I'm an empathetic "guy" (lol) and get your points completely. But we can't all be empathetic about everything, and it's probably not a great idea to make everyone feel like they SHOULD take everything (little things like this) so seriously. I'm not trying to take away anything from anyone - some people take this more seriously, and are offended my "non-inclusive terms", but to me this seems to be delving to deep, and really - there is no clear end in sight, we could find 250 words that we want our team to use differently.. each disagreeing with eachother, etc.
A team should be inclusive, safe, friendly, etc place for ALL team members. But when we start applying our personal beliefs about how the english language is flawed, and can upset some team members, and needs to be altered to not upset those certain people, we are really getting far away from the entire point of being a team, and wasting time and nit picky things, that (in my opinion) should not be offensive to most.
This isn't true for all things, obviously certain things are inherently offensive, however when it comes to something like this, its perspective and opinion for the most part, NOT inherently offensive, and has no REAL life negative impact on anyone, except for the way they take it. Some things people are offended by really come down to - they choose to be offended.
I personally believe in reducing how many times I'm offended in a single day - and practice not getting upset over things that are small, personal to me, etc.
Also I will say - communication is an important subject when it comes to teams working well together, sure we could all debate, and agree to use certain words, but in my mind, this could literally go on and on and on, and is completely out of the scope of the teams goals, etc. The point of communication is, do you understand what i'm referring to? not as much - do you love my word choices?
Who said it was about offending or upsetting people? Can't it also be a hack to nudge people to think about how language can be more or less welcoming? Language doesn't have to be offensive in order to be exclusive.
As you point out, “guys” are but one example. As I also write, it is used and interpreted differently, in different contexts. In tech, it has for some, especially those who in a thousand small ways are reminded that they are in a minority, begotten the meaning of being gender normative. Reports of that are enough to make me reconsider it.
In terms of empathy, you state you are of that nature in the beginning. But you spend 5 paragraphs addressing how I'm in the wrong and that people who take issue with gender normative language should “get over themselves” (or “reduce how many times they are 'offended'"). Well, that suggests me that you haven't really considered or talked to underrepresented people about their experiences (just my presumption).
But to the core of your point: It's hard to negotiate language. You're completely right. And that's why, if you read me more closely, you'd see that I'm also hesitant to go that route. That being said, I think it should always be OK to question how language, privilege, and power relate to each other, and how we, in fact, can use it to achieve an "inclusive, safe, friendly, etc place for ALL team members".
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I'm an empathetic "guy" (lol) and get your points completely. But we can't all be empathetic about everything, and it's probably not a great idea to make everyone feel like they SHOULD take everything (little things like this) so seriously. I'm not trying to take away anything from anyone - some people take this more seriously, and are offended my "non-inclusive terms", but to me this seems to be delving to deep, and really - there is no clear end in sight, we could find 250 words that we want our team to use differently.. each disagreeing with eachother, etc.
A team should be inclusive, safe, friendly, etc place for ALL team members. But when we start applying our personal beliefs about how the english language is flawed, and can upset some team members, and needs to be altered to not upset those certain people, we are really getting far away from the entire point of being a team, and wasting time and nit picky things, that (in my opinion) should not be offensive to most.
This isn't true for all things, obviously certain things are inherently offensive, however when it comes to something like this, its perspective and opinion for the most part, NOT inherently offensive, and has no REAL life negative impact on anyone, except for the way they take it. Some things people are offended by really come down to - they choose to be offended.
I personally believe in reducing how many times I'm offended in a single day - and practice not getting upset over things that are small, personal to me, etc.
Also I will say - communication is an important subject when it comes to teams working well together, sure we could all debate, and agree to use certain words, but in my mind, this could literally go on and on and on, and is completely out of the scope of the teams goals, etc. The point of communication is, do you understand what i'm referring to? not as much - do you love my word choices?
Thank you for your comment @robcapell !
Who said it was about offending or upsetting people? Can't it also be a hack to nudge people to think about how language can be more or less welcoming? Language doesn't have to be offensive in order to be exclusive.
As you point out, “guys” are but one example. As I also write, it is used and interpreted differently, in different contexts. In tech, it has for some, especially those who in a thousand small ways are reminded that they are in a minority, begotten the meaning of being gender normative. Reports of that are enough to make me reconsider it.
In terms of empathy, you state you are of that nature in the beginning. But you spend 5 paragraphs addressing how I'm in the wrong and that people who take issue with gender normative language should “get over themselves” (or “reduce how many times they are 'offended'"). Well, that suggests me that you haven't really considered or talked to underrepresented people about their experiences (just my presumption).
But to the core of your point: It's hard to negotiate language. You're completely right. And that's why, if you read me more closely, you'd see that I'm also hesitant to go that route. That being said, I think it should always be OK to question how language, privilege, and power relate to each other, and how we, in fact, can use it to achieve an "inclusive, safe, friendly, etc place for ALL team members".