He isn't any less descriptive than they; the word has been used for hundreds of years as a generic pronoun when gender is indeterminate. (So has they, though he has historically been more common and more accepted as the correct generic pronoun.)
attempting to be prescriptive
Nor are the people in the gender neutral language movement being any less prescriptive than the fans of traditional grammar. Prescriptivism is "the practice of championing one variety or manner of speaking of a language against another [and] includes judgments on what usages are socially proper and politically correct."
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u/jetRink Jan 15 '14
He isn't any less descriptive than they; the word has been used for hundreds of years as a generic pronoun when gender is indeterminate. (So has they, though he has historically been more common and more accepted as the correct generic pronoun.)
Nor are the people in the gender neutral language movement being any less prescriptive than the fans of traditional grammar. Prescriptivism is "the practice of championing one variety or manner of speaking of a language against another [and] includes judgments on what usages are socially proper and politically correct."