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Using 'Guys' to Address People: Anyone Else Offended?
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Chiming in here to join to those of you who tend to use the guys irregardless of whether I'm addressing men or women, just out of habit. As a non-native speaker, I do assign a (masculine) gender to the word, but then again it truly is a roll of the tongue. 'Hey, guys' - so easy. I've been changing it lately, though. I still don't see it as necessarily offensive (I would immediately change the word if someone did take it like that)...but, well, it really isn't that much more difficult to say 'ladies' if you're talking to other women, right? Words that I'm careful to say, at least in certain places? 'Girls', for example. I know that I can get away with it as a woman myself, and I certainly don't mind to be called that by the right person (aka friends and family) but to me it feels more belittling than 'guys'. Funnily enough, I know!
On the other hand, we have our own word for 'guys' in Spanish, which is 'tíos' - but there's no conflict because for the female version it's as easy as writing an a instead of an o. :)
Now that you mention this topic, I remember a funny moment I had with English a year ago or something. I had met this really nice and easy-going Aussie guy who was really easy to make friends with, and each time I found him in our campus he would stop and we'd chat a bit. So after a while I would just consider him a pal and waved him goodbye with a See ya later, dude! He sort of giggled and when I asked him why, he said that it was no big deal, but that girls normally don't use 'dude'. I laughed and thought it was funny, so I kept using it. Native speakers, was that true? Language is a funny, complex thing indeed.
Personally I use dude the time but then I'm from the home of dude because it started out as surfer slang in Southern California.
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Lorraine wrote: "I live in the Midwest - Michigan, to be exact - and am not sure if anyone will agree with me, but I think it's a regional colloquial word. Midwesterners do this a LOT. "Guys" to us is gender neutra..."Yes, I agree. I live in Indiana, and I say "you guys" as a lot to make it clear that I am talking to all of the people in the group, as opposed to just one person. It can be frustrating have you as both the single and plural second-person pronoun.
Ana wrote: "I just want you to know that I'm laughing here, alone in my room, over the Home of Dude thing. LOL. I'm imagining it as a trademark and everything. Home of Dude, Inc. Or TM. :'D"Get ready to laugh some more. I actually have this sign outside my door.
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Its internet bought. Etsy shop, "Signs that Work."In relevant news to the subject of this thread, this week Canada changed the lyrics of their national anthem from
"all thy sons" to "all of us."
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I understand feeling unhappy being addressed as 'guys'. I am English and have used 'guys' as a gender-neutral form of address to people the same age or younger than me. I also use 'folks'. I would like to think that if I did offend someone they'd tell me they didn't like it.
I don't care for 'guys' much, unless the group is guys only. To me it is describing men.I saw a comic type of image once where a woman said 'hey girls' to a bunch of guys and it wasn't met well. Made me think how once again stuff seems to tilt into the territory of men.
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I think demarcations are the reason why we sometimes get treated differently because of our gender. We taught ourselves through language to differentiate between men and women.
personally, i don't think it's a bad thing for me to be differentiated from a man. i'm not a man, don't want to be a man. i like being a woman, and i like being treated like a woman. that's not to say that i think women are lesser or anything like that - just different, and, to me, it's ok that we have our differences. like, an apple and an orange are different. both are fruits, but they have different characteristics, different qualities, different smells, different tastes. neither is better or worse than the other.
on a sitcom many years ago, ('designing women'), there was a discussion about women trying to be as good as men. one of the characters said, words to the effect, that women should stop trying to be the same as men/as good as men, but just be the best women they can be. those words resonated with me then, and i carry them with me now.
there are things i can do that men can't, and vice versa, based simply on gender. i have said for a very long time that i think every man should experience what it's like to be a woman for nine months, while every woman should experience what it's like to be a man for nine minutes. there are intrinsically different things that go on with both sexes that the other sex cannot experience, but i think it would be an eye-opener for everyone to experience what they normally cannot.
For what it's worth, the dictionary says that guys can be used for people of either gender: "2. Usually, guys. Informal. persons of either sex; people:Could one of you guys help me with this?"
