ALT TEXT:
- Panel 1: A person with the text “Singular ‘they’” written on them smiling with open arms.
- Panel 2: “Singular ‘They’” beaten up by others who said, “Singular they is ungrammatical. It’s too confusing,” “How can anyone use plural pronouns for singular,” and “Every pronoun should only have one purpose.”
- Panel 3: “You” hiding from the mob who was beating “Singular ‘They’”
- Panel 4: “German ‘Sie’” hiding with even more fear next to “You”
Isn’t “You” always singular? The words it’s accompanied by make the overall statement plural. Like “you guys” or “you all”. My brain might be slow this morning, but I can’t think of any instance where it’s plural without an accompanying word.
Nope, “you” can be 2nd person plural on its own. You can refer to a group of people as just “you”
For example, imagine a security guard saying to a group of shoppers “everybody listen up, you need to leave the store”. You might use “you all” but it’s not grammatically necessary, it just adds specificity.
I find this kinda fascinating because if you’ve thought this your entire life, you would have had to have read every intended plural “you” as singular and there would be nothing to inform you otherwise without very explicit context.
For the record, every 2nd person pronoun in the preceding paragraph can be singular or plural and still be grammatically correct while remaining socially correct for my speaking to an audience of unknown size. “You all” and “you guys” are slang phrases that don’t appear in formal writing.