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The rule has not changed, it is simply an accepted misuse. The english language stubbornly refuses the introduction of gender neutral pronouns.

You have some serious issues, haven't you?
No roleplaying.

Their - Meaning ownership. (ex. That is theirs)

There - Telling of a location. (ex. Get your a** over there.)

Who cares? It's English, love it or leave it.

In writing, I tend to use s/he for a gender neutral pronoun. It's a wee bit on the 70's feminist side but I'm used to it now. I have tried just alternating "she" and "he" in speaking but using "she" still sticks out in a funny way.

Do you think that they/their should be adopted as the gender neutral pronoun of choice or not? If not, do you have another suggestion?

Really? I was always taught that Ud. was the formal expression of the second person, i.e. English equivalent of "Thou."

Ex. "?Como esta Ud.?" is "How are you?" (EDIT: I couldn't use proper punctuation and accented letters, so don't try to correct me.)

As "Thou" is an antiquated expression in English, I believe more and more Spanish-speakers are moving away from Ud. In fact, most Mexican natives I know (and I know alot of 'em) never use the formal second person expression, and one or two have outright asked me what I was saying when we were introduced.


Absolutely. The correct expression should be, "Everyone has one's own place." I don't think it's too difficult to remember. If, however, one insists on using pronouns, one may use "its," as opposed to one, so long as the pronoun is expressed in the same sentence as "everyone."


I think that despite teachers' efforts to prevent that from happening, most teenagers are too damned lazy to care, and the parents aren't helping. I really don't want it to happen, but what the ******** can I do about it, since I don't have a M.L.A.?


So also have French and Spanish. What the ******** is your point?

At the risk of opening up a wound fixing to be sealed, I'd like to point out that the English language is not one with a fixed set of pillars for rules. The language is constantly sliding, shifting, morphing every day. I'm not saying that the period will no longer mark the end of a sentence soon, but a language is defined by those who speak it--thus, if everyone (or nearly so) uses "Everyone has their own place" and everyone (or nearly so) accepts it, then it becomes, by definition, acceptable grammar practices, and thus "rules".
[By the by, Crimson Kitten, that's a perfectly admissible comma splice, especially in the context it's in (opening sentence of a discussion comment.)]