Re: [boost] Gender neutral documentation

From: Angus Leeming (angus.leeming_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-11-04 07:41:40

Martin Bonner wrote:
>> We do have a pronoun for just such a usage, albeit one that appears
>> to be used today only by the British royal family. Perhaps it
>> sounds archaic, but one understands what one is talking about when
>> one uses the correct language.
> 
> We do.  However what one *meant* to write was:
> 
>  One's personal preference is to use "they" as the *THIRD* person
>  singular gender-neutral pronoun.

Ok. However, as you have already intimated, that's grammatically
incorrect.

> As used by the British royal family, "one" is a first person
> singular pronoun.

Perhaps. I've always felt that the royals refer to themselves in the
third person and that it's this that makes them sound a little
peculiar. I've always thought as "one" as directly equivalent to the
French «on» and the German «man» which are third person pronouns.
However, I'm having difficulty thinking of any English examples :)

Perhaps I've led us down a blind alley; apologies for that.

Returning to the original example:
    This means for example that the client can completely
    discard Bind if she does not need it.
I'd suggest rewriting it as:
    This means that the user can discard Bind completely
    if it is not needed.

That would get rid of a split infinitive too, but that's a whole other
ball game :)

Angus