday conversation.

 

[JaniceM]

I will still sometime address an email "To Whom It May Concern" if I am sending it to a company with no particular contact. I don't use it in everyday conversation.

I have trouble with that, too, but it's not because of the pronouns issue it's because of this "casual" trend.
When I worked as a business secretary, I used that approach when recipients' names were unknown; otherwise, it was "Dear Mr/Mrs/Ms LastName."
These days, I receive emails and business-type texts addressed to me as "HEY!"

 

[Paco Dennis]

This who and whom pronoun is a real doozy. I wonder if this has se*ual connotations also. It might...somehow.

"How to Use 'Who' vs. 'Whom'​

What you really need to know

---

What to Know
Who performs the action of a verb (e.g. “Who sent us this gift?“), while whom receives the action (“We got this gift from whom?“). In grammar terms, that makes who a subject, and whom an object. When following a preposition, whom is the preferred choice (“To whom should we address our thank you note?“).

What You Really Need to Know About 'Who' and 'Whom'​

Trust your instincts. The choice between who and whom can sometimes be confusing, and this has always been the case. But English is extremely flexible, and actual usage doesn’t always follow the strict rules of grammar. Our ears are our guides, and there are many constructions (like "Whom did you speak to?" vs. "Who did you speak to?") in which whom may be technically correct but still feel fussy or unnatural. In these cases, it is perfectly standard to use who.

A Detailed Guide for Hardcore Grammar Fans​

Whom is both simple and complicated. It is simple in that it is simply the objective case of who, which means that it's the form of who that is in the object position in a sentence. What exactly constitutes the object position in a sentence is where things get complicated.
An object, in grammatical terms, is a noun or noun equivalent (such as a pronoun, gerund, or clause) that receives the action of a verb or that completes the meaning of a preposition—so, for example, sandwich in "They bought a sandwich"; it in "My dog ate it"; apologizing in "an appropriate time for apologizing"; and that it was true in "I was afraid that it was true."
Who is a pronoun, which means that it's used instead of a noun or noun phrase to refer to a noun/noun phrase that has already been mentioned or that does not need to be named specifically. Whom replaces who in spots where that word would receive the action of the verb or complete the meaning of a preposition.

'Who' vs 'Whom' Examples​

Let's look at some of the grammatical places who tends to appear and see whether whom ought to go there instead.
Who often functions as an interrogative pronoun, which means that it introduces questions that have nouns as the answer:

Who told my dog about that sandwich?
Who should my dog apologize to?

Both of these sentences sound natural with who, but if we want to know whether whom is the grammarian's choice in either of them, we'll have to determine if each who is in the object position. With questions, the easiest way to do this is to reimagine the question as a statement. "Who told my dog about that sandwich?" becomes "X told my dog about that sandwich," with "X" standing for the unknown divulger of sandwich existence. "X" is the subject of the verb told, since "X" has done the telling, so who is indeed correct.
Reimagining the second question as a statement, "Who should my dog apologize to?" becomes "My dog should apologize to X." "X" is the object of the preposition to, so who should technically be whom: "Whom should my dog apologize to?" (If you don't like the terminal preposition—which is ancient and perfectly grammatical—you may prefer "To whom should my dog apologize?") We'll highlight the preferred versions:

Whom should my dog apologize to?
OR
To whom should my dog apologize?

Relative Pronouns and Subordinate Clauses​

Who and whom also frequently function as relative pronouns, which means that they refer to a noun or noun phrase that was mentioned earlier:

The person who told my dog about the sandwich was unhelpful.
The sandwich's owner, who my dog apologized to, requires a replacement sandwich.

Again, some analysis is required to determine if who here is in the object position and should therefore technically be whom. Relative pronouns introduce subordinate clauses, a subordinate clause being a group of words that has a subject and predicate but that doesn't by itself form a complete sentence. In the sentences above, the subordinate clauses are "who told my dog about the sandwich" and "who my dog apologized to." To determine whether whom is the preferred pronoun, we need to figure out if the noun or noun phrase that who refers to is in the object position or not. We'll replace who with the noun/noun phrase it refers to, and split the whole thing into two sentences for clarity:

The person told my dog about the sandwich.
The person was unhelpful.

In "The person who told my dog about the sandwich was unhelpful," who refers to "the person," which is the subject of both predicates: "told my dog about the sandwich" and "was unhelpful." Therefore, who is indeed the preferred choice.
Now we'll look at the second relative pronoun example, replacing who with the noun/noun phrase it refers to, again splitting the original into two sentences:

The sandwich's owner requires a replacement sandwich.
The sandwich's owner my dog apologized to.

