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[SealyStar]

Most people think math is "masculine" subconsciously because sexism. "Vector" is grammatically masculine in pretty much every language with grammatical gender that it appears in, including the source Latin. From a sound standpoint, it has a "tough"-sounding voiced fricative and two plosives in a row, which is like a phonological face punch, and it's only two syllables, and terseness is often associated with toughness and therefore masculinity.

There. I came up with four or five reasons why "Vector" might come across as masculine in two minutes.

Yep. All of that, and it's also one letter away from the masculine first name/concept "Victor."

o_O
I asked my parents about this because totally confused [the orange part]. Semantics...ideologies...association with action...They didn't get it either, and they're 60+. xD

Also, [mahth]...right? It sounds more...err, fluffy, than rough. Must be the 'ah' feeling like a carpet.
... Fun with translating images to words.

Sexism is weird.

I mean that people think of math itself, not the word math, as masculine. I understand the confusion because most of my discussion was about the sound of words.

There's an ongoing harmful stereotype that women are bad at math, coupled with the consequent reality that there aren't a lot of women in math-related fields, and math is "nerdy", and people also think of nerds as mostly guys, so the whole idea of math is considered a male pursuit.

Didn't you have the other name before this one?

No. Well, yes. And no. I derived the other name from yet another one which I started using at roughly the same time as this one, but in connection with this one. And then there's another one which is just a cool-sounding Spanish word with an arbitrary meaning. And another one which I deliberately picked to be mysterious. I have a number of usernames for different sites.

And, for the record, both names are screen names, not real names. That should be clear from the context, but it doesn't hurt to set it straight.

Ignore me, I thought you used to be this guy.

Yeah, I get that a lot. It's just the peril of using a seal for an avatar. I had never even heard of him when I joined this forum - I remember all the "Oh hey I thought you were Barbarossa"s I got.

[BFEL]

last I checked firearms don't have genders or sexes.

B-but....they all have long pointy bits...

NIPPLES ARE LONG AND POINTY!

[Tiruin]

Most people think math is "masculine" subconsciously because sexism. "Vector" is grammatically masculine in pretty much every language with grammatical gender that it appears in, including the source Latin. From a sound standpoint, it has a "tough"-sounding voiced fricative and two plosives in a row, which is like a phonological face punch, and it's only two syllables, and terseness is often associated with toughness and therefore masculinity.

There. I came up with four or five reasons why "Vector" might come across as masculine in two minutes.

Yep. All of that, and it's also one letter away from the masculine first name/concept "Victor."

o_O
I asked my parents about this because totally confused [the orange part]. Semantics...ideologies...association with action...They didn't get it either, and they're 60+. xD

Also, [mahth]...right? It sounds more...err, fluffy, than rough. Must be the 'ah' feeling like a carpet.
... Fun with translating images to words.

Sexism is weird.

I mean that people think of math itself, not the word math, as masculine. I understand the confusion because most of my discussion was about the sound of words.

There's an ongoing harmful stereotype that women are bad at math, coupled with the consequent reality that there aren't a lot of women in math-related fields, and math is "nerdy", and people also think of nerds as mostly guys, so the whole idea of math is considered a male pursuit.

o_o
...Not here they don't, and by that I meant as a reply to all of the above. But I get your point.
There's a lot of women in math-related fields here

[SealyStar]

Most people think math is "masculine" subconsciously because sexism. "Vector" is grammatically masculine in pretty much every language with grammatical gender that it appears in, including the source Latin. From a sound standpoint, it has a "tough"-sounding voiced fricative and two plosives in a row, which is like a phonological face punch, and it's only two syllables, and terseness is often associated with toughness and therefore masculinity.

There. I came up with four or five reasons why "Vector" might come across as masculine in two minutes.

Yep. All of that, and it's also one letter away from the masculine first name/concept "Victor."

o_O
I asked my parents about this because totally confused [the orange part]. Semantics...ideologies...association with action...They didn't get it either, and they're 60+. xD

Also, [mahth]...right? It sounds more...err, fluffy, than rough. Must be the 'ah' feeling like a carpet.
... Fun with translating images to words.

Sexism is weird.

I mean that people think of math itself, not the word math, as masculine. I understand the confusion because most of my discussion was about the sound of words.

There's an ongoing harmful stereotype that women are bad at math, coupled with the consequent reality that there aren't a lot of women in math-related fields, and math is "nerdy", and people also think of nerds as mostly guys, so the whole idea of math is considered a male pursuit.

o_o
...Not here they don't, and by that I meant as a reply to all of the above. But I get your point.
There's a lot of women in math-related fields here

Here as in where you live or on these forums?

'Cause on these forums pretty much everyone is in a math-related field (or studying to take up one), so consequently a lot of the women are too.

[RedKing]

last I checked firearms don't have genders or sexes.

B-but....they all have long pointy bits...

NIPPLES ARE LONG AND POINTY!

MEN HAVE NIPPLES TOO!

[Vector]

.

[GiglameshDespair]

<snippy snippy>
Age is just a number. What matters is what you do with it ;3

It's also a fairly reliable gauge of your general physical and mental faculties.

Ahaha. Ahaha....

Not really. If that were true, I likely wouldn't be able to write using proper English like I do, because I'm 15, and most American 15-year olds can't. And I'll tell you what, it bothers the crap out of me that they can't.
So yeah. No assumptions about people based on age. Especially not on here, where I can see. It's bad, mkay.

Ok. I challenge you to find a three-month-year old with the mental and physical development of a average 21-year-old.
Or a three year old.
Or a thirteen year old.

