Gender Games

   A feminist linguistics professor insisted that the feminine pronoun should always be used when citing comments from a corporate or government source, even when that person has asked for anonymity.
   The problem, as the working journalist in the class noted, was that despite requests to be an anonymous source, using the pronouns "she" and "her" immediately reduces the field of possible suspects when management looks to identify the source.
   The solution is to phrase source comments in the plural, and write the sentence accordingly. It also eliminates the clumsiness of mismatched pronoun/verb construction, such as "everyone ... their" or "every person ... his/her" or using "them" as a singular non-gender pronoun. Go to the plural.
   There is a singular non-gender, or neuter, pronoun available in modern English -- "it" for the nominative and "its" for the possessive. These, however, are generally used in reference to things and animals, not people. There is also a neuter (non-gender) pronoun available for the objective -- "hem." It's still used, except that the beginning "h" was dropped, and an apostrophe was inserted to indicate a letter was dropped.
   Thus, we have phrases like "Go get 'em," which is not a shortened "them" but rather a shortened "hem." The full set of singular pronouns in the objective case comprised "him, her, hem." The initial "h" was also dropped in some British dialects from "his" and "hers." But the "h" was retained in parts of the rural American South for the neuter pronoun "hit."
   Confusing? Perhaps. Consistent? No. Logical? Never. But as noted 'ere earlier, logic don't enter into hit.