Speaker For The Diodes - Post a comment

05:24 am - QotD

"As a kid I liked to read through my dad's Reason newsletters. One topic I remember was a search for new pronouns, similar to how some feminists have embraced the gender-neutral 'ze'. The Libertarians, however, wanted pronouns that did not assume human or animal existence. Instead of 'he' or 'she', they suggested 'e' as a sort of ur-pronoun that assumed neither gender nor humanity.

"At the time, I was fascinated by the science-fictional overtones of 'e'. I imagined conversations with intelligent robots, or aliens, using this new pronoun: a language of the future! It wasn't until years later that I realized the real aim. While the language appealed to my love for science-fiction, the point was actually just to help normalize the idea that 'corporations are people'."

-- commenter Atheist at Alicublog, 2013-11-09 [thanks to realinterrobang for quoting this earlier]