More gender neutral experimentation

Okay, so yesterday’s experiment with a new gender neutral pronoun (qi/qir) wasn’t a success. I quite like ze/hir (see, e.g., Love at first unsight), but the ze can be problematic and intrusive (see The Need for a Gender-Neutral Pronoun).

The thing about he/she, his/her(s) and him/her is that they are not at all intrusive. So, how about using thi with a soft th (like the first syllable of theatre) and thir again with a soft th (like the first syllable of thirty):

‘Come, there’s no use in crying like that!’ said Alice to thirself, rather sharply; ‘I advise you to leave off this minute!’ Thi generally gave thirself very good advice, (though thi very seldom followed it), and sometimes thi scolded thirself so severely as to bring tears into thir eyes; and once thi remembered trying to box thir own ears for having cheated thirself in a game of croquet thi was playing against thirself, for this curious child was very fond of pretending to be two people. ‘But it’s no use now,’ thought poor Alice, ‘to pretend to be two people! Why, there’s hardly enough of me left to make ONE respectable person!’

Is it better, or just perverse, to use new symbols, i.e., the Greek letter theta (Θ/θ)?

‘Come, there’s no use in crying like that!’ said Alice to θirself, rather sharply; ‘I advise you to leave off this minute!’ Θi generally gave θirself very good advice, (though θi very seldom followed it), and sometimes θi scolded θirself so severely as to bring tears into θir eyes; and once θi remembered trying to box θir own ears for having cheated θirself in a game of croquet θi was playing against θirself, for this curious child was very fond of pretending to be two people. ‘But it’s no use now,’ thought poor Alice, ‘to pretend to be two people! Why, there’s hardly enough of me left to make ONE respectable person!’

Visually it’s intrusive, a Cyrillic letter littering the Latin text, but easy enough to read once you get used to it. The mind immediately understands the word, whereas thi and thir parse like typos.

If there’s one thing I have against this system, it’s the lisp factor: ‘Come, there’s no use in crying like that!’ said Alyth to θirself, rather sharply…