Blogging to Readers of Both Sexes

"His, her, or they?" is the touchy question on which fellow Mensa member Steve Merchant weighs in. "What strategies can be used to avoid gender bias without making language stilted? Does it matter?" asks Merchant.

Thanks for bringing this up, Steve.  Bloggers, including, I’ve found, business bloggers, appear to share the belief that being sticklers about correct spelling and grammar is superfluous. Blog posts are more casual than websites, the argument goes, and should be written in conversational tone.

It probably comes as no surprise that I don’t agree with that view. Putting our businesses’ best feet forward in our blogs, however casual and conversational their tone, means avoiding language that distracts readers from our message –  even if some of those readers happen to be eighth grade English teachers!

In this month’s issue of The Mind, Merchant quotes rules from Words and Type, a respected book in the publishing business:

• It is convenient to use "his" when both sexes are referred to.                             Each student must give me his choice before tomorrow noon.
  
• If you are a feminist writer or writing for feminist readers, it is wise to use the more cumbersome "his or her".                                                                                         Each student must give me his or her choice before tomorrow noon.

The most common solution, and, according to Steve Merchant, the best compromise, is this: Make the original noun plural. 
Students must give me their choices before tomorrow noon.

Out of curiosity, I revisited some random blog posts from two of my favorite fellow bloggers to see how they handle the gender-in-blog-writing challenge.

From Seth Godin’s Check-in, Chicken:

"Another way, probably a better one, is to have each member of the team announce what they’re afraid of."

Rather than the awkward "have each member of the team announce what he or she is afraid of", or, worse, risk being accused by feminists of the sexism by having "each member of the team announce what he’s afraid of", Godin incorrectly uses "they" tp modify "each member". Steve Merchant would advise Godin to use the plural noun members, who could then (correctly) announce what they’re afraid of!

From Roundpeg’s blog:

"Every now and then we have are lucky enough to bring on a new client who has a good idea of what they want…". "Has" is obviously a mismatch with "they", but Taylor, too, wanted to avoid the awkward "he or she" in referring to the new client (singular). 

Steve Merchant’s solution would fit nicely here: "Every now and then we are lucky enough to bring on new clients who have a good idea of what they want."

Does any of this matter to readers (to him or her?) Well, for bloggers trying to avoid distracting readers with awkward sentences, it should!