(ref. dictionary.com)
I like the new phrase of "guys, gals, nonbinary pals" as a greeting. ;3 Especially for a mixed group. :D I will admit to using "guys" for friends and general people, "OH DUUUUDE" and "Hey man!" and "MAN this sucks" and "Wth dude?!" and stuff like that, and many of my women friends around my age use the same.
I am unsure about using "Hey girl!" because it feels like I might be skewing into "unwanted creep" territory, a "devaluing a woman into a girl" territory, or if I say "Heyyyyy girrrrrrrl~" then I out myself as an effeminate gay and could potentially get into trouble with some homophobic bigots around me.
For a mixed group I'm probably gonna work on using "guys, gals, and nonbinary pals" though. :3
My ex-husband used to call me dude sometimes. Each time I asked him not to, and he was surprised (he had forgotten and it was spontaneous without any harm meant), because his sister calls him dude and she him as well. Yeah, no, I have nothing against the word itself, but really, I am no dude. I suppose it is different for those who grew up in the culture (he did).
Stacy wrote: "For what it's worth, the dictionary says that guys can be used for people of either gender: "2. Usually, guys. Informal. persons of either sex; people:Could one of you guys help me with this?"
(re..."
The informal part could very well have added a blurb about local culture, because while I speak English, on its own the word has a narrow meaning only.
The definition I assume you are referring to is also informal. Here is the entire entry:"1.
Informal. a man or boy; fellow:
He's a nice guy.
2.
Usually, guys. Informal. persons of eithersex; people:
Could one of you guys help me with this?
noun
3.
Chiefly British Slang. a grotesquely dressed person.
4 (often initial capital letter) British. a grotesque effigy of Guy Fawkes that is paraded through the streets and burned onGuy Fawkes Day."
I missed Indigo's creative greeting :D
Indigo, I reckon you could also stick to "you assholes". After all, everybody's got one of them, right? ;D
Sandra wrote: "for quite a while, it has irritated me when someone refers to a group of people of mixed genders as 'guys'. maybe it's just me, but i'm wondering if anyone else sees this as offensive. i don't unde..."I only found this thread today, but it happened to me yesterday, I was at a shoe store with my sister and this guy address us as guys and I thought soooooooo weird!! Never happened before! We were 2 girls there, why don't use girls...
I suppose I am of an age that could be offended by the term guys as gender neutral. I always used to say folks until some teenagers told me I sounded like a hippy. Peeps is a term that seems too much like slang. I am OK, oddly enough, with using guys for large groups but find it discomforting when it is used to a couple of mixed gender. Equally well, I wouldn't use ladies as a gender neutral term. It tends to be used by blokish blokes as a joke. So I suppose I would stick with guys as the lesser of two evils, or y'all if I was joking. (How else would I get away with it as an English woman). Most of the time I try not to be offended by any colloquial forms of address. They are age specific and culturally influenced.
Rita wrote: "I only found this thread today, but it happened to me yesterday, I was at a shoe store with my sister and this guy address us as guys and I thought soooooooo weird!! Never happened before! We were 2 girls there, why don't use girls...Lol, I'm sorry to have to be difficult but I can't stand it when adult women are called girls. It's different if I address close friends ('you go girl!' or 'hello girls' or such) but when a stranger calls me girl or Miss/Mrs/ma'am I cringe equally much. (The latter are polite but in my part of the world we usually go by first name so I still cringe.) But I was a girl 20 years ago :)
Aglaea wrote: "Rita wrote: "I only found this thread today, but it happened to me yesterday, I was at a shoe store with my sister and this guy address us as guys and I thought soooooooo weird!! Never happened bef..."For me it depends on the situation- if you'd call a similar group of males boys I'm not bothered but in a professional situation or anything like that where you wouldn't call a group of males boys don't call a group of women girls. Because we call children girls and boys it can definitely be infantilising to use it to address adults.
