He or She Is Not Gender Neutral

If the cause for gender neutral language and against gender specific language is enough to appropriately move you to use, in writing and in speech, the failed solutions of she, he or she, s/he, or alternation, then instead of using those solutions, you ought to put more effort into being appropriately moved to be completely gender neutral.

Gender, contrary to popular belief, is not binary. There are many people who do not fit into the gender norms; there are also people who do fit into the gender norms, but choose to identify differently which is altogether their choice and we ought to respect that. As such, the 'he or she' fix to gender specific language is actually no fix at all. If you want to avoid gender specific language, you CANNOT exclusively use he, she, he or she, s/he, or alternate. This lousy attempt at a solution is leaving out many other groups of people, which is just as unfair as leaving out either of the mainstream norms. Again, we ought to put our effort into either making 'they' appropriate as a singular pronoun, or making up a new, aesthetically pleasing, singular gender neutral pronoun.

Culture and Felt Reasons

How does culture influence how people are moved by felt reasons?

Culture has a tremendous effect on how people are moved by felt reasons. The example that is most prominent in my mind is related to the ethics of vegetarianism and animal abuse. Many people in western society would agree with the following statement: animal abuse is wrong. People in western societies take offence against people who kick puppies, they criticise those people and take legal action against them. The people of western society, in regards to abuse against dogs and cats, are appropriately moved  but not appropriately moved.

Presumably, people of western societies would also agree with the following statement: dipping a conscious animal into a boiling vat of water and then slitting its throat, while it is still conscious, that it may bleed to death slowly is animal abuse. They would be appropriately moved if they took offence against someone whom had done this to a dog. However, they are neither appropriately moved  nor appropriately moved when this very same thing happens to most farm animals that will soon become their food. I think that anyone who is against the abuse of dogs and cats should be against the abuse of pigs, cows, chickens, turkeys, and so on. I think that anyone who is appropriately moved against the abuse of dogs and cats should be appropriately moved and appropriately moved against the abuse of pigs, cows, chickens, turkeys, and so on. Our society, however, does not share that view.

In response to Avery - full post here


Note this is not entirely related to your post; I simply wanted to comment on Solipsism, and was reminded of that when I saw your post.

I think that felt reasons are certainly limited and are especially subjective. Michael Levin, as you pointed out, is a prime example of that fact. Levin assumes that because he finds the idea of homosexuality repulsive, everyone must also find the same thing.

I think that the idea of solipsism is strikingly more interesting because most of humanity feels that it is wrong due to the fact that they live in this apparently empirically observable universe. I agree that it would be best to not deny the possibility that solipsism could indeed be correct. I do think, however, that there are benefits to assuming it is not. It does appear as though the empirically observable universe, even if we make all of it up, does affect us. For example, if we decided that nobody actually exists and thereby concluded that it would be okay to punch a police officer in the face, we will find out that the figments of our imagination will throw is in what appears to be an actual prison. Even if we claim to know that the prison is not real, we have no way to escape it.