But while Isaac is a Joyent employee, Ben is not—and if he had been, he wouldn't be as of this morning: to reject a pull request that eliminates a gendered pronoun on the principle that pronouns should in fact be gendered would constitute a fireable offense for me and for Joyent. On the one hand, it seems ridiculous (absurd, perhaps) to fire someone over a pronoun -- but to characterize it that way would be a gross oversimplification: it's not the use of the gendered pronoun that's at issue (that's just sloppy), but rather the insistence that pronouns should in fact be gendered. To me, that insistence can only come from one place: that gender—specifically, masculinity—is inextricably linked to software, and that's not an attitude that Joyent tolerates.

Using the plural pronouns isn't grammatically correct!

I've been assured by people far more knowlegable than I that it's ok, even Shakespeare did it. Personally, I'm comforted by the knowledge that even if I'm wrong about the grammar, I won't have made anyone feel excluded.

S
omeone sent a pull request to my project changing the languages!
So merge it! If you've got some process that a contributors needs to go through (such as a CLA), let them know. They're just trying to make your community better and bigger!


They said I was being hostile!
I'm sorry, but you were. Your choice of language has an impact on people.


I wasn't trying to be!
That's ok, hostility isn't about intent, your words had an impact whether you meant it or not.