Reply to the original post, "When you use the word "womyn", you insult women."
Etymology lesson!
Once upon a time (back in the days of Old English) male humans were called weremen and female humans were called wifmen. Wereman meant “man” (this is still seen today in words like “werewolf”, which of course means “wolf man”) and wifman meant “wife of man”. The -man suffix…
My friend recently shared this post with me. I’d respectfully push against this absolute denial—since the shift from “wifman” to “woman” (or “wimmen” pl., “wummon” sg.) only began to appear circa twelfth century, the Anglo-Saxon neuteur “wif” would have still have been a noun marker for women, generally, rather than for our common understanding of “wife” (as in marriage). True, “man” refers to “one” or a person, but in the context of the word’s evolution, the marker “wif” doesn’t indicate subordination in itself. Interesting food for thought, though, and how ready we are to jump the gun on these issues.
Source: rcphoenix
