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Comment by pwdisswordfish8 | Hacker News Reader

Especially since he/she is already gender-neutral.

> clearly improve readability

Not necessarily. Some people object to singular they on grammatical grounds, in that it may confuse the reader who associates the pronoun with plural meaning only into thinking it refers to some previously unmentioned group. Infamously, Monica Cellio’s dismissal was more or less over this.

I happen to prefer singular they over he/she, but I acknowledge it’s not an obviously uncontroversial choice.

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The "singular" they always confused me as a non-native speaker, and to be honest I don't know anyone non-native who actually knows this exists and is not a mistake.

> singular they on grammatical grounds,

It's in the APA style guide (it's been there for a while now.) IMO that's even more pedantic than the "begs the question" battle which was lost some time ago.

I don't mind either way, but the he/she thing always felt clunky.

There's absolutely no ambiguity introduced in the PR's changes. And I don't think any grammar guide would prefer "he/she" for these particular uses.

They would advise to rewrite the sentence instead. The singular they appeared in the CMoS only in the 17th edition, and they approve this particular usage only in informal speech:

http://cmosshoptalk.com/2017/04/03/chicago-style-for-the-sin...

You? :-)

He/she is not gender neutral. It reinforces the gender binary by excluding non-binary individuals.

> non-binary individuals

I would saw we are all "non-binary". We fall somewhere on the spectrum of gender. Some men are "alpha-males", whilst others are more "camp" [0], etc. Also see "tom-boys". I find the whole non-binary thing to be unhelpful and meaningless.

[0] hopefully these aren't offensive terms.

Non binary is about gender identity. You're talking about gender expression. They're related but not the same.

Sure ok...

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