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[–]Three_oneFourWanted for thought crimes in countless ideologies 20 insightful - 5 fun20 insightful - 4 fun21 insightful - 5 fun -  (5 children)

I don't get why they're so obsessed with that letter. Is it because X is one of the least used letters in the English language?

If that's the case, then they need to check their colonialist and English as a first language PRIVILEGE /s

[–][deleted] 13 insightful - 1 fun13 insightful - 0 fun14 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

"X" is used in English commonly as a wildcard. "A playing card whose value can vary as determined by its holder."

So like instead of latina or latino, you've got latinx. 'course, that's not English but it's common among NA English speakers.

[–]fuck_reddit 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Ironically, the "latino/latina" problem was created by wokesters... they insisted on using "latino/latina" since it is more "culturally sensitive" compared to "latin," but then they decided that "latino" was gendered (even tho, it isn't necessarily in Spanish).

[–]HelloMomo 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

"X" is used in English commonly as a wildcard.

I don't think that's so much an English thing as it is borrowed from math. X is the default variable in mathematics.

[–]OPPRESSED_REPTILIANIntersex male | GNC | Don't call me "a gay", "twink" or "queen" 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Someone once explained to me that it's because "X can be used as a variable", but I'm pretty sure that's not the origin.

I believe it originated with "neopronouns" like "xe/xir" which pretty much exist solely to be as weird and different as possible. It's confusing to read and pronounce, and doesn't look like it belongs with he/she at all, but that's the point. Also see words like "womxn" - something I've seen used by both TRAs and radical feminists - because the "man" in "woman" is apparently sexist and needs to be swapped out. TRAs use womxn because the X is supposed to be "inclusive", radfems use it because they don't want "man" in the world (but they'll also use womyn, womon, wombyn and so forth)

tl;dr yes. It's because it's one of the least used and most "weird" sounding.

[–]Three_oneFourWanted for thought crimes in countless ideologies 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Except it isn't really weird sounding at all, just has absolutely no consistency or sound of its own. It usually sounds like ks, but sometimes can be z. Ironically enough, just as in math, x in English is just a variable for a different letter or combination of letters