“There are countries in which ‘king’ is the name of the ruler, and women rulers have thus been styled king.”

is one for which I would be most interested in seeing some evidence. I cannot at once call to mind such a country, but this may be due to my ever-declining faculties.

Well, we *are* speaking English, aren’t we? In English, “king” means a male monarch. Whether there are other words in other languages that mean other things is not especially relevant.

Now instead of being male-centric, you’re being anglo-centric. There are countries in which ‘king’ is the name of the ruler, and women rulers have thus been styled king.
It’s not racist to speak about a time in which racism existed. It is not racist to assume that when one speaks of a slave in the american south, we mean a black person. Even if an act is discriminatory, referencing it is not by default.

Just because it is discriminatory that king is often the highest rank, and usually only able to be filled by a man does not make it sexist to reference ‘king’ when one wants to suggest a total ruler.

At least, she is this everywhere except in Scotland, who never had a Queen Elizabeth the First. Good Queen Bess died in 1603, but the Act of Union between England and Scotland was not passed until 1706 in England and 1707 in Scotland, giving rise to a ludicrous situation where for some months England was united with Scotland but Scotland was not united with England. As late as 2002, the leader of the Scottish Nationalist Party wrote to Her Majesty asking her to adopt the title Elizabeth the First while in Scotland. Her Majesty’s reply is not recorded, because the Queen can do no wrong and what she said was certainly not suitable for a family audience.

And . . . “If there was one gender there would be no such thing as gender neutrality . . . ” – huh?

Duke – Duchess
Marquess – Marchioness
Earl – Countess
Viscount – Viscountess
Baron – Baroness

A mild example of gender inequality is this: if a Duke marries, his wife becomes a Duchess, but if a woman who is a Duchess in her own right marries, her husband does not become a Duke. That is why the present Duke of Edinburgh did not become Prince Philip when he married Princess Elizabeth in 1947 – he had to wait until 1957 when his wife, by now Queen, gave him the title of Prince.

To redress the balance, the children of princes are themselves princes and princesses, while the children of princesses are not (unless their father is also a prince). However, since October 2011 the first-born child of the reigning monarch will become heir apparent to the throne and will become the Sovereign on the death of the present monarch whether he or she is he or she, so to speak.

Huh?

Des, the opposite of queen is earl, and QE2 is king of the United *Kingdom* and is also queen of it, both titles being equal. By contrast Charles would be king only but have just as much power as Elizabeth. The key is that the title is an office held by a person.

I know you intend to be correct here but this is not like “fireman” or “chairman.”

The problem is that the masculine experience is assumed to be the “normal” or “standard”, and then there is the feminine version of normal. Flesh-colored crayons imply that flesh is normally Caucasian, and that there are other versions of that “normal”. In the same way, using masculine versions of words when you mean to use something gender-neutral exposes an underlying assumption that the feminine experience is a different version of normal. If king is gender neutral and queen is feminine, what is the masculine version of the word?

I know that seems like an overreaction to some. If you’ve never been discriminated against, it is easy to say that those that have are over-sensitive.

So if you’re used to sitting in a 65 degree house all day then you get more acclimated to 65 degrees. It doesn’t seem cold cause you’re used to it. But if you set your temp to 72 degrees then you get used to 72 degrees and 68 feels cold.

Really? My wife and I wrap up in a blanket around the house all the time, but it’s by no means freezing. “Wrapping up in a blanket” is akin to “putting on a sweater and sweatpants” – would you only go to such extremes of bundling when you would literally be too cold to type otherwise?