indeterminate gender

[darkoshi]

I like the implication of the pronoun on this mailing.

"Our next president will face many challenges and difficult decisions. But they will also inherit our nation's proud legacy of helping those in need."

Comments

[marahmarie]

I think they had no other good choice, what with Hillary running...otherwise it becomes "But he or she" which was what we all said back in the day but it really was much more awkward and bad-looking/bad-reading than to just say "they" (in which society finally comes around to pronouns I've always preferred for completely non-gender-related reasons...yay).

[darkoshi]

Yep. But just think, 20 or 30 years ago (or maybe even 10), writing "he or she" (or implying it with "they") in regards to the next president would have seemed ridiculously far-fetched.

[(Anonymous)]

True enough. Which inspired me to find out exactly how ridiculously far-fetched it was:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_female_United_States_presidential_and_vice-presidential_candidates#Presidential_candidates:_party_nominees

And:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_female_United_States_presidential_and_vice-presidential_candidates#Presidential_candidates_for_party_nomination

What's ridiculously far-fetched is not that no woman before Hillary has ever run for president but that the media and our society sure don't talk about the ones who did too much.

[darkoshi]

I found that same page when writing my last comment, and wondering if there had been any previous female presidential nominees. It is surprising how many there were. But considering that they were all from small/fringe political parties, it would still have been far-fetched to think they'd have much chance of winning.

Did you read the link about "Edith Bolling Galt Wilson/the first female president of the United States"? That was interesting too.

[darkoshi]

Huh, ok. Margaret Chase Smith in the 1964 Republican Convention... I suppose she would have still been quite far fetched, but maybe not ridiculously so.