Re: Politically correct vs. accurate

[Nancy Hayes <nancyh -at- PMAFIRE -dot- INEL -dot- GOV>]

In article <30C5D779 -at- msmailgtwy -dot- nvl -dot- symix -dot- com>,
Cheryl Kidder  <chekid -at- symix -dot- com> wrote:
>I agree w/Tracy B.

>   ... snip .....

>I think politically correct/gender neutral language is an important
>topic, but I was kind of disappointed in this particular way of
>presenting it. To me, "blind study" is just not controversial enough
>to argue about. Of course, I'm not blind (not totally, anyway), so I
>may be making an incorrect assumption, but it seems to me that "blind
>study" doesn't have the negative connotations that "blind luck" and
>"blind alley" might possibly have, since it pretty much describes the
>process. I'd rather get on a soapbox and talk about *my* pet
>peeves... such as nursing textbooks that refer to all nurses as "she" and
>all
>doctors as "he." (grrrrr...)

>..... end snip .....

>The assumptions we all live under and write into our documents, be they
>technical or otherwise, aren't weakened by close examination.  Raising a
>daughter in the world we live in makes you much more aware of how many
>active verbs are associated w/males, passive verbs w/females, etc.  Or how
>many stereotypical positions we find a female taking in examples, demos,
>line drawings.
>Language, and those who know how to use it, is very powerful.  It works on
>us in subliminal ways we may not have ever questioned before.  Why shouldn't
>I, as a technical writer, incorporate my belief system, where appropriate
>and applicable, to the work I'm doing?  Why should I leave this up to
>someone else?  It's easy enough to include as many "she"s in my examples as
>"he"s.

>Cheryl D. Kidder
>chekid -at- symix -dot- com
>Symix, Inc.
>Columbus, OH