What our pets alooklike

[LordRetard]

Uh... Both of you? Why not, it's a party.

[Cirtur]

Dude, you.

[wolf]

Pets? Yay! This is my rat Omagus. Wally died last year.


And this is Jaydee the boxer puppy.

[mountainmage]

I want to mush Jaydee's adorable jowls. Did I mention Boxers are my favorite dogs behind pugs?

Also,

All I'm saying is that when a woman offers me their ass as a hump-toy, I respectfully decline.

This has never happened.

[Edminster]

And this is Jaydee the boxer puppy.

Did you name it after Jaydee?

[Rainbow]

All I'm saying is that when a woman offers me their ass as a hump-toy, I respectfully decline.

Who are these people that have an ass offered by a third party woman as a hump-toy? I'm sorry, I tried to hold it in. Now, fix your grammar, you whore.

[LordRetard]

Who are these people that have an ass offered by a third party woman as a hump-toy? I'm sorry, I tried to hold it in. Now, fix your grammar, you whore.

I'm not entirely sure what you think that you're trying to say. Anyway, don't fix anything, Ahmet. Linguistics is all about describing language and I need your texts as sample data.

[wolf]

And this is Jaydee the boxer puppy.

Did you name it after Jaydee?

I didn't name her. The rescue place we got her from did. But if it helps you sleep at night, yes I named her after that Jaydee.

[Rainbow]

Yar, he ought to 'ave said "...a woman offers me her ass as a hump-toy..."

[mountainmage]

They/their can be singular or plural, although if it's singular, it usually means the person is of an unspecified or unknown gender. So, you're both right?

[Rainbow]

No, no, no, stop being wrong. Not only is their/they totally not correct as a singular (I do admit it is up for debate, however), but he already had identified a woman in the sentence before he switched his pronouns to be all whackadoo.

[Oldrac the Chitinous]

The plural pronouns have also been put to use as pronouns of indefinite number to refer to singular nouns that stand for many persons <'tis meet that some more audience than a mother, since nature makes them partial, should o'erhear the speech — Shakespeare> <a person can't help their birth — W. M. Thackeray> <no man goes to battle to be killed. — But they do get killed — G. B. Shaw>. The use of they, their, them, and themselves as pronouns of indefinite gender and indefinite number is well established in speech and writing, even in literary and formal contexts. This gives you the option of using the plural pronouns where you think they sound best, and of using the singular pronouns (as he, she, he or she, and their inflected forms) where you think they sound best.

(Emphasis mine.)

If you're going to use "ironic" in its colloquial sense, no fair turning into a prescriptivist here.

[LordRetard]

Ja, ja, das ist recht. Honestly I'd never recommend a prescriptivist grammar in any case, because often times a human being is a better judge of what sounds "good" or "right".

[mountainmage]

No, no, no, stop being wrong. Not only is their/they totally not correct as a singular (I do admit it is up for debate, however), but he already had identified a woman in the sentence before he switched his pronouns to be all whackadoo.

Like I said...they/their is usually an unknown gender when it's singular, but the fact that Ahmet didn't use "she" doesn't make it wrong.

[Rainbow]

No, though. That whole argument is and always will be an argument, different in every book. I always have firmly believed that 'their' and 'they' are plural pronouns. The counter that authors have contradicted my view is laughable, because authors writing creative literature have atrocious grammar when you look at the book. Grammar does not apply to creative, stylistic writing. When you are doing your everyday speaking, it is grammatically incorrect to use 'they' or 'their' as a plural.