I was raised to address strangers and those I wish to show social deference to as “Sir” or “Ma’am”. It’s a difficult habit to break, as it is deeply engrained.
What is an equivalent gender neutral honorific that is relatively common in English? If I can’t break the habit I’d rather have a substitute word to use instead of an awkward pause in the middle of addressing someone
I’d just use Google to ask but I’d rather ask the people directly rather than an AI generated answer based off of Reddit threads
ETA: I suppose if Yessir and Yes’m work, Yesn’t could too? Mostly joking… but maybe… 🤔
Just say Y’all, it pretty much covers that
Fucker!
S’mr’amr
RoboCop “citizen”
I prefer “fellow human” spoken in a slightly suspicious manner.
I like referring to all as boss or chief.
Not champ
What about Sport?
I love this question and the discourse it’s spawned!
personally I’ll use “friend” if I’m at all acquainted with the other person or bend over backwards to not use one if I’m not. not too hard to leave it out if you try, and like anything becomes second nature pretty quick.
that being said I do use “chef” a lot, especially the phrase “heard, chef!” and I haven’t worked in a kitchen in almost a decade lol
I can’t hear friend without thinking. im not your friend …
I’ve asked people to call me ‘it’. Hasn’t happened yet.
Yesn’t, I can do that
I think devils panties had a comic around this topic. can’t remember if she had anything in the notes with an answer.
Comrade
Chief is the only correct answer.
I often call people chief. One time I started to say Yessir, realized midway the person I was taking to might not appreciate the label, tried to change lanes and say Yeah, Chief, and wound up saying Yes Chef.
We had a really good conversation about The Bear TV series afterwards
I mean chef literally means chief
In Dragon Age, Serah and Messere and the gender neutral terms, which i alway thought went nicely with "Ladies & Gentlemen, Serahs & Messeres!” However Serah is for those equal or lower in status and Messere is higher status. Choose wisely.
Personally, I like “Sir” as in the Star Trek/Orville usage. It did happy things to my brain when the crew on the Orville referred to Commander Kelly Grayson (a cis woman) as “Sir”, respectfully referring to her by her proper title as a commanding officer. That was cool. I like the gender neutral “Sir” a lot.
But for casual usage, “Friend” or “Neighbor” is nice. “Hey, neighbor, you dropped this.” “Excuse me, friend, lemme reach around you here.”
Yeah I think “sir” trumps madam because it’s professional
I also like this interpretation. It’s the same gender neutral connotation as the Cali surfer “dude” or “bro” used equally with everyone.
Similar to “boi”
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Some of my friends use “yes them” jokingly to replace yes sir/yes ma’am. Certainly not correct in any grammatical way, but it does flow well enough and is kindof funny as long as the person being addressed doesnt mind.
