So sorry. ಠ╭╮ಠ

Sucks, but I object to incorrect plural pronouns. PCness doesn't trump grammar and basic English.

I believe that's what the individual prefers?

@2 canst piss off, forsooth.

@2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singular_t… - nice try! I'm curious as to why treating people with respect is derisively described by you as 'PCness'.

Please return to masturbating to pictures of Trump in a vain attempt at making your orgasms great again.

That's horrible. Donation made. All vulnerable folk should return to their cars in pairs or groups if at all possible in those early morning hours.

Plural pronoun? If it's what they want, that's cool. We want what we want.

Can't blame people for being confused when reading it though; it took me a moment to figure it out. It *is* grammatically incorrect and a violation of basic English, too. But, so what? Respect is more important than language purity.

It's a silly objection anyway. As an olde tyme internet wag once said, arguing against those who want the English language to remain pure (I'm paraphrasing); "English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. It's been known to follow other languages down dark alleys, knock them down and rifle their pockets for vocabulary."

Best wishes to them for a speedy recovery and for a quick capture of fuckstick who did it to them.

that's a pretty specific anti-trans attack. get this fucker off the streets now.

emotions are going to be sky high this weekend. don't take it out on the cops, ok?

@8: After figuring out what @2 was referring to:

As Michael was walking to their car, they past the rose, and were approached by a white man in an orange sweatshirt with scruffy brown hair.

I agree with @2. Wikipedia is not God's gift to Earth, BTW. The objective of good grammar and language is clear and correct communication, period. Especially in journalism.

Crap you guys the Trump supporters (@2) have found The Stranger!!!!

 My last comment should refer to @7.

Someone was attacked and you sad bastards are nit picking on grammar. What the fuck is wrong with you? You simple, self involved, empty souled pieces of shit. Have fun cuddling up to a dictionary since you are, clearly, an unlovable human.

It is possible (though, frankly, I doubt it) that @2's comment isn't coming from a Trump supporter. It could be coming from someone who is frustrated and confused by poor communication skills. If we are to be understood by others we must make an effort to communicate clearly. If we do not, we can't expect others to understand what we are saying.

Here is an example of where communication here goes haywire; "As Michael was walking to their car, they past the rose (sic), and were approached by a white man in an orange sweatshirt with scruffy brown hair."

Since "they" is referring to a single person, the sentence should read; "As Michael was walking to their car, they past the rose, and was approached by a white man in an orange sweatshirt with scruffy brown hair."

Here is why it is confusing. In English, "was" is used for first person singular (I) or third person singular (he, she, it). "Were" is used for second person singular and plural (you, your, yours) or first or third person plural (we or they).

Michael prefers that we refer to him (now..don't get angry... that's the pronoun used!) as "they". As this is third person plural, the sentence is *sensu stricto* correct, except that the pronoun refers in this case to a single individual. As it stands, the passage suggests that "they" refers to more than one person. But that's not what it means, is it?

Confusing, to say the least. So for those who insist on using plural pronouns to describe themselves, please be kind to those of us who get confused and make mistakes when trying to figure out what it is you are saying.

Grammar evolves. If you found someone's cell phone and didn't know who it belonged to, you would be speaking of "their" phone, hoping "they" come back for it so you can give it back to "them". Speaking in gender-neutral terms is really not as hard as you're trying to make it out to be.

The haters can just GTFO of Seattle already. We are so much better than this.

In addition, "they", is used as a pronoun for the selves of an individual afflicted with Dissociative Identity Disorder.

Fuck that guy. I hope they catch him and charge him with a hate crime. Also, it's "passed", not "past" and The Rose deserves the respect of being capitalized.

Also, have a great Pride weekend and watch out for each other.

@14- what you're ignoring is that conjugations don't exist for classes of pronouns (i.e. 3rd person singular), but for pronouns themselves. You clearly already know that "you" is used for both 2nd person singular and plural (which, as a side note, somehow manages not to 'disrupt communication' or w/e). It uses the same conjugations between both forms, not for the same reason two different classes of pronouns might coincidentally use the same conjugations (e.g. I was/she was), but because it's the same pronoun.

This is more clear in languages which have a 2nd person T-V distinction and at the same time use the same pronoun for 2nd person singular and plural in some cases. In French, for example, tu is used for the 2nd person informal singular, while vous is used for formal singular or any plural second person. French uses the same conjugations for vous whether it's singular or plural, but there is never an instance in which the conjugation for "vous" is the same as that for "tu" even if they're both being used as 2nd person singular pronouns. The assertion that a singular they should take on the conjugations of its fellow 3rd person singular pronouns just doesn't hold up.

Also, to everyone else whining about 'proper grammar,' "they" is already a de facto singular pronoun by popular use. Style guides and other prescriptivist authorities can kick up all the fuss they want, but the language does not belong to them or any other individual.

At the end of the day, this is an article about a trans person who was assaulted, and the comments really shouldn't be about whether their choice of pronouns is valid. (And @14 again- the thrown in "him"? Really? Nowhere in this article does it refer to Michael with that set of pronouns. That was 100% unnecessary.)

Jesus people, get off the grammar high horse. Michael was assaulted and prefers they/them pronouns. Welcome to the 21st century.
Donated. Would have volunteered to bring a casserole and offer support if I was anywhere near Seattle.