To make that second one grammatical, we have to do some rearranging, as we did with the questions:

My dog apologized to the sandwich's owner.

In "The sandwich's owner, who my dog apologized to, requires a replacement sandwich," the subject of the verb apologized is "my dog"; who is actually the object of the preposition to, which means that whom is the preferred pronoun here:

The sandwich's owner, whom my dog apologized to, requires a replacement sandwich.

More Tricky Examples​

These can be tricky so we'll analyze a few more examples. Plus, this sandwich-dog drama goes deeper.

According to my cat, who was among those witness to the sandwich consumption, the sandwich appeared to have been abandoned.

Is who here correct? Yes: because who, while referring to "my cat," is the subject of the predicate "was among those witness to the sandwich consumption."

My cat, who I was eager to believe, has been known to fib.

How about here? In this case, who refers again to "my cat," but is the object of the verb believe: "I was eager to believe my cat." Therefore the sentence should technically in fact be:

My cat, whom I was eager to believe, has been known to fib.

Sometimes the who/whom is quite buried, syntactically speaking, making analysis especially difficult. See here:

I know that who is on the cat's good side always matters in such cases.

Here, we have the conjunction that introducing a subordinate clause headed by the pronoun who. The first part of our analysis is determining the subject and predicate of the entire sentence. The subject is I; the predicate is everything else. Know is the main verb, and everything else is actually the object of that verb: "I know x."
Now that we know much, we can focus on what who is doing in that very long subordinate clause:

Who is on the cat's good side always matters in such cases.

Who here is a relative pronoun referring to an understood noun/noun phrase along the lines of "which person/creature." Since the sentence is still quite complex, we'll simplify again, finding the main subject and predicate. Stripped down to its most essential meaning, the sentence can be understood as "Who (aka, which creature) always matters," which tells us that the subject is the entire bit "Who is on the cat's good side," and the predicate is "always matters in such cases."
Note, though, that the subject is itself a clause with its own subject and predicate: "Who is on the cat's good side." Who is the subject of the verb is: "X is on the cat's good side." This means that our original sentence is indeed technically correct, despite the fact that who appears in what look like an object position, after the verb know:

I know that who is on the cat's good side always matters in such cases.

After all that, surely no one can claim that keeping who and whom in their prescribed places is easy to do. In fact, it's about as easy as keeping a dog from eating an unguarded, and ostensibly abandoned, sandwich.""

https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/who-vs-whom-grammar-usage

 

[JaniceM]

This who and whom pronoun is a real doozy. I wonder if this has se*ual connotations also. It might...somehow.

"How to Use 'Who' vs. 'Whom'​

What you really need to know

---

What You Really Need to Know About 'Who' and 'Whom'​

Trust your instincts. The choice between who and whom can sometimes be confusing, and this has always been the case. But English is extremely flexible, and actual usage doesn’t always follow the strict rules of grammar. Our ears are our guides, and there are many constructions (like "Whom did you speak to?" vs. "Who did you speak to?") in which whom may be technically correct but still feel fussy or unnatural. In these cases, it is perfectly standard to use who.

A Detailed Guide for Hardcore Grammar Fans​

Whom is both simple and complicated. It is simple in that it is simply the objective case of who, which means that it's the form of who that is in the object position in a sentence. What exactly constitutes the object position in a sentence is where things get complicated.
An object, in grammatical terms, is a noun or noun equivalent (such as a pronoun, gerund, or clause) that receives the action of a verb or that completes the meaning of a preposition—so, for example, sandwich in "They bought a sandwich"; it in "My dog ate it"; apologizing in "an appropriate time for apologizing"; and that it was true in "I was afraid that it was true."
Who is a pronoun, which means that it's used instead of a noun or noun phrase to refer to a noun/noun phrase that has already been mentioned or that does not need to be named specifically. Whom replaces who in spots where that word would receive the action of the verb or complete the meaning of a preposition.

