First of all, this thread is like, a month old? Why even bother responding to me at this time?
Anyway, “dude” is rarely gender neutral. Here are the two main definitions on Wikitionary:
- (chiefly US, Canada, colloquial) A man, generally a younger man.
- (colloquial, used in the vocative) A term of address for someone, typically a man, particularly when cautioning them or offering advice.
So yeah, totally a gender neutral word. /sarcastic
And it’s pretty obvious where the dogwhistle is, calling someone with she/her pronouns clearly listed a “dude” in a disparaging tone. Going “oh but it’s a gender neutral term” has the exact same level of insufferable, bad-faith smugness as an edgy 14-year old claiming that the swastikas they’re scrawling on their desk are actually Buddhist symbols.
