Kee who has many friends has no friends.

Dear Fellow Earthlings,

This announcement greeted me on the internet on April 5, 2020:

" ' They ' is Merriam-Webster's Word of the Year 2019. "

To quote from the announcement, dated December 9, 2019:

" Our Word of the Year for 2019 is they. It reflects a surprising fact: even a basic term, among the most common in the language -- a personal pronoun -- can rise to the top of our data. Although our lookups are often driven by events in the news, the dictionary is also a primary resource for information about language itself, and the shifting use of they has been the subject of increasing study and commentary in recent years, and especially in the past year. Lookups for they increased by 313% in 2019 over the previous year. This curiosity is remarkable for a venerable old pronoun, but this is a special case -- and a consequence of shifts in the way they

is used. "

I beg to differ -- AND IN THE STRONGEST TERMS!!

The internet is taking over everything from humans: the way we socialize, the way we obtain information (regardless of whether the information is true or not), the way we wage war, the way we bank, the way we date -- and now the way we express ourselves through language !...

I call your attention to my blog of August 29, 2013 (Installment 95). In that blog I explained about the need in English for an epicene pronoun. I then proceeded to list the various forms for this new English morpheme: kee/kerm/kerm/kermself/kerms.

Ever since August 29, 2013 I have used the epicene pronoun forms -- described in Installment 95 -- in my blogs. Carrying the idea forward a bit (albeit a bit facetiously), in Installments 317/318 (October 12/13, 2016), I even went so far as to suggest an epicene pronoun kit/kit/kit/kitself/kits for robots.

In short, rather than silently accepting a jerry rigged "they" forced on us by the "powers that (would) be" on the internet, why not just try the following for yourselves to see just how unwieldy "they" is as a viable epicene pronoun for English:

In Installment 337 (November 7, 2016), one of 7 adages I cited was the Arabic proverb (translated into English):

He who has many friends has no friends.

Applying my "kee" morpheme, I derived:

"Kee who has many friends has no friends." : This works!

Next, applying my "kit" morpheme, I derived:

"Kit who has many friends has no friends." : "Kit who?...that? // "has many friends has no friends??". Is "kit" a "who"? -- Or is it a "that"? Does "kit" govern the third person singular "has"? Or does it govern the third person plural "have"??

Other problems also arise, since AI ventures have not yet produced an entity that is both AI/robot and human... At present, I refrain from making any judgment on the viability of employing the morpheme "kit" to serve as a "linker" between HI (human intelligence) and AI (artificial intelligence).

As for this attempt at forcing the world to swallow "they" as some sort of solution to pollution:

"They who have many friends has no friends," DEFINITELY DOES NOT WORK, for how can an individual be singular and plural at the same time!

"They who has many friends have? friends." NOR DOES THIS WORK! How can a set of individuals be plural and singular at the same time!

Debunked! (Just take a look at today's "catch phrase" -- and then at the four "litmus test" phrases cited here.

Litmus Test 1: (until the advent of "politically correct" suasion): "If someone feels that he is being discriminated against by someone else, rather than taking it upon himself to seek out a lawyer, he can merely tell the person who is bothering him to look at his (that person's) own face in the mirror, try to imagine how he might look to the person whose feelings he has hurt – and to compare that observation to his own reaction to such discrimination in the event that he were the one bearing the brunt of its consequences! Unwieldy? A bit...But it would have worked.

Litmus Test 2: (first attempts to "make English less biased" (circa 1980): "If someone feels that he or she is being discriminated against by someone else, rather than taking it upon himself/herself to seek out a lawyer, he or she/that individual can merely tell the person who is bothering him/her to look at his/her (that person's) own face in the mirror, try to imagine how he/she might look to the person whose feelings he/she has hurt – and to compare that observation to his/her own reaction to such discrimination in the event that he/she were the one bearing the brunt of its consequences!

Unwieldy? A bit...And then there was always the question; Should we say "he or she" -- or should we say "she or he"?

Litmus Test 3: (using "kee" and its declined forms): "If someone feels that kee is being discriminated against by someone else, rather than taking it upon kermself to seek out a lawyer, kee can merely tell the person who is bothering kerm to look at kerm own face in the mirror, try to imagine how kee might look to the person whose feelings kee has hurt – and to compare that observation to kerm own reaction to such discrimination in the event that kee were the one bearing the brunt of its consequences!

Unwieldy? A bit.... But it works! (By the way, today's catch phrase, "Kee who has many friends has no friends." fits into this category.

Litmus Test 4: (using Merriam-Webster's so-called 2019 "Word of the Year:): "If someone feels that they is?are? being discriminated against by someone else, rather than taking it upon themself (SIC) to seek out a lawyer, they can merely tell the person who is bothering them to look at their?his?her? that person's? own face in the mirror, try to imagine how they (?) might look to the person whose feelings they has?have? hurt – and to compare that observation to their own reaction to such discrimination in the event that they were the one?ones? bearing the brunt of its consequences!

Unwieldy? More than unwieldy: It is fustian!

I rest my case.

Steve Walker

Earthsaver and Jingles Creator

© 2013 Steve Walker, The Jingles-The Japan Foundation for English Pronunciation, Summit Enterprises.