The Speech Police Want To Erase One Of My Favorite Greetings

The speech police are at it again. This time, they’re going after one of my personal favorite greetings: “Hey guys.”

You guys (see?) know I use that a lot. I’m not a “y’all” kind of gal. I would actually feel incredibly awkward if I DID say y’all IRL. I have a northern family– what can I say? Again, that’s just ME. That obviously doesn’t apply to the other Chicks. We all have different backgrounds, and it’s super cool.

ANYWAY. Guys. I say that a lot, and no. I don’t consider it a “gender specific” phrase. When I say it, I’m thinking about a group of PEOPLE. But I guess that doesn’t matter, because the PC police officers have decided that the phrase isn’t inclusive enough. Therefore, we should work on phasing it out.

From The Atlantic:

“Okay, guys,” a female coworker of mine recently began, as she addressed me and a female colleague. Then she stopped herself, said she was making an effort to use more gender-neutral language, and carried on talking.

It was a small self-correction, and a glimpse at the conflicted feelings stirred up by one of the most common greetings in the English language. Guys is an easygoing way to address a group of people, but to many, it’s a symbol of exclusion—a word with an originally male meaning that is frequently used to refer to people who don’t consider themselves “guys.”

Sorry, but I’ve never felt “conflicted” about using the word “guys.” Ever.

My coworker is one of many who have started editing themselves in response to this exclusion. In the course of reporting this story, I heard from teachers who wanted a better way to get students’ attention, an ice-cream scooper who wanted a better way to greet customers, and a debate coach who specifically encourages his students to use y’all. These are representatives of a broad coalition of people who have contemplated, and often gone through with, excising guys from their vocabularies.

There are, of course, plenty of people—including many women—who have no problem being addressed as “guys,” think the word has evolved to be entirely gender-neutral, and don’t see a reason to change their usage. But others aren’t so sure. “I think there’s a really serious and welcome reconception of gender lines and relationships between sex and gender going on,” says John McWhorter, who teaches linguistics at Columbia University and has written several books about language. He says “something has crested in particular over about the past 10 years”—something that has people examining their everyday communications.

Yeah. It’s called the PC police police. They won’t crawl out of our butts. That’s the difference.

The author of the article goes on to say that the word is particularly troublesome for– you guessed it– trans people.

“As a transgender woman, I consciously began trying to stop using guys some years ago,” says Brad Ward, a college counselor at a high school in Atherton, California. She added, “When I’m included with a group that is called guys, there’s some pain, since it takes me back to my male days in a way that I’d rather not go.”

It causes pain? That’s a level of fragile I simply cannot sympathize with. Get over it.

ANYWHO. Possible alternatives for guys apparently includes “folks,” “friends,” “people” and “team.”

“Hey team.” Uh, no. Sorry. I’m not your coach.

Interestingly, the PC police seem to really champion the use of “y’all.”

Which brings us all to y’all, which seems to be the alternative with the most passionate backers. It has many of the necessary features to be the heir to guys—inviting, inclusive, monosyllabic. But what holds it back is its informality, as well as its regional associations, which many don’t know how to handle.

I heard from people born and living outside the South who didn’t feel they could use the term naturally…

Exactly. That’s how I feel. I am incapable of using the word naturally, so guys it is.

The author concludes:

Even if guys is widely regarded as gender-neutral, there will still be a sizable contingent of conscientious objectors. They argue, not incorrectly, that dropping guys takes very little effort, and any awkwardness that comes with the odd folks or friends or y’all seems far preferable to making a listener feel ignored. (Personally, I’ve come to favor you all, which carries some of the perks of y’all without being tied to any particular region.)

Nah. Guys is here to stay for me. If I ever use another term, it’ll be on, well, my own terms. I’m not worried about the inclusivity of the words I use. If you can’t deal, don’t talk to me. You probably wouldn’t get along with me anyway.

#SorryNotSorry.