From: Mike '/m' 

On Thu, 26 Jun 2003 14:44:11 -0400, Gary Wiltshire  wrote:

>On Wed, 25 Jun 2003 17:45:02 -0400, Mike '/m'  wrote:
>
>>On Tue, 24 Jun 2003 23:29:18 -0700, Alan Cairns 
>>wrote:
>>
>>>And we
>>>could do with a neutral 3rd person singular pronoun.
>>
>>
>>English has one, it just happens to be the same word as the masculine 3rd
>>person singular pronoun.
>>
>>German also has similar overlaps.  For example, the masculine subjective
>>pronoun "der" is the same word as the feminine dative pronoun.
>>
>>Why everyone has their shorts all a-twist just because the neutral
>>pronoun is the same word as the masculine pronoun, yielding horrible
>>constructs such as 's/he', is beyond me.
>>
>> /m
>>
>An increasing trend is to use the third person plural:  A person must
>have their own tools.

Stated more precisely: An increasing trend is to use the same word as the
third person plural.

 /m

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