Hacker News Reader

Comment by notamy | Hacker News Reader

> Who told you this isn’t correct?

The last few years aside, I've always had an issue with it. In my personal experience, people who tend to call women/girls "females" never, ever use the word "males" to describe men/boys in similar context. It's about using language consistently imo.

View on HN

This is a new wave thing pretty much only prominent in online spaces like Reddit. Read some fantasy by female author Robin Hobb and she will regularly use the word. Spend anytime immersed in minority culture and you will frequently hear females used with affection. At best this argument is right up there with “chicks”. Some groups in some places decided to be offended while other groups in other places proudly refer to themselves as Dixie Chicks. It likely stems from online incel communities using the word frequently when discussing…females.

It’s not entirely new. As late as the mid-20th century, the term “female” was considered vaguely dehumanizing when applied to women even as an adjective. Here’s a Google Ngram graph showing changes in usage over time:

https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=female+lawyer%...

Yes, it wasn't that long ago that making the OK sign was the most evil Nazi thing one could do, and it didn't matter how many times it was started that it was a 4chan troll that society fell for, people who weren't in the know about the outrage news of the week got harmed for doing an action that for most their lives was viewed as completely harmless. Unable to admit they were trolled, the message was "Well, now Nazis are actually using it", with zero evidence or even thought of pushback against the "Nazis" who allegedly were controlling everyone's actions through negative identity.

Now you can make the OK symbol again and it's OK. The outrage over it got replaced by a new outrage and the victims of outrage culture during that period are simply seen as an acceptable cost for keeping the outrage fire burning. No apologies. No admissions of guilt or harm. Just the monster leaving behind its path of righteous destruction.

> This is a new wave thing pretty much only prominent in online spaces like Reddit.

Nah. It's always been a bit odd in certain contexts. And I'm pretty old and square.

That’s fine, but it’s disingenuous to dress it up with an “in English it sounds weird...” There’s nothing wrong to my ears as a native speaker.

I empathise with your thoughts on this. It occurs to me that the different words aren't consistent across cultures and sometimes the word man and woman don't feel equivalent. Sadly I didn't pay attention when being taught grammar so can't explain why I think that in detail.

What do you think of the word lady? Gentlemen doesn't seem to be the male equivalent anymore.

I have heard people use female and male as nouns to describe others, but this usually indicates a military background.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com