I’m not a native speaker, but as far as I understood, for singular objects and animals “it” was used. Why use “they” for individual people then?
In: 1400
**This response doesn’t explain why “they” is the appropriate usage, but it explains why “it” is inappropriate.**
English is a language that sees humans as more worthy of animacy than pretty much everything else. Literally, there are humans, and then the rest of the universe is separate. (English is not, by any means, the only language to do this, as humans have a tendency to place ourselves at the top of the ladder of importance. We will, however, gift this animacy and respect to other living beings that we’ve deemed worthy, such as pets or that which we revere, for one reason or another.) That said, using “it” to describe a tree is perfectly fine, despite its being very much alive and interactive with its environment, but using “it” to describe one’s grandma is seen as absolutely ridiculous and disrespectful. It, honestly, makes very little sense to me, but I gave up trying to make sense of human ego-driven decisions a long time ago.
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