'Who' vs 'Whom' Examples​

Let's look at some of the grammatical places who tends to appear and see whether whom ought to go there instead.
Who often functions as an interrogative pronoun, which means that it introduces questions that have nouns as the answer:

Both of these sentences sound natural with who, but if we want to know whether whom is the grammarian's choice in either of them, we'll have to determine if each who is in the object position. With questions, the easiest way to do this is to reimagine the question as a statement. "Who told my dog about that sandwich?" becomes "X told my dog about that sandwich," with "X" standing for the unknown divulger of sandwich existence. "X" is the subject of the verb told, since "X" has done the telling, so who is indeed correct.
Reimagining the second question as a statement, "Who should my dog apologize to?" becomes "My dog should apologize to X." "X" is the object of the preposition to, so who should technically be whom: "Whom should my dog apologize to?" (If you don't like the terminal preposition—which is ancient and perfectly grammatical—you may prefer "To whom should my dog apologize?") We'll highlight the preferred versions:

Relative Pronouns and Subordinate Clauses​

Who and whom also frequently function as relative pronouns, which means that they refer to a noun or noun phrase that was mentioned earlier:

Again, some analysis is required to determine if who here is in the object position and should therefore technically be whom. Relative pronouns introduce subordinate clauses, a subordinate clause being a group of words that has a subject and predicate but that doesn't by itself form a complete sentence. In the sentences above, the subordinate clauses are "who told my dog about the sandwich" and "who my dog apologized to." To determine whether whom is the preferred pronoun, we need to figure out if the noun or noun phrase that who refers to is in the object position or not. We'll replace who with the noun/noun phrase it refers to, and split the whole thing into two sentences for clarity:

In "The person who told my dog about the sandwich was unhelpful," who refers to "the person," which is the subject of both predicates: "told my dog about the sandwich" and "was unhelpful." Therefore, who is indeed the preferred choice.
Now we'll look at the second relative pronoun example, replacing who with the noun/noun phrase it refers to, again splitting the original into two sentences:

To make that second one grammatical, we have to do some rearranging, as we did with the questions:

In "The sandwich's owner, who my dog apologized to, requires a replacement sandwich," the subject of the verb apologized is "my dog"; who is actually the object of the preposition to, which means that whom is the preferred pronoun here:

More Tricky Examples​

These can be tricky so we'll analyze a few more examples. Plus, this sandwich-dog drama goes deeper.

Is who here correct? Yes: because who, while referring to "my cat," is the subject of the predicate "was among those witness to the sandwich consumption."

How about here? In this case, who refers again to "my cat," but is the object of the verb believe: "I was eager to believe my cat." Therefore the sentence should technically in fact be:

Sometimes the who/whom is quite buried, syntactically speaking, making analysis especially difficult. See here:

Here, we have the conjunction that introducing a subordinate clause headed by the pronoun who. The first part of our analysis is determining the subject and predicate of the entire sentence. The subject is I; the predicate is everything else. Know is the main verb, and everything else is actually the object of that verb: "I know x."
Now that we know much, we can focus on what who is doing in that very long subordinate clause:

Who here is a relative pronoun referring to an understood noun/noun phrase along the lines of "which person/creature." Since the sentence is still quite complex, we'll simplify again, finding the main subject and predicate. Stripped down to its most essential meaning, the sentence can be understood as "Who (aka, which creature) always matters," which tells us that the subject is the entire bit "Who is on the cat's good side," and the predicate is "always matters in such cases."
Note, though, that the subject is itself a clause with its own subject and predicate: "Who is on the cat's good side." Who is the subject of the verb is: "X is on the cat's good side." This means that our original sentence is indeed technically correct, despite the fact that who appears in what look like an object position, after the verb know:

After all that, surely no one can claim that keeping who and whom in their prescribed places is easy to do. In fact, it's about as easy as keeping a dog from eating an unguarded, and ostensibly abandoned, sandwich.""

https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/who-vs-whom-grammar-usage

As a former English major, I don't understand why anyone thinks it's complicated.

It reminds me, though, of a scene in the movie "In the Heat of the Night"- "You must be from up north!" "Philadelphia!" "Philadelphia, Mississippi?" "Philadelphia, Pennsylvania!!"

 

[Paco Dennis]

With the amount and intensity of change happening in our present time it is no wonder how/why so much is confusing. I don't need to mention all that is up for grabs. There are MAJOR changes in the air now, and it is difficult to find closure. It is a time when the reed needs to be flexible in the storm so it will survive.

 

[JaniceM]

With the amount and intensity of change happening in our present time it is no wonder how/why so much is confusing. I don't need to mention all that is up for grabs. There are MAJOR changes in the air now, and it is difficult to find closure. It is a time when the reed needs to be flexible in the storm so it will survive.

But how flexible?
Some old saying from long ago- keep an open mind, but not so open your brain falls out!! Does kinda make sense, doesn't it?