I have a proposal about our new usage of “they” to refer to individual people, as in, “Irene?
Oh, they left an hour ago” or “Bernard cut themselves by accident.”Because it is so hard to change language by fiat, I know that my proposal here must qualify as modest.
But propose it I must: Might it make the new “they” a little easier to handle if it were used with singular tense marking?
Context usually makes the meaning known, but surely it would make things a little clearer if we could use “they wants to trim the cat’s claws” when referring to just one person.
Poor little “they” has had it rough over the years.
Persons:
“ Irene, Bernard, ”, “, Chaucer, Thackeray’s