*Her
For example, the sentence, "Pat has a flower. Their flower smells good, " doesn't sound right because "their" is plural. "Pat has a flower. Its flower smells good, " doesn't sound right either because "its" is reserved for things and not people.
Also, the dictionary isn't a good source for grammar. It contains definitions of words, proper or not, like "ain't" and "irregardless."
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/irregardless?utm_...
Even if it did, I suspect either the US or the UK would reject the country that wrote it.
>They with a singular antecedent has remained in common use for centuries in spite of its proscription by traditional grammarians.
I was being a traditional grammarian. "John has a flower. Their flower smells good," sounds as incorrect to me as, "John ain't got no flowers." For me, the more important the point I'm trying to make the more grammatically correct I try to be.
Of course the spoken word is completely different. I think a message can get a lot of additional value misusing the language.
Maybe I should just realize, "ain't nobody got time for that."
But try it with "Someone has a flower. Their flower smells good." Sounds right to me.
There's no need to replace one with the other everywhere. For example, why would you use "ain't" if you are trying to sound formal and a suitable alternative exists? Just say "No one has time for that."
I think it is a strawman argument to equate "there is an alternative word that can be used" (like they or ain't) with "one must use the alternative exclusively" (see how "one" was chosen over "they" in that sentence?)
Of course, my quote is starting a sentence with a preposition, which is also poor form.
>Because he is no longer accepted as a generic pronoun referring to a person of either sex, it has become common in speech and in informal writing to substitute the third-person plural pronouns they, them, their, and themselves, and the nonstandard singular themself.