@17 nailed it. Some here are arguing over the correctness of the third-person as a gender-neutral singular pronoun and/or the correct verb agreement when doing so (which is an odd complaint given that the prior is already technically ungrammatical). Meanwhile you let slip the incorrect use of "past". Shameful.

Anyway, I really came to say this:

But make no mistake, this attack and all others like it are the result of hateful language that stigmatizes and alienates groups of people because of who they are...

While that's probably mostly true, there is also a non-zero chance that mental illness (and our city and state's inability to properly deal with it) played a role.

@23: are you sure you were assaulted because you are white? Is there no chance at all that you were assaulted because you're a jerk?

@23 #WhiteLivesMatter amirite? Sorry that happened to you, but also, shut up. You'll be fine. You're white and a dude.

@ 23

you called the cops, right?

link?

did you set up a go fund me?

anything?

@23: I don't now Michael at all, but likely that they have a great sense of humor so I don't think the quibbling over politically correct grammar would be bothersome. But your non-sensical straw-man quip sure added a stain to this thread.

"They" is an interesting, significant usage but not in this context
I wish Michael quick recovery & that cops find the a-hole very soon

Sick

@2 Tough shit dick-wipe.

This is really sad, particularly in our own city. I transitioned a year ago and have had zero problems, but I constantly fear something like this. It makes me wonder if I should get a concealed weapons permit. I'm adept with firearms from my time in the military, but it sucks to carry one around and really I don't want to. But, with Trump on the rise and anti-trans violence in the news every week it seems, I'm concerned.

@19: "conjugations don't exist for classes of pronouns (i.e. 3rd person singular), but for pronouns themselves"
Source on that assertion? Because I don't think that's actually true.

So, about the rainbow crosswalks:

The ostensible purpose was to address the rise in violent hate crime on Capitol Hill. However, it seems that hate crime has only increased since they were installed.

Would you want the government to identify LGBTQ people and show pride by painting rainbow stripes in front of their residence? Or identify residential blocks with a lot of LGBTQ people and paint rainbow stripes on that block? So why should it identify commercial districts with a lot of LGBTQ people and paint rainbow stripes on the crosswalks in that district? Maybe these constitute government profiling that targets our community for violence. I think the experiment has failed and they should be removed.

Less confusing would be to just repeat Michael's name instead of pluralizing an individual.

@33 Wow. You really missed the point. Do you think after 9/11 we should have abolished American flags too? Wouldn't want to give anyone more targets. Everything should be boring and gray and we should all go run and hide, not band together and show that we aren't afraid.

@35 - Then make the choice to fly a flag, great, show people you will are someone who cares and wants to band together and take care of each other. But if the government paints it on the street, it is an empty gesture that doesn't mean anything and doesn't let people make that choice for themselves.

Get well soon Michael.
Stay safe Seattle, be sure to look out for one another.

@23 Newspapers don't report on incidents they don't know about, and they certainly don't report about things that don't happen. If you had been assaulted on a city bus, the bus driver would have been required to call the police. We can also assume that other passengers on the bus would have tried to intervene in some way, or at least document the attack with a cell phone video or pictures. If there had been an attack, someone would have contacted the media. I assume the local media would have covered the story, if it were real.
I live in Detroit, and violence on the bus always makes it into the papers and onto the news.

"They" is gaining ground even in print (Seattle Times, on this story, for instance), so get used to it. You can tell it's being used as a singular because the verbs will be conjugated singular:
"Does they want to come to the party?"
"They says they's coming, but they needs to buy a hat first."
See? Easy!

Yes, they was used in the Seattle Times...who had the basic understanding that there was a need to explain the use. Jumping from talking about Michael to saying 'they were doing X" is confusing to the uninitiated reader.

@38: Nobody hold the copyright on grammar.

38 - Even so, if you have a message, I believe it better to provide less distractions that cloud what you're actually trying to say. I don't disagree with the intent to have an identification pronoun, I just think pluralization is ineffective. Just look at these comments; they're about grammar as much as this senseless crime. Uncommon usage, explained or not, detract from the message. Can it become common? Yes. Will it? Hard to see it.

@33, "It's our responsibility not to inflame the bigots with gay crosswalk propaganda, ya'll!!"

@32- I'm not saying that pronouns of the same category don't tend to use the same conjugations. The claim that was being made was that if "they" is used as a singular, it must take on the conjugations of he/she/it, and I was trying to say that it's not a necessary condition that all 3rd person singular pronouns have the same conjugations. I mean, afaik what I said is true- pronouns acquire conjugations that stick with the pronoun itself and the type of pronoun affects (but doesn't determine) what conjugations it has- but I'm not exactly trained in linguistics or anything and my original sentence was kind of poorly phrased.

As another example (or futher elaboration, really), Old English had a 2nd person plural pronoun which was a precursor to the Middle English "ye" (plural and formal singular). Over time, "ye" evolved into/was swallowed by "you," and gradually displaced "thou" as the 2nd person singular pronoun. Ye's conjugations were used for "you," while thou's dissolved along with it. If classes of pronoun had to use the same conjugation, wouldn't we be using modernized versions of thou's forms? The two did coexist for some time, so if that were true, it would make sense for singular "you" (or even "ye") to adopt the pre-existing conjugations for thou.