Hmm. Well, I don’t have much of a gender identity, so I don’t know how annoying being addressed like that would be. On the other hand, English doesn’t have any gender-neutral pronouns that don’t make me feel silly, and I refuse to make one up when I’m not writing fiction.
Well, obviously it’s up to you. My own preference is to do one of
determine the gender of the person you’re referring to
use a gender-neutral pronoun
restructure the sentence so as not to need a gendered pronoun
use a construction like “he or she”
in preference to possibly misgendering someone, since I know some people find that very unpleasant. But if those are all too much trouble, fair enough.
Just that you said “he”.
Hmm. Well, I don’t have much of a gender identity, so I don’t know how annoying being addressed like that would be. On the other hand, English doesn’t have any gender-neutral pronouns that don’t make me feel silly, and I refuse to make one up when I’m not writing fiction.
Well, obviously it’s up to you. My own preference is to do one of
determine the gender of the person you’re referring to
use a gender-neutral pronoun
restructure the sentence so as not to need a gendered pronoun
use a construction like “he or she”
in preference to possibly misgendering someone, since I know some people find that very unpleasant. But if those are all too much trouble, fair enough.
Yes, it does: “he”.
Unfortunately, the mental image of maleness overrides any hope of that working consistently in people’s imagination.
Example: “Man is the animal that suckles his young”.