With human nature there's always outliers, but it does indeed function as a gauge of development.

[The Darkling Wolf]

last I checked firearms don't have genders or sexes.

B-but....they all have long pointy bits...

NIPPLES ARE LONG AND POINTY!

MEN HAVE NIPPLES TOO!

NOT ALL MEN!!

SOME OF US HAVE EXTRAS TO MAKE UP THE NUMBERS!!

AND WHY ARE WE YELLING!? ;-;

[Descan]

Most people think math is "masculine" subconsciously because sexism. "Vector" is grammatically masculine in pretty much every language with grammatical gender that it appears in, including the source Latin. From a sound standpoint, it has a "tough"-sounding voiced fricative and two plosives in a row, which is like a phonological face punch, and it's only two syllables, and terseness is often associated with toughness and therefore masculinity.

There. I came up with four or five reasons why "Vector" might come across as masculine in two minutes.

Yep. All of that, and it's also one letter away from the masculine first name/concept "Victor."

o_O
I asked my parents about this because totally confused [the orange part]. Semantics...ideologies...association with action...They didn't get it either, and they're 60+. xD

Also, [mahth]...right? It sounds more...err, fluffy, than rough. Must be the 'ah' feeling like a carpet.
... Fun with translating images to words.

Sexism is weird.

I mean that people think of math itself, not the word math, as masculine. I understand the confusion because most of my discussion was about the sound of words.

There's an ongoing harmful stereotype that women are bad at math, coupled with the consequent reality that there aren't a lot of women in math-related fields, and math is "nerdy", and people also think of nerds as mostly guys, so the whole idea of math is considered a male pursuit.

o_o
...Not here they don't, and by that I meant as a reply to all of the above. But I get your point.
There's a lot of women in math-related fields here

Which just shows that sexism is cultural and not intrinsic to the species. :V

Er, that is, sexist stereotypes. It's possible that the sexism-thing *is* intrinsic to the species, a loooot of cultures have it.


Edit: Me and my "dude-bro wot I cuddle with" (i seriously don't know guiz) both have a secondary pair of nipples underneath our pecs. That is, undeveloped nipples. They're more like... dark dents than actual nipples. And on me they're more like a smudge than a dent. But anyway, more than 2 nipples.

[Gunner-Chan]

<snippy snippy>
Age is just a number. What matters is what you do with it ;3

It's also a fairly reliable gauge of your general physical and mental faculties.

Ahaha. Ahaha....

Not really. If that were true, I likely wouldn't be able to write using proper English like I do, because I'm 15, and most American 15-year olds can't. And I'll tell you what, it bothers the crap out of me that they can't.
So yeah. No assumptions about people based on age. Especially not on here, where I can see. It's bad, mkay.

Ok. I challenge you to find a three-month-year old with the mental and physical development of a average 21-year-old.
Or a three year old.
Or a thirteen year old.

With human nature there's always outliers, but it does indeed function as a gauge of development.

.... There's also the fact that being 15 and being able to write and use proper English isn't anything special. It's how things SHOULD be. You shouldn't be comparing yourself to people far below acceptable standards.

[Kadzar]

I just want to remark on how thankful I am I have an overhead fan in my room this summer.

I now return you to your regularly scheduled nipple/teenage literacy discussions.

[Karkov]

It's better to compare yourself to your mental and physical equals or betters, so that you have something to compete with at all times, otherwise you sort of become stagnant and complacent with yourself.  Aim for the top, not better than the bottom.

Also, a happy I've been meaning to post all day, my jacket that I wear constantly got washed yesterday and basically smells blissful.  I can't stop smelling the damned sleeve why is this so good?

EDIT: I just realized this sounds immensely... I'm not quite sure of the word... Hostile?  I mean, yeah, be happy with yourself, definitely, you have to be happy with yourself.  Just don't stop getting better.  I think that's what I was trying to say.  I swear the jacket's throwing off my proper wordage or something.  stop smelling so good you wonderful bastard

[RedKing]

last I checked firearms don't have genders or sexes.

B-but....they all have long pointy bits...

I think you're thinking about the screws that keep them together.

So guns are like marriages? 

[hops]

I associate Vector with Vactor, the guy who host Urist McStation, and Vactor is a dude.

[IronTomato]

<snippy snippy>
Age is just a number. What matters is what you do with it ;3

It's also a fairly reliable gauge of your general physical and mental faculties.

Ahaha. Ahaha....

Not really. If that were true, I likely wouldn't be able to write using proper English like I do, because I'm 15, and most American 15-year olds can't. And I'll tell you what, it bothers the crap out of me that they can't.
So yeah. No assumptions about people based on age. Especially not on here, where I can see. It's bad, mkay.

Ok. I challenge you to find a three-month-year old with the mental and physical development of a average 21-year-old.
Or a three year old.
Or a thirteen year old.

With human nature there's always outliers, but it does indeed function as a gauge of development.

.... There's also the fact that being 15 and being able to write and use proper English isn't anything special. It's how things SHOULD be. You shouldn't be comparing yourself to people far below acceptable standards.

Aaagh! That's not what I'm trying to say. I'm not trying to say infants can be smarter than adults. I was simply trying to say that it varies way too much for that to be a reliable statement.

And Janet, I wasn't trying to say I was special. I wasn't trying to say I was special. In fact, I thought I clearly said the opposite. Most of the people I know who are my age appear below average, which is why I said it bothers the crap out of me. I was showing my own observations about how much mental development can vary.

I'm not trying to be rude, I've just run out of patience today.