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
For objects, yes, it is ‘it’. ‘It’ shouldn’t really be used for animals. If they’re unclear people sometimes say ‘it’, but it should really be he or she also, as they’re also he or she. And when plural, we use ‘they’. Look at them sheep over there? Where are the sheep? They’re over there. It’s just the weird plural nature of ‘they’ in English versus how it can be plural and singular in other languages (or non-gendered entirely).
For ‘it’, you would be referring to an object. And calling a person an ‘it’ would obviously be offensive. But it should be ‘they’ for other animals also and ‘he’ or ‘she’ for singular animals. This is done most commonly when someone is familiar with the animal. Where’s my dog? She’s over there. So it shows a lack of familiarity (and respect) when using ‘it’ for an animal (including humans).
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