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[–]Three_oneFourWanted for thought crimes in countless ideologies 17 insightful - 3 fun17 insightful - 2 fun18 insightful - 3 fun -  (2 children)

If a word can mean different things to different people, then it's worthless as a word. Imagine a bank note that could have its value as whatever you want. Someone gives it to you and says it's worth 100 dollars, but then you try to buy something with it and the cashier says it's only worth 10, and you need more change to buy just 20 bucks worth of groceries. it would be a totally worthless note because no one would want to use it. And here we are, with people trying to make words all be the same thing and all different all at once. No one will ever actually use these words anymore because they've been ruined with contradictory and ambiguous definitions.

[–]BusterGrundle 12 insightful - 3 fun12 insightful - 2 fun13 insightful - 3 fun -  (0 children)

It's ridiculous in both directions, too. I was poking around the LGBTA+ wiki and I found a sexuality that meant "woman who is gay for men". It had 14 listed synonyms plus etc.

[–]reluctant_commenter 9 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 0 fun10 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Agreed, and I like your metaphor.

"Gender" is only hanging on as a commonly-used vague word because a lot of the people who say it actually mean "sex"... and saying "sex" is offensive, at the current moment in time...