Normally I'd say it's quite silly to be annoyed by being called "guys" even if you're in an all-female group, as the term can very well be used as gender neutral and frankly it's a nice gender neutral word to have; simple, quick to get people's attention, male or female, and most importantly: one syllable so you can get their attention quickly. However, I find myself often using the same word when referring specifically to men, so saying the former would make me a hypocrite. I suppose I should start saying "everyone" or if I'm talking to a specific group within a larger group I could say "you lot".
sometimes i get the feeling that, in this day and age, everything is being shortened, abbreviated, or initialized. not owning a cell phone, nor being on social media means that i'm not privy to the new 'language' that's out there now. but the idea of fast, faster, even more faster (lol!) is the norm. i usually say 'you all', (which is different from 'y'all'), or 'everyone/everybody'. but, then again, i don't have a problem taking the long route where language is concerned. 'guys' may be in the dictionary as the second definition for addressing a mixed group of people, but it just doesn't ring true to my ears or sensibilities. that's just me. the rest of the world can certainly address each other as they please.
and, i do agree that greetings must be appropriate to the group: professional, family, acquaintances, close friends, etc. maybe it's because i'm becoming an 'elder' that i'm getting persnickety about such things. *chuckle*
People is a nice gender-neutral word and really not that long. It's only two syllables.
Bunny wrote: "People is a nice gender-neutral word and really not that long. It's only two syllables."True enough, but it doesn't feel like it has any familiarity to it, not to me anyway. As I said though, you could save yourself a lot of effort by referring to everybody with swear words. Tactful it is not, but it's sure to get people's attention, and there's plenty of gender neutral ones that roll off the tongue smoothly with two syllables or less.
(If you can't think of any, just let a mosquito in your room and try to sleep for one night. By the time the sun comes up you'll have a whole manifesto of short, gender neutral swear words to call somebody, believe you me.)
I'm okay to be uncool with my 'hi, how are you doing' as ina) hi, how are you-oneperson doing
b) hi, how are you-manypersons doing
I won't step on toes and don't have to try to figure out someone's preferred gender pronouns without knowing them.
Tim, I know don't you mean harm, but your message 87 is bordering on self-centered. It isn't for you to decide whether another person perceives a particular word as unwelcome or not.
After looking through all the suggestions shared, I'm leaning towards using "y'all" and "folks" myself for a nice shorthand gender-neutral phrase for a mixed group. :3 And if I wanna be fancy, instead of "ladies and gents" I'll use "guys, gals, and nonbinary pals" :D Yes I think this will work for me. :3 I don't mind being called a hippy lol. I just was born far too late to get the chance to be one!Any thoughts? :D
Aglaea wrote: "I'm okay to be uncool with my 'hi, how are you doing' as ina) hi, how are you-oneperson doing
b) hi, how are you-manypersons doing
I won't step on toes and don't have to try to figure out someone..."
I know, and as I said, it would be hypocritical for me to say that in this particular case. Nonetheless, I don't think it's okay to let people be offended for the sake of it; sometimes you have to bring up the possibility that they're overreacting, if not for the fact that they are annoyed by being called something, then at least for the extent to which they so are. But, again, I'm not bringing that possibility up right now, because it would be hypocritical of me. As has been said here earlier, if I were in a group of any sort, even if female-dominated, and someone would say "gals" to address us all, I'd be somewhat weirded out, and as I said, I tend to more often than not use "guys" to refer to men in general, so there's two layers of hypocrisy that would be at play if I were to say it's silly to feel somewhat bothered when called guys.
Indigo wrote: "After looking through all the suggestions shared, I'm leaning towards using "y'all" and "folks" myself for a nice shorthand gender-neutral phrase for a mixed group. :3 And if I wanna be fancy, inst..."Lol, is that a flower I see you waving in your hand there? ;)
you see one in my hand! : ) i actually was a hippie, still have flower power in my heart!and, tim, with all due respect, it's not up to you to determine when and how much people are offended by anything, or to 'let people be offended for the sake of it'. being offended by something is personal, and may have a lot to do with past experience. you may not understand why something is offensive to someone, or why they react to it the way they do, but to decide not to 'let' then? i don't think that's your call.
r-e-s-p-e-c-t, as aretha put it.
