Was it necessary to put female in the title?
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potsy
Rambler
- Location
- My Armchair
None.
potsy
Rambler
- Location
- My Armchair
I think you're reading too much into it TMN, but if you want it changing then I have no problem with that 
marknotgeorge
Hol den Vorschlaghammer!
- Location
- Derby.
I'm uncomfortable with this.
deptfordmarmoset
Full time tea drinker
- Location
- Armonmy Way
I can't speak for M not G but let's not get distracted from a needless death. I can't speak for Potsy either but I'd guess he'd wish he'd not mentioned gender in the OP. RIP to whoever the person was.
marknotgeorge
Hol den Vorschlaghammer!
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- Derby.
This is a little hard to explain, mainly because I'm socially anxious and have a great fear of being disapproved of. Most of the time I'd probably not say anything. So speaking as someone who picks his words very carefully, and whose backspace key is the one most likely to wear out first, another lexical hoop like 'unthinking sexism' is most unwelcome. The word 'female' in the thread title reads to me like a description, as innocuous as 'black hair', 'wearing lycra' or 'riding a mountain bike'. The fact that if it weren't there and I'd read that a cyclist was killed in Manchester might initially conjure up an image of a bloke in lycra pedalling away on a road bike in no way means female cyclists are in any way less valuable or important or worthy.
Rob3rt
Man or Moose!
- Location
- Manchester
OMG Potsy is a sexist, hung drawn and quartered, what a scummer!
marknotgeorge
Hol den Vorschlaghammer!
- Location
- Derby.
No. The inferred ism simply doesn't exist.
I assume what you mean to say there is "I'm not sexist". I must bring you the unwelcome news that it doesn't work like that: your communications are judged on their effects, not on the purity of your heart.
marknotgeorge
Hol den Vorschlaghammer!
- Location
- Derby.
I didn't say that, and well you know it.
An interesting point. You're saying that the preconceptions we have about the word 'cyclist' are causing us to make assumptions about what happened that may not be supported by the facts known to us, and that we might have quite a different mental picture of events if that word had been left out of the title.
I don't think this is anything to do with whether offence has been caused. See above
Steve Malkin
Veteran
- Location
- Cheshire
No, I'm saying that having read the story and looked at the photos it seems to me that the fact she was a cyclist may have had no bearing on the incident.
I don't believe that the description of the cyclist as 'female' in the thread title led me to have any preconceptions about the nature of the incident before reading the story.
Spinney
Bimbleur extraordinaire
- Location
- Back up north
I don't find the thread title offensive, but I do think that including the word 'female' in it was un-necessary. As TMN says, it implies that the default gender for cyclists is male. And that there is possibly something different about an accident when a female is involved.
The OP most likely didn't mean any of this, but this unwitting, insidious use of language contributes to the continuing gender inequalities in our society.
The OP most likely didn't mean any of this, but this unwitting, insidious use of language contributes to the continuing gender inequalities in our society.
I can't see inside your head but I'm happy to take you at your word. However, the thing about unconscious biases is that anyone who did have preconceptions about the nature of the incident (whether due to the word 'female', the word 'cyclist' or even the word 'Manchester') would doubtless be unaware of them anyway.
Steve Malkin
Veteran
- Location
- Cheshire
RIP.
The thread derailing and nit-picking on this thread is vomit inducing and pety, having said that free world and all.
You're right, getting embroiled in a sexism debate on a thread of this nature is very insensitive - sorry
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