> Is this insensitive? No, it's just sticking to patterns

IMHO, that's the cause of most discrimination. People aren't intentionally discriminatory, but not having experienced it themselves they suffer from the blinders of their own perspective (as humans do), are unaware of the consequences of their actions, and are doing the very human thing of downplaying the magnitude of others' problems. As Mel Brooks (IIRC) said, 'Tragedy is I stub my toe; comedy is you get eaten by a lion.'

That's why people talk about being 'woke' or becoming aware of their 'privilege'. They weren't intentionally insensitive before, but they didn't grasp what they hadn't experienced, and then one day the blinders come off.

> the modus operandi of our mind

The modus operendi of our minds can lead to all sorts of horrible things, from murder to war to theft. We can and do use reason in order to do better, including by learning the pattern of not making assumptions.

> it's a natural thing to do

It's natural to follow patterns, but the pattern isn't natural; it's just one arbitrary pattern we learn. We can learn other patterns, which is how we change and grow. Whole societies learn new patterns; democracy and universal human rights didn't exist until the 18th century (roughly speaking); for all of human history until maybe 50 years ago, women were 'naturally' though of as qualified only for raising babies and maybe some nurturing jobs. Now they fly fighter planes off aircraft carriers and are a majority of new lawyers (IT hasn't figured it out yet, apparently).

> It's very tiresome to watch yourself all day

If you think that's tiresome, imagine facing endless discrimination everywhere you go, from family, co-workers, employers, the person on the bus, the movie, the book, the Reddit thread, etc. Imagine facing the prospect of experiencing that for the rest of your life.

Anyway, we don't have to watch ourselves all day. Just learn something new, and pretty simple. I learned some new Vim techniques recently and now I don't have to watch myself all day, I just use them. I learned to say 'they' awhile ago, and it's now second nature - Vim was harder.

The typing isn't hard, the hard part is keeping yourself from making assumptions about who people like to date. There's much more than a "tiny off-chance" that people are queer, at least where I'm from (and probably at Intel HQ too).

"Which of you thinks you are the smartest?"

I used "you" as both singular and plural in that sentence, and no one would blink an eye at it.

"They" is used the same way as "you", as either a singular or plural pronoun depending on the context. This was the case in English for centuries, until some prescriptivist grammarians decided they didn't like it, each for their own reasons.

BTW, do you really think that last sentence would be improved by saying "each for his or her own reasons"?

The modern resurgence of singular "they" is just returning English to what was common and correct usage before the prescriptivists hijacked the language.

https://www.google.com/search?q=singular+they+history

https://stroppyeditor.wordpress.com/2015/04/21/everything-yo...