Sandra wrote: "you see one in my hand! : ) i actually was a hippie, still have flower power in my heart!and, tim, with all due respect, it's not up to you to determine when and how much people are offended by a..."
Well said. In regard to 'dude', if the abusive ex would have used it in an inflamed situation, I most likely would feel very different, much stronger about it, and it should suffice that I say I simply do not care to be addressed 'dude.' I don't owe anyone an in-depth account of exactly when the word would have gone from neutral to something akin to a trigger, what he said (well, roared in my face in alcoholic stupor more likely) and how it affected me.
You're right Sandra. But I would like to ask this: what if someone only uses "guys" as gender neutral and never uses it to refer to men in general? What if this same person is okay with being called "gals" when in a largely female group? What if this same person says "guys" and someone is bothered by it? Who is being disrespected here? The intention was very strictly to be gender neutral, the speaker set that goal for themselves after giving it lost of thought and realised they aren't bothered either when addressed with "gals", but the person who is bothered doesn't seem to consider this. Would the person who is bothered be disrespectful for disregarding the speaker's intention or would the speaker be disrespectful for saying the person has no reason to be bothered by it? I don't intend to use "guys" as gender neutral myself, so I'm not really picking any side in this hypothetical situation, but I'm just trying to show here that respect isn't always that one-sided, at least not with this very particular topic (i.e. using "guys" to refer to mixed groups).
how other people care to be addressed is up to them. how they address others is also up to them. i can respect their wishes, is all. if i'm bothered by someone addressing me as a 'guy' and it's a close friend, i'll let my friend know, and s/he will respect that and not call me a guy anymore. if i'm in some public place with people i don't know, and someone addresses the group as guys, i may wince a bit inside (to be honest) but i won't say anything because these people are not that important in my life. i respect that person's right to use 'guys' as s/he sees fit, even if i don't personally like or agree with it. it's a personal thing, it's my thing, but i can respect that other people who don't know me don't know my preferences. hence, i'll let it pass.anyone who tells someone 'you shouldn't be bothered by _______ (whatever)' is being disrespectful. telling someone how s/he should/shouldn't feel is considered emotional abuse, which is disrespectful from the get-go. respect is a many-directional dynamic, in my mind.
i was not brought up to always respect other peoples' feelings, because my feelings weren't always respected. i had to learn both to respect myself and to respect others. at this stage of my life, respect and tolerance are paramount in my dealings with others. but, i still sometimes have to watch myself closely, because i will, at times, stumble into old patterns. when that happens, i apologize as soon as i realize what i've done/said, or when it's been pointed out to me, because i also see that as a sign of respect.
I'm sorry, Aglaea, I posted my last comment right around the same time as you so I did not see it beforehand. I apologise if it upset you and I'm sorry your husband was like that. :/
Sandra wrote: "how other people care to be addressed is up to them. how they address others is also up to them. i can respect their wishes, is all. if i'm bothered by someone addressing me as a 'guy' and it's a c..."In 99% of cases, I also would simply apologise and get on with it, probably without using the word around them again. Trust me, I'm no stranger to something you don't like to be called being thrown around. I said in one of the OG threads I'm minorly autistic, and not just among angry dudebros on the internet, but also among everyday yougsters in the real world here in Flanders (Belgium) the word "autist" is a pretty common insult. I don't consider myself the victim of ableism because I don't consider my particular autism to be a disability (although that may just be arrogance on my part), but nonetheless it isn't exactly fun to hear, especially given the nature of how I found out I have it. I'm not going to say how it happened for no other reason than: I simply don't want to.
