'Her biggest pet peeve was when people used "they"': Student complies to teacher's grammatical demands

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Brad Dickson • Managing Editor
Oct 22, 2023 12:00 PM EDT

Good teachers are sticklers about things, and the ones you learn the most from are the ones who are insistent upon correctness to an absurd level. That said, every teacher isn't always going to be correct about everything and may wind up insisting on something that is wildly incorrect—like that time when your 6th-grade teacher told you that you couldn't start a sentence with a conjunction. But, further down the line, you later probably came to find that that wasn't really true or a grammatical rule at all.

This teacher wasn't a fan of the word "they" and really hated it when students would overuse the word in their essays. So, this employee decided to maliciously comply with their demand to use it less and never use "they" in their paper again. This paper goes on to take a weird turn, which may or may not have resulted in its removal from the Reddit sub where it was originally shared. Read on and see the story below.

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    via Unseen Studio
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    Font - Posted by u/Lowkey_Sus_Ngl 5 hours ago Teacher hates it when people put the word "they" in writing, so I didn't use it at all. S OC I have this teacher, let's call her Ms. Stinkyba, that is a huge hypocrite. She's my English teacher, and for 30 years the entire school has hated her. Because of the horrible hiring turnover rate, the school refuses to fire her. Everything she tells you to do in an essay, even if you change it verbatim, she counts off for it. Earlier this year, on the first
    via u/Lowkey_Sus_Ngl
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    Font - Ms. Stinkybot gave my friend a 10 on his essay. She gave another friend of mine a -15 in an assignment, but she decided to be kind and add an extra 10 points to make it -5 instead [I got a 23 on that assignment]. Needless to say, everyone is failing. At the beginning of the year, Ms. StinkybO told us one of her biggest pet peeve was when people used "they" in writing. She said it was illogical, and grammatically incorrect, and that we should be using he/she instead. She told us she would
    via u/Lowkey_Sus_Ngl
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    Font - Needless to say, I've complied. In every single essay I've written, I've never used the word they, even when referring to a group of people. Ex, there is a group of 6 people I'm writing about: She and he and he and he and she and he did not like the fact that her and his and his and his and her and his club was shut down by the principals.
    via u/Lowkey_Sus_Ngl
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    Font - insane. Needless to say, this drove her fi She started to hate me so much. She pulled me aside a few times to talk about it, but every time I told her I was doing exactly what she asked and I wouldn't want to go back on her word. Besides, what I was doing was grammatically correct, right? Turns out she had a heart attack a few days ago when grading some essays. On one hand, that's horrible, but on the other hand, she's still been sending out assignments, so she's fine enough for me to sec
    via u/Lowkey_Sus_Ngl
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    Font - Indication_Easy 4 hr. ago Time to write a get well card with a gift and write, "i spoke to the rest of the class and he and she and she an he... all wanted to do something nice to help cheer you up in recovery!" Vote Reply Share hovering_vulture. 1 hr. ago Plus, referring to each and every person's gendered pronoun is a great way to hit the minimum word count requirement in the next essay! Vote Reply Share
    via u/Lowkey_Sus_Ngl
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    Font - Evil Creamsicle 4 hr. ago Also, I don't know if this was intentional, but in this post you also didn't use the word "they" except when referring directly to "the word 'they"". So, props. Vote Reply Share uwillnotgotospace 4 hr. ago OP had a lot of practice. Vote . ●●● Reply Share ●●●
    via u/Lowkey_Sus_Ngl
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    Font - RegularHistorical315 3 hr. ago Where I live it is the teacher who gets in trouble when "everyone is failing." Vote Reply Share Lowkey_Sus_Ngl OP - 3 hr. ago The office "reprimanded" her [aka just gave her a slap on the wrist], but they really can't do anything because we're already so short on teachers. This freshman biology teacher [who we'll call Ms. Ogre] refuses to teach evolution when the unit comes up, and her entire class failed the state test the year before I got to high school b
    via u/Lowkey_Sus_Ngl
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    Font - Some-Resist-5813 4 hr. ago But using they/them/their is not illogical or grammatically incorrect. Not only is her pet peeve annoying, it's also just wrong. Vote Reply Share ...
    via u/Lowkey_Sus_Ngl
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    Font - HockeyFan_323 hr. ago 2 people hate you. They are not nice people. Things get better. Now only one person hates you. He or she is not a nice person. Go biblical on the next assignment. Use "thou" and "thee" Vote Reply Share Lowkey_Sus_Ngl OP - 3 hr. ago I'll go full Shakespearean on her ao Vote Reply Share
    via u/Lowkey_Sus_Ngl

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