Path: csiph.com!news.mixmin.net!eternal-september.org!reader01.eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Mike Spencer Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers Subject: Re: self-documenting APL, not COBOL and tricks Date: 02 Nov 2022 15:15:31 -0300 Organization: Bridgewater Institute for Advanced Study - Blacksmith Shop Lines: 49 Message-ID: <87o7tpql30.fsf@bogus.nodomain.nowhere> References: <2012409812.688843357.955525.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org> <1289582114.689099990.798302.peter_flass-yahoo.com@news.eternal-september.org> Injection-Info: reader01.eternal-september.org; posting-host="017a2616f319d0f8ebb4ddb32fafa988"; logging-data="1301410"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org"; posting-account="U2FsdGVkX1+2KuSJ8VOv7Jy49hVi0wgQ09xpJQXjXWM=" Cancel-Lock: sha1:RHy4H+8bWeLYUD6ci7NGGgycnrY= X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.7/Emacs 20.7 X-Clacks-Overhead: 4GH GNU Terry Pratchett Xref: csiph.com alt.folklore.computers:222280 Charlie Gibbs writes: > The co-opting is now done by those who are trying to use "they" as > a genderless singluar pronoun. What we really need is a completely > new set of pronouns, e.g. > > xie (subject) > xis (possessive) > xir (object) Thereby pulling undefined orthography out of thin air. How do you pronounce those? In Nova Scotia, there is an increasing and welcome recognition of the Micmac people whose turf this was before Europeans snarfed it away from them. But no one other than tenured academics knows how to derive correct (or even reasonable) pronunciation from the orthography chosen to write Micmac words. There's no way for even an educated and literate person to guess that Pijinuiskaq (the name of a new park in Bridgewater, NS that replaces an ugly parking lot) is pronounced "be-jn-oo-is-gah". Not to mention the apparently (if not technically) gratuitous apostrophes in words such as Mi'kmaw (the now politically correct version of the deprecated Micmac.) > If you want to pick nits about dative and accusative cases, try > > xim (indirect object) > xir (direct object) > > Leave "they" alone. It's plural. Just so. Will we soon hear about "Tasty Liberation"? No more rude "fuvgrngre", no more intellectual evasions such as "coprophage" or journalistic "differently dieted". It's Tasty. Digressing, even LGBTQ is a poor choice, along the same lines as PETA (People Eating Tasty Animals) or the Canadian Reform Alliance Party acronym. How many people intuitively read that poorly chosen abbreviation as Lets Go Bash The Queers? Language is the salient, arguably the defining, attribute that differentiates humans from non-humans. Don't carelessly (or, for that matter, belligerently, pig-headedly) shpx it up. -- Mike Spencer Nova Scotia, Canada