[Fraggy]

Ive noticed so many posters call their cars "shes". To me, my car is a "he". Hes my little buddy, he kicks ass, he is fast, he is loud, and his suspension is tough.

How can you say all those things about a "girl"

[Year's_End]

...repost...someone explained it awhile back...curvy, sexy, able to get you excited, etc.

[Joonsup]

well maybe b/c he swings from the other side of the plate.














j/k

[Kilgore Trout]

If your car is a she, do you need to put a bra on the front to keep it from sagging?

Also, if you don't know what gender it is, why not just look underneath?

[LI E90]

It stems from boats....... here is the answer

The exact reason why boats are called she in English is lost to history. While explanations abound, most appear to be of the folk variety, assumed or invented after the fact as a way to make sense of the phenomenon. Boats are a truly interesting case in English, as they are among the only inanimate objects that take a gendered pronoun, whereas most others are called it. Countries are also called she, as are cars sometimes, but the latter example is almost certainly an extension from boats.

One plausible theory is that boats are called she because they are traditionally given female names, typically the name of an important woman in the life of the boat's owner, such as his mother. It has also been surmised that all ships were once dedicated to goddesses, and later to important mortal women when belief in goddesses waned. Interestingly, although male captains and sailors historically attributed the spirit of a benevolent female figure to their ships, actual women were considered very bad luck at sea.

A second theory as to why boats are called she points to the existence of grammatical gender in most Indo-European languages besides English. While Modern English has hardly any grammatical gender, limited for the most part to cases of natural gender, such as the nouns "woman" and "man" being called she and he respectively, there is evidence that English once has a more extensive system of grammatical gender, similar to that in languages such as German and French. In most Indo-European languages with grammatical gender, the word for "ship" is feminine. In Old English texts, there is more evidence of grammatical gender, such as a shield being called she.

Because English is an Indo-European language, it is most likely that it once had grammatical gender and lost it, since it would be highly unlikely for all the other Indo-European languages with grammatical gender to have acquired the feature independently rather than inheriting it from a common background. Linguistic historians have postulated that proto-Indo-European, the hypothetical "mother language" to all modern Indo-European languages, originally had two genders: animate and inanimate. The inanimate category later split into feminine and neuter, giving three genders: masculine, feminine, and neuter. As each language evolved, so did its system of grammatical gender, so that it has become different in each modern-day Indo-European language.

Whether the fact that boats are called she is a throwback to an ancient system of grammatical gender that has disappeared from English in all but a few instances or an analogy to the reverence that sailors have for the women in their lives, the phenomena is one of the most interesting anomalies in Modern English. Recently, advocates of gender-neutral or non-sexist language have proposed that ships no longer be called she, but rather it, like any other inanimate object.

[borisivan]

pickle-sniffer

[samwoo2go]

Originally Posted by Fraggy

Ive noticed so many posters call their cars "shes". To me, my car is a "he". Hes my little buddy, he kicks ass, he is fast, he is loud, and his suspension is tough.

How can you say all those things about a "girl"

and you also polish your little buddy's "knob" everyday?

im jp man

[ALPINE6SPD]

Mine is a car and has no gender.

[emarkd]

Originally Posted by ALPINE6SPD

Mine is a car and has no gender.

x2. And I don't name my cars either. But to each his (or her) own...

[ncoig]

Originally Posted by joonsup

well maybe b/c he swings from the other side of the plate.

What does being left-handed have to do with it?

-N














J/K

[Mk23]

Originally Posted by Fraggy

Ive noticed so many posters call their cars "shes". To me, my car is a "he". Hes my little buddy, he kicks ass, he is fast, he is loud, and his suspension is tough.

How can you say all those things about a "girl"

If you are gay then this might work... Otherwise no..

[Davin]

interesting

[Gesler]

Originally Posted by LI E90

It stems from boats....... here is the answer

interesting!

[BMWFM]

My car is a she (no name though). But in my mother tongue (not English), a car is feminine.

FM

[aut0sh0cker]

Originally Posted by Fraggy

Ive noticed so many posters call their cars "shes". To me, my car is a "he". Hes my little buddy, he kicks ass, he is fast, he is loud, and his suspension is tough.

How can you say all those things about a "girl"

Sounds like you tune meat whistles for a living...




























jk

[Fraggy]

You guys are funny LOL, Im not gay, I AM NOT GAY, I NEVER HAVE BEEN GAY!

Oh um, yea, like, I uh, mean, no no silly boys, Im not gay, I liiiiike, girls

Dont you remember, Im the porn guy, I shoot hotties for a living

[Fraggy]

Originally Posted by LI E90

It stems from boats....... here is the answer

The exact reason why boats are called she in English is lost to history. While explanations abound, most appear to be of the folk variety, assumed or invented after the fact as a way to make sense of the phenomenon. Boats are a truly interesting case in English, as they are among the only inanimate objects that take a gendered pronoun, whereas most others are called it. Countries are also called she, as are cars sometimes, but the latter example is almost certainly an extension from boats.

One plausible theory is that boats are called she because they are traditionally given female names, typically the name of an important woman in the life of the boat's owner, such as his mother. It has also been surmised that all ships were once dedicated to goddesses, and later to important mortal women when belief in goddesses waned. Interestingly, although male captains and sailors historically attributed the spirit of a benevolent female figure to their ships, actual women were considered very bad luck at sea.

A second theory as to why boats are called she points to the existence of grammatical gender in most Indo-European languages besides English. While Modern English has hardly any grammatical gender, limited for the most part to cases of natural gender, such as the nouns "woman" and "man" being called she and he respectively, there is evidence that English once has a more extensive system of grammatical gender, similar to that in languages such as German and French. In most Indo-European languages with grammatical gender, the word for "ship" is feminine. In Old English texts, there is more evidence of grammatical gender, such as a shield being called she.

Because English is an Indo-European language, it is most likely that it once had grammatical gender and lost it, since it would be highly unlikely for all the other Indo-European languages with grammatical gender to have acquired the feature independently rather than inheriting it from a common background. Linguistic historians have postulated that proto-Indo-European, the hypothetical "mother language" to all modern Indo-European languages, originally had two genders: animate and inanimate. The inanimate category later split into feminine and neuter, giving three genders: masculine, feminine, and neuter. As each language evolved, so did its system of grammatical gender, so that it has become different in each modern-day Indo-European language.

Whether the fact that boats are called she is a throwback to an ancient system of grammatical gender that has disappeared from English in all but a few instances or an analogy to the reverence that sailors have for the women in their lives, the phenomena is one of the most interesting anomalies in Modern English. Recently, advocates of gender-neutral or non-sexist language have proposed that ships no longer be called she, but rather it, like any other inanimate object.

Thanks for the reply, I sure hope you copied and pasted that from somewhere

[kevinbahnz]

I prefer riding on top of girls or under.

[Arustik1]

Originally Posted by kevinbahnz

I prefer riding on top of girls or under.

Wait what? Choose one!

[Kilgore Trout]

Originally Posted by Fraggy

You guys are funny LOL, Im not gay, I AM NOT GAY, I NEVER HAVE BEEN GAY! Oh um, yea, like, I uh, mean, no no silly boys, Im not gay, I liiiiike, girls

Dont you remember, Im the porn guy, I shoot hotties for a living

Methinds he doth protest too much.

[kevinbahnz]

Originally Posted by Arustik1

Wait what? Choose one!

i forgot another, inside....

[MontegoblueE92]

Originally Posted by kevinbahnz

i forgot another, inside....

That's what you do with your car. You get inside and ride the shit out of her. Then you buy her nice things.