RE: [PATCH v3 4/4] CodingGuidelines: recommend singular they

From: Felipe Contreras <felipe.contreras@gmail.com>
Date: Jun 15, 2021, 17:08 UTC
Message-ID: <60c8dea5ef999_12c2820871@natae.notmuch>
In-Reply-To: <f06092a9053e40d93c4ec94b7fbbb1b8d563957b.1623766273.git.gitgitgadget@gmail.com>

Derrick Stolee via GitGitGadget wrote:

Show 8 quoted lines

> From: Derrick Stolee <dstolee@microsoft.com>
> 
> Technical writing seeks to convey information with minimal friction. One
> way that a reader can experience friction is if they encounter a
> description of "a user" that is later simplified using a gendered
> pronoun. If the reader does not consider that pronoun to apply to them,
> then they can experience cognitive dissonance that removes focus from
> the information.

The gender of the reader is never specified.

The documentation doesn't mention users in that way, only third-person developers, reviewers, etc.

The code mentions third-person users.

Never the reader.

So it's not true the reader can experience cognitive dissonance when the gender ofthe reader is specified, because we never do that.

Do you have an actual example?

-- 
Felipe Contreras