Eli5: Why do you use “they” for non-gendered speech instead of “it”?

Question

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

Answer 1

Because they has been used as a genderless third person singular for hundreds of years.

“It” isn’t genderless, it’s gender is “neuter”. “They” is actually genderless, both for singular and plural use.