For the record I was posting in support of inclusive language, but pointing out that context and convention matter.
They seem to have even scrubbed my comment from their instance, lol.
I’m gen x dude also has no gender.
dude is masculine in every definition i’ve found (looked it up) except for a city slicker new to a ranch…
i’ve always known it to be gender neutral… but i have a female friend that gets offended every time someone calls her that.
but the fact that it keeps happening means that it’s gender neutral to all of those people too (she’s a fairly feminine female).
that said, it’s best to just call people terms that they are comfortable with, not ones that you’re comfortable calling them.
personally, i find calling a single person they/them a little obtuse, but it’s not really that hard. (slightly confusing when there’s a question of whether im referring to them or a group of people).
Except when it comes to cultural/generational uses of words. Every generation has words they use in a altered way. Dude was one such word when I was young. It was used by my generation in a way that didn’t exactly match the definition. Just like all the other generations use words out context with their written definitions. Its why I laugh when the younger generations get mad because they think they invented the concept.