this post was submitted on 30 Aug 2023
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No, it doesn't. It's really awkward.
Canada has a player on the women's national soccer (football) team who wants people to use they/them pronouns when referring to them in the third person. It leads to trying to create sentences like "they've been playing well today but they haven't".
And it would be impossible to replace one of those pronouns with "the team" or the player's name. Completely impossible.
I feel like when you say that out loud it's actually very easy to understand due to intonation.
They (singular) has been used since at least Shakespeare, so every single student in an English-speaking country has learned how to use it correctly; including how to format sentences using singular they. 'The firefighter rescued a puppy from a burning building; they were really lucky they spotted the puppy in time.' In any sentence where two pronouns are the same, you'd replace one or the other (preferably the latter though the 'rules' on this are stupidly complex). Alex was drinking Jim's coffee. He should really buy ~~him~~Jim a replacement.