The English language doesn’t have a gender-neutral pronoun to refer to an individual. But you knew that. Many writers resort to using the plural they to refer to a person whose gender is unknown. And most authorities are OK with that, especially in informal writing. But the writer for Yahoo! Shine has gone too far with the they:
In that context, the pronoun refers to husband or boyfriend, both singular and presumably male. The correct pronoun is he. But you knew that, too. And you probably knew that the writer forgot how to spell Alzheimer’s.
January 30, 2012 at 8:16 am
Which begs the question once again: What in the world is going on over there at Yahoo?
January 30, 2012 at 9:21 am
I don’t know what’s happening with Yahoo, but mistakes like this (and all the others) aren’t new. I’ve been blogging about them for nearly four years. I know some Yahooers read this blog, so maybe one of them will enlighten us.