I should say I'm sorry, Aglaea, if I'm disappointing you with that, but my point here is: I'm no stranger to having to hear something being said around you that you don't like to hear, and frankly I think there's a little bit of hypocrisy going on about this topic. One of the things we oppose is comparing people to women as a means of calling them weak, right? Because in our current patriarchal system, being compared to a woman is insulting, right? Well, what are we doing right now? We are complaining about women being compared to men. And for crying out loud, it's not even used in a deliberately derogatory manner, no, we're complaining about a word that often is used to refer to men, being used to get both men and women's attention (mostly that's what it is used for) because it happens to be a conveniently simple word to use. I'm no anti-feminist, you all know that, but any anti-feminist would see this, do you reckon they'd be eager to re-think their stance?
For me, it's gender neutral. I'll ask my gfs "Do you guys want to go to the game with me?" I think it's more along the lines of foreign language using the male pronoun for a group. Again, for me.I'm also a big fan of "y'all" when I want to be even more casual, or "all y'all" when I'm being silly. As in, "All y'all gotta see that new movie! For reals, yo." (Which makes my son cringe, which makes it that much more fun to do. LOL)
Oh and a few things I forgot.One: this issue we're talking about is basically limited to the English language. I know there's other languages that may use masculine words to refer to mixed gender groups, but we are currently just talking about the English word "guys" and as far as I know (and I grew up speaking Dutch and Bosnian and learning German, French and English in school) most languages have gender neutral words to adress groups and they tend to be used a lot.
Two: even if the hypocrisy can be debunked, or if we were to set it aside for a moment, I just can't but ask: is this the best thrid wave feminism has to offer in terms of discussions? I mean, no offense to people who think this is an issue, and I especially don't want to self-advertise here, but I remember starting, in late April, a thread on sex work and how those who do it are often either marginalised or patronised by contemporary feminists and why we should, as feminists, argue for full decriminalisation. I was excited for this thread, as I had just read up on numerous articles and statements made by sex workers or actvisist groups centered around sex work and hoped to confront those of us who have a problem with it. To my shame, this thread over the course of 2 weeks got 54 comments total and hasn't received any new input since May. Yet, here we are now, on a thread that in just 5 weeks has got 100 posts, discussing whether or not this ONE very specific word, exclusive to the English language no less, can or cannot be used in a gender neutral manner. I'm sorry, but I think this is precisely what people mean when they say "white feminism"; this one very particular English word being so fixated upon, whilst thousands of perfectly legitimate workers being marginalised, patronised and oppressed not only by those we're supposed to be allies with, but also by laws and police forces, being, apparently, just not relevant enough to talk about.
Something feels seriously wrong here right now.
Tim wrote: " I just can't but ask: is this the best thrid wave feminism has to offer in terms of discussions? I mean, no offense to people who think this is an issue, and I especially don't want to self-advertise here, but I remember starting, in late April, a thread on sex work a...I was excited for this thread, as I had just read up on numerous articles and statements .... To my shame, this thread over the course of 2 weeks got 54 comments total and hasn't received any new input since May. Yet, here we are now, on a thread that in just 5 weeks has got 100 posts, discussing whether or not this ONE very specific word, .."Here's the thing Tim. For a lot of people, myself included, it takes some time to build enough trust and community within a group before we will want to talk about serious topics. We don't just wade in the minute we arrive because we have had many bad experiences in the past and do not want to repeat them.
We begin with talking about something lighter and less difficult as a way to test the waters and discover whether these people are people with whom we can discuss honestly or people with whom we will need to be guarded and careful and circumspect. It is possible we will never get past the lighter topics if the group doesn't turn out to seem trustworthy enough. If you don't understand why that is, I suggest you look into harassment of women on the internet.
If you think that the reason that people focus on lighter, less challenging topics with those they don't know well is that they don't care, I think you are mistaken.
Here's an example of why people are cautious about who they interact with on the internet. I can cite you hundreds more.http://blackgirlinmaine.com/current-e...
Tim wrote: "I'm sorry, Aglaea, I posted my last comment right around the same time as you so I did not see it beforehand. I apologise if it upset you and I'm sorry your husband was like that. :/"No worries, I'm not upset at all. I just used it as an example of what could hide behind some short request. Like I explained earlier, he never used it in a bad way, but could have. And strangers are people we don't know yet, so I prefer to at least try to see the best in them at first, which includes the respect Sandra wrote about.
