Stop Dehumanizing People With Your Writing

Paying attention to a simple detail can mean so much

It irritates me. I know they don’t mean it, but when writers do it, it still irritates me to the point that I stop reading when I see it.

I read a lot as a writer and professor, and I see this bad habit all the time. People are continually dehumanizing other people with their words. It’s sheer obliviousness.

What I’m talking about is when I read sentences with phrases like,

“People that…”
“A woman that ….
“Voters that…”

.. and so on and so on.

It’s about the that.

I am not a grammar nazi, but let’s be perfectly clear on an important point. A person is a “who.” A person is not a “that.” This simple choice of words is much more than a question of grammar, though obviously, you should care about grammar; it is an issue of how we think about ourselves and our fellow human beings.

Correct thinking and grammar include writing sentences with words such as:

“Potatoes that…”
“Shirts that…
“Lizards that…”