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PaperclipPerfector  6mo ago (text post)   3060 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for June 29, 2025

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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What annoys me, and has become quite common lately, are people who write in to advice columns who deliberately obscure the gender of everyone mentioned in their letter. They, spouse, sibling, child, partner.

Since I was in college, I've read every advice column I've been able to get my hands on, as a way to make up for my complete social cluelessness. Dear Abby, Ann Landers, Miss Manners, Carolyn Hax, Care & Feeding, Captain Awkward.

I try to picture in my head the people involved in these situations. But I cannot picture a genderless person - my mind short-circuits and just gives me a sentient cloud of fog!

If I were writing to a public forum, asking for advice about my lurid love affair, I’d take any opsec I could get.

I should probably do more here.

Something I ran into today: https://dev.epicgames.com/documentation/en-us/unreal-engine/epic-cplusplus-coding-standard-for-unreal-engine#inclusivewordchoice

Good thing I can now code Boomer Wish Fulfillment, Minority Slayer 2000 and Dubiously-Consensual Intercourse Simulator in a fully inclusive style. Thanks to whoever wrote that coding standard!

I get the idea of using inclusive language in the UI, but I'm confused by what they mean when they start talking about how to name classes and other programming constructs. Am I somehow missing hordes of developers using racial epithets in their variable names?

I mean you should keep that in mind. Getting called into a meeting with your manager because GenericUserIsRetardedError showed up in a stack trace for an end user isn't fun.

Told you you should have went with Redot ;)

"Unreal isn't woke", they said!

Did you follow Redot further, btw?

Didn't code anything in it (wait, I lied), but I'm following their Twitter. Seems pretty active.

It's not just advice columns. People do this in real life for some reason!

The speaker almost always has a common gendered relationship in mind - daughter, boyfriend, wife, etc. - but are deliberately choosing not to reveal that info when it would be harmless, and help the listener understand the situation better.

I thought it was bad in Brisbane, but then I went to Sydney. Everyone down there has a partner, everyone has a child - it felt like I was talking to aliens.

It's in the water. People do it without even knowing.

I'm remembering a 1954 movie, and it's worth a chuckle pretending that them refers to giant ants.

Especially when these people use gender neutral pronouns when the gender is already specified.

It's because of habit.

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