[Python-Dev] Support the /usr/bin/python2 symlink upstream

[Westley Martínez]

On Sat, 2011-03-05 at 03:27 +1100, Steven D'Aprano wrote:
> Westley Martínez wrote:
> > On Fri, 2011-03-04 at 00:54 -0800, Aaron DeVore wrote:
> >> On Thu, Mar 3, 2011 at 11:44 PM, Kerrick Staley <mail at kerrickstaley.com> wrote:
> >>> That way, if the sysadmin does decide to replace the installed "python" file, he can do so without inadvertently deleting the previously installed binary.
> >> Nit pick: Change "he" to "they" to be gender neutral.
> > 
> > Nit pick: Change "they" to "he" to be grammatically correct. If we
> > really have to be gender neutral, change "he" to "he or she".
> 
> Actually, that's a hyper-correction imposed by grammarians in the 18th 
> century who were overly influenced by Latin. The use of "they" as a 
> generic singular and indeterminate pronoun in written English goes back 
> at least to Chaucer in the 14th century, and very likely as long back as 
> before English was English, and remains in common use today. Despite the 
> distaste for it among (mostly American) grammarians, it is 
> linguistically sound and widely accepted in most of the English-speaking 
> world, particularly England itself. The use of singular they is 
> widespread, natural, and grammatically correct.
> 
> http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-the2.htm
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singular_they
> http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archivs/005423.html
> 
> But for the sake of not upsetting our nuclear-armed cousins on the wrong 
> side of the Atlantic *wink*, perhaps the sentence could be reworded to 
> refer to system administrators plural, and thus satisfy everyone?
> 
> "That way, if sysadmins decide to replace the installed "python" file, 
> they can do so without inadvertently deleting the previously installed 
> binary."
> 
> 

All right I have to reply to all these "singular they" remarks. Just
because the singular they has been used for a long time doesn't make it
right. It sounds unnatural, at least to me, and I've always been taught
to use "he or she" which I despise. So all my life I've used the generic
"he". Anyways, I remember reading somewhere that for Python Strunk and
White apply, and neither Strunk nor White like singular theys.