Well, I feel like this "address the smaller things first" approach is precisely where the original suffragettes went into the mist. I'm fairly sure it's the reason black women only received suffrage (in the US at least) several decades after white women. A lot of even first wave feminists took great issue with black suffrage and instead they stuck to the things that concerned them. I feel like we're seeing the same here.I'm not excusing harassment in any way and I'm glad that Milo twat is off Twitter (his fanboys were on me as well for a whole day when I supported the hashtag #BanMilo), but it just seems a convenient excuse for you to not have to pay sufficient attention (or speak up about) people who are not only more marginalised but also face tons of outright oppression and/or bullying from the law, especially in the United States where there is a federal ban on it. Only certain counties in Nevada allow some form of paid sex, but it has to be in established brothels, i.e. you have to work for a pimp or you can't do it at all, so clearly that's only deserving of a golf clap, if that.
Now, I will not disregard your right to not have to feel harassed; I acknowledge that how society makes us feel is in fact an important aspect of whether or not we are free, but compare general use of the word "guys" (which is what this thread started around; context was only added later), to people who could risk arrest at any moment for no other reason than their labour involving sex (not to mention the societal oppression they receive), and I know where my priorities lie, and I must say I'm disappointed that I become a minority as soon as I say they lie with the latter. I've always argued when asked "why do feminists focus on women if they're for equality?" that it only makes sense to pay more attention to those who are more oppressed. BLM does the same in regards to blacks and they have my support as well. However, I don't really feel like I'm seeing a lot of that in this particular thread. Instead, I'm seeing people focussing more on their own oppression rather than the worst oppression, which, as I said, was the same fault many of the first wavers suffered.
(Here's a link by HowStuffWorks going into slightly more detail about the faults of the older generations of feminists. You might find a familiar name there: http://people.howstuffworks.com/femin...)
Did I? Didn't you miss mine? I said I find it disappointing that this seems to be our current focus when there are vastly worse problems to discuss that seem to have been left completely untouched in comparison, then you brought up building up trust, attacking smaller things before the larger ones and harassment on the internet, which despite the fact I agree it needs to be addressed, didn't really seem what we were talking about even before what I said. Then I said that while it would be more beneficial to you and others, there's people who need our support far more than we need each other's and that by addressing our own first, we're making the same mistake our predecessors made.I get that your original point was about building trust and community, but I don't really get what this thread had to do with that; most of us don't use "guys" when talking to this group anyway, as far as I'm aware. Besides, the group has been around for a while now and lots of us have had meetups within our geographical areas. I don't think we have a significant lack of comradery here.
Tim wrote: "Did I? Didn't you miss mine? I said I find it disappointing that this seems to be our current focus when there are vastly worse problems to discuss that seem to have been left completely untouched ..."We all know there are bigger problems that women face than being called guys however that doesn't make this concern invalid. A lot of other areas of sexism have been well discussed elsewhere but this was the first time I saw a conversation about the use of guys to address people which was why I joined in.
And while it's not the biggest problem is part of bigger one. When you look at a group of men and call them guys, a group of women and call them ladies and then a mixed group and call them guys there's no way around the fact that you're acknowledging the men and not the women. It's a reflection of what happens across the rest of life where women are not noticed so much in a group, not heard as much in a group. Women's voices just aren't hear in conversation- in a group of equal men and women men will typically dominate the conversation and interrupt women more (research studies not personal opinion).
As someone who grew up in the late 1990s and early 2000s, I don't see "dude" as a masculine term. I refer to women, men, and mixed as "dude," so I am not offended by it. I think, as you said, that this is just a word that has changed over the years.
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I understand that men was once used as a synonym for humans or people, that was in fact one of the points I was making. Men was used as the synonym. Not women. The shape of the language said something about what was the norm and what was the exception. But people who spoke English decided they didn't like that any more so they changed it.