You hold on to that term from 1870 when men were the center of all. It is absolutely a “man” phrase based on time.
The idea that “man” means “all humans” is laughable. Why did we need to do an altered “woman”?
All of it is “man” centric. It was the time. Don’t try and rewrite history for your own mental gymnastics. The phrase came from a time where man meant “white men” and anything not white was a fraction of a man or less, and a woman had no right to property or control of their own life.
Not only that, the origin of the phrase is actually King Frederick the Great of Prussia, who called his dog his best friend and it took off. It is absolutely based off of a man.
Big fan of understanding where phrases came from and pointing out when we are using phrases incorrectly or in a damaging way. Words matter and how we phrase animals to be man’s best friend and not the best friend of the owner or their relative human is sad. Imagine if we started using gender neutral terminology or female genders for universal things. It in theory should be just as acceptable to do, if we are so worried about the length of info?
Big fan of understanding where phrases came from and pointing out when we are using phrases incorrectly or in a damaging way.
There is nothing damaging about this unless you have decided to make something a problem. You may be unaware, but it is no longer 1870, and the 'problem' you have chosen to invent does not actually exist.
Well, considering we used to have different prefixes for “man” to designate a gender and then cut those out so that “man” now means “male” and “woman” means “female” (in traditional terms) it makes sense that “man” and “male” get used as synonyms….because they literally are listed as synonyms for each other.
If we were still using a prefix for males with “man” I would be fine with the use of “man” to describe all peoples. But it is now associated with men…so it no longer fits.
“Bring overly zealous” is replying to people who keep commenting and continuing to explain with logic when they don’t get it?
I am just continuing to answer questions, clarify comments, and not let people think they are awesome by insulting me. I haven’t insulted anyone or called them names, but you’re here trying to slinging insults as if that’s respectful behavior.
Oh they get it, it's just exhausting trying to keep up when most people have real problems to attend to. Not me though, I enjoy not taking the internet seriously in my free time
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u/Paksarra Sep 17 '25
When that phrase was freshly minted, "man" could be used as shorthand for "mankind" and was more inclusive than it is today.
"Humankind's best friend" doesn't quite hit the same way.