TO THE EDITOR:
I was exceptionally annoyed after reading a kvetch on Feb. 11 that said, “Feminists, if it is that important to you why don’t you change it to personopause?”
I appreciate the fun of the kvetching board, but I believe that this kvetch brought up an important issue of the continued lack of gender-neutral language on this campus. To anyone who does not understand the necessity of gender-neutral language: Language is a reflection of the views of society. When it’s considered normal to refer to humanity as “mankind,” to large groups of people as “freshmen,” or to greet a room full of people with “Hey guys,” (just to name a few) this implies that an entire half of the population is so unimportant that they don’t even deserve to be included in common language.
How would people feel if we switched sexist language to racist language? What if you were an African-American sitting in a room full of people of mixed races, and one of your friends came in and greeted everyone with, “Hey whiteys”? I think someone would get pretty upset if, as an African-American, they were referred to as “whitey.” So why don’t women get upset when they are referred to as men? Why is it still okay for masculinity to be the norm and femininity to be the abnormality?
Katie Varner
Junior
History
