transcript

Screenshot of a tweet by @feralhousepuppy: hey so you’ve been calling me “bro”, “man”, and “dude” a lot and it’s really invalidating to my masculinity cause those are all gender neutral things you call trans women :/

    • 𝙈𝙞𝙖@quokk.au
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      2 days ago

      Nah, mate is as gendered as dude. Like sure some woman won’t mind, but it’s mostly men being called mate by other men.

      No straight man is going to be like “I had sex with my mate” when talking about say a fwb.

      • Ginny [they/she]@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        5 hours ago

        Nah, mate is as gendered as dude. Like sure some woman won’t mind, but it’s mostly men being called mate by other men.

        Well, yes and no, depending on where you’re from.

        Where I’m from, I’d say mate meaning “a person who is my friend” as opposed to mate meaning “greeting to a random person” are used a bit differently. I think it’s normal for anyone of any gender to refer to someone else of any gender as one of their mates. I would say it’s not uncommon (though less common, for sure) for women to greet other women. But men and women generally refer to someone of the opposite gender as love (and of course this is looked down upon in other parts of the country (other terms of endearment are available, but love is the most common, at least when I lived there)).

        I’d agree that no straight man would be likely say “I had sex with my mate”, but I don’t think they’d be much more likely to say “I had sex with my friend”, either, unless they ended the sentence “… with benefits”.

      • alapakala@quokk.au
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        1 day ago

        been using “m8” for too long, that I don’t think I’m call’em “benefits.” @That point: “tis my partner[s]” or “oh em? that’s ma spotter/coach.”

    • mobyduck648@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Mate doesn’t pluralise well though, ‘I’m going out with my mates’ is fine but ‘hi mates’ sounds wrong. Also a lot of it is in the delivery, calling someone ‘mate’ can be anything from friendly to neutral to hostile depending on the tone and the words which precede it.

      • Enkrod@feddit.org
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        2 days ago

        Of course “Hi mates!” feels wrong, it needs to be either “g’day mates” or “ahoy mateys” or “oy mates”…

        Sorry.

        Btw. you have the same “problem” (imho, feature) of tone determining level of friendliness with dude, dude. And partly even with bro, though bro feels harder to turn unfriendly when adressing someone.

        For me, “Hi mates” or “oy mates” sounds completely okay, but I’m a non-native speaker.