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Comment by newsgremlin | Hacker News Reader

I feel like I've wasted my time reading into this controversy for how absurd it sounds unless I'm missing some other crucial information.

From what I've gathered from the various references, a mod questioned if the use of gender neutral pronouns such as "they" would be acceptable in response to new rules being announced to moderators that the persons specified pronouns should be used. Despite the fact these rules were not even implemented officially, the mod was terminated immediately.

Now what we see here is them backtracking, but I don't believe they have reinstated the mod. So I don't believe they think are truly remorseful and have realized they overstepped the mark.

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It's kind of the reverse: The mod in question adamantly refused singular "they" in particular, not for religious or transphobic but rather stylistic reasons (from what I could find). But that's hours of chat and months of context boiled down into one third-hand sentence.

SE has not said whether this in particular was the cause for the firing, but it seems evident. Regardless, there is no indication that SE intends to undo the firing.

Thank you for summing up.

What I still don't quite get is: did the mod reject singular they a) when preference was unknown (ie: prefer to rewrite), b) reject singular they, when preferred (someone not identifying as male/female), c) Choose the conventional "he" over singular they when preference was unknown?k8s

From what I've read it's a) - and it's pretty hard for me to imagine a scenario in which that seems like a good reason to drop a moderator.

Also, is this a volunteer being kicked, or is it some kind of paid position?

Ed: from tfa: "Second, we hurt a longstanding member of the community and an important volunteer moderator." So I guess that answers my last question.

From what I can tell it's a) and b). Side-stepping the issue by avoiding pronouns or disengaging altogether was suggested by the moderator but dismissed as not an option because similarly hurtful in (perceived?) intent.

So that’s what happened. Thanks for your time and explanation!

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