The pronouns ‘he’ and ‘she’ were once standardized with the word “he” used to describe non-specific individuals of every flavor way back when the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was not yet an idea running down daddy’s leg. The argument against changing the wording of our Constitution where it refers to our president as ‘he’ rests in the phrase “we the people” being inclusive of all. The inferred assumption is that the pronoun ‘he’ is used to individualize all persons within a given group. ‘He’ is not gender-related, by this archaic logic. At some point toward the end of the 20th century, ‘he or she’ evolved as an acceptable dual set of mandated literary pronouns used to describe a single individual of unidentified gender. In other words, both pronouns had to be written together to make certain women were collectively included as a separate group when addressing concepts that refer to all nonspecific individuals within any population. This way, ‘he’’ or ‘she’ could be thoroughly unidentified, separately. Around the first part of the 21st century, the pronoun ‘she’ became interchangeable with ‘he’ and writing both together ceased to be necessary. Unfortunately, mainstream society has not adopted the implied use of pronouns so quickly. Documents that use only ‘she’ as a singular pronoun easily get misinterpreted as addressing only women. Various approaches to better clarity include alternating the use of ‘he’ and ‘she’ per paragraph. The problem? Readers cannot tell to whom the writer refers without reading the entire document. The solution? Alter the use of ‘he’ and ‘she’ within the same paragraph. Unfortunately, ‘she’ has simply not caught up with ’he’ as all-inclusive, so this approach is even less clear.
Today, the pronoun “they” can refer to one person or many because ‘they’ is used as a singular pronoun as well as plural. While “they” removes reference to gender identity, using the word for one or many fails to communicate how many, not to mention the fact that the use of ‘they’ as a singular pronoun has always been a grammatical faux pas. We do not say “they is,” we say “they are.” ‘They’ as a pronoun for one person is simply confusing. How many are they? What about them? How many of them are there? Is there? To use ‘they’ as a singular tense pronoun requires a complete revision of the proper use of the verb “to be” in order for “they” to clearly specify a number. Demanding a comprehensive change in the grammatical structure of the English language is a tall order. For gender to be undefined, what is wrong with the singular pronoun “it”? The “they” social movement requires the rewrite of every publication and now includes a choice of pronoun on documents and forms. Apparently ‘it’ is an ‘N’ word. It refers to objects, and no one wants to be objectified. We have a dilemma. Or they do.
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Executive Order 13988, officially titled Preventing and Combating Discrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity or Sexual Orientation, was created in an effort to neutralize discrimination by gender identity or sexual orientation (two entirely separate issues). Trump revoked the order, and the backlash of indignation may produce an unexpected consequence. To be nondiscriminatory, ‘they’ must become the standardized pronoun to include everyone, singularly or in groups. The practice of separately defining race, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, and/or ethnic origin (i.e., anyone described by likeness) must also be addressed before a comprehensively fair system of difference neutrality can arise. Pronoun identification impacts every group of people described by likeness because the ‘they’ group remains ‘black’, ‘white’, ‘of alien origin’, or whatnot. ‘They’ do not escape discrimination by being called “they.” What “they’ really get is another venue for marginalization within the various sub-groups. If we are going to revise the use of pronouns in the English language, we must also remove all types of segregation by difference on paper. Remove the descriptors; remove the problem. ‘They’ the people are ‘we’ the people.
What happens once statistical definitions of difference become outlawed by language? We will have to address the very real social deficit of segregation by wealth, an issue that could never be addressed through identification of minority status anyway. We just won’t know what the people who have less look like anymore. To distribute equality, the barrier of wealth in the U.S. must be defined in terms of basic human needs as well as the spoils of privilege. Adequate healthcare for all citizens was a major step toward wealth equality by basic human need. Affordable housing will hopefully be next.
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This article appears in Feb 14-27, 2025.