Toads are apparently a genderless race

Walkazo said:
Prescriptionist attitudes towards language is pretty irritating to me in general, whether it's people swapping British/American spellings (both ways), poo-pooing the use of contractions in formal writing, refusing to acknowledge emergent vocabulary and novel derivational affixation, or yes, flipping the hell out about singular "they".
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Don't forget the rules "Don't end a sentence with a preposition" and "Don't start a sentence with a conjunction".
This is just the sort of nonsense up with which I refuse to put. And I don't.
 
Not this "language evolves" argument again. It's true, but when there's still controversy surrounding it, I'd stay clear of it. Sometimes, you want to be as clear as possible, and sometimes, "they", feels cleaner than the blech-y "he or she", sometimes just doesn't cut it. Ultimately, though, that singular "they" still triggers heated arguments, it makes it less-than-ideal to incorporate it in writing. Just give it a few more decades and maybe it will be accepted everywhere.

Writing, especially formal writing changes way more slowly than spoken, so just because it's an "emergent vocabulary and novel derivational affixation" (really, now?) doesn't mean it's acceptable in writing. As Kurt Vonnegut Jr. said, "if it were only teachers who insisted that modern writers stay close to the literary styles of the paste, we might reasonably ignore them. But readers insist on the very same thing. They want our pages to look very much like the pages they have seen before."

I don't mind the "singular" they in conversation and informal writing; it flows a lot better than the clunky structures. I find in unacceptable in formal writing, though, and you will be dinged in English and grammar classes if you think the singular "they" is acceptable. There are dictionaries than contradict each other and themselves on the singular "they" and "they" isn't established quite yet in the language. There are quite lengthy arguments on the singular "they", so it isn't as clear-cut as what Walkazo asserts as "viable". To avoid such discussions, I'd rather not use "they" or "he or she" and rather reword the sentence as a whole (pluralize the subject, replace pronoun with an article, and other things). It's not a foolproof method, but it gets by a lot of times.

Singular "they" sounds awkward in this case either way. How would you address a known person whose gender cannot be identified? Like, somebody who is transgendered? "They" doesn't work. Neither does he or she.

Finally, I'd opt for "it". I don't care if it's dehumanizing, it's our speciest attitude that's blocking progress there.

So yeah, off-topic crap from a pedantic plumber person... thing.

Let's just agree to disagree here, m'kay?
 
What a.contradicton
 
The only thing I'm okay with would be that Toad and Toadette has no romantic feelings for each other.
 
And ship-sinking. :smug:

Seriously, though, I'm fine with them not being siblings and not being paired up, but the whole gender thing......I could see it working with Yoshis. But not Toads. I GUESS it could explain why female Toads are absent in some games, like Sticker Star and Dream Team.
 
Dude, guys, sensational journalism. Why are you guys believing that Toads are truly genderless?
 
And then there's Toadsworth, Zess T., Tayce T., Russ T., the Master, Fice T., Ghost T., Toadia, Jolene, Mush, Zip Toad, the Toad Waitress, etc.

Heck, the fact that Zess T. and Tayce T. are sisters and the Master is their brother produces another problem. The same problem comes up with Jolene and Mush. And don't forget the Toad Bros. Bazaar! And then we have the problem with the Toad Waitress.
 
J-Yoshi64 said:
And then there's Toadsworth, Zess T., Tayce T., Russ T., the Master, Fice T., Ghost T., Toadia, Jolene, Mush, Zip Toad, the Toad Waitress, etc.

Heck, the fact that Zess T. and Tayce T. are sisters and the Master is their brother produces another problem. The same problem comes up with Jolene and Mush. And don't forget the Toad Bros. Bazaar! And then we have the problem with the Toad Waitress.
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thing is a lot of these are from rpgs which nintendo doesnt consider canon so.....
 
Dr. Mario said:
Not this "language evolves" argument again. It's true, but when there's still controversy surrounding it, I'd stay clear of it. Sometimes, you want to be as clear as possible, and sometimes, "they", feels cleaner than the blech-y "he or she", sometimes just doesn't cut it. Ultimately, though, that singular "they" still triggers heated arguments, it makes it less-than-ideal to incorporate it in writing. Just give it a few more decades and maybe it will be accepted everywhere.

Writing, especially formal writing changes way more slowly than spoken, so just because it's an "emergent vocabulary and novel derivational affixation" (really, now?) doesn't mean it's acceptable in writing. As Kurt Vonnegut Jr. said, "if it were only teachers who insisted that modern writers stay close to the literary styles of the paste, we might reasonably ignore them. But readers insist on the very same thing. They want our pages to look very much like the pages they have seen before."

I don't mind the "singular" they in conversation and informal writing; it flows a lot better than the clunky structures. I find in unacceptable in formal writing, though, and you will be dinged in English and grammar classes if you think the singular "they" is acceptable. There are dictionaries than contradict each other and themselves on the singular "they" and "they" isn't established quite yet in the language. There are quite lengthy arguments on the singular "they", so it isn't as clear-cut as what Walkazo asserts as "viable". To avoid such discussions, I'd rather not use "they" or "he or she" and rather reword the sentence as a whole (pluralize the subject, replace pronoun with an article, and other things). It's not a foolproof method, but it gets by a lot of times.

Singular "they" sounds awkward in this case either way. How would you address a known person whose gender cannot be identified? Like, somebody who is transgendered? "They" doesn't work. Neither does he or she.

Finally, I'd opt for "it". I don't care if it's dehumanizing, it's our speciest attitude that's blocking progress there.

So yeah, off-topic crap from a pedantic plumber person... thing.

Let's just agree to disagree here, m'kay