Quote Originally Posted by 5crownik007 View Post
But it's convenient to call a group of people "dudes" or "guys". On a certain technical and tangential level, calling a group of people "men" is gender neutral, but I doubt people will know why. It's culturally understood that a group of people can be called by these words, regardless of gender, so why is it an issue? It's only mean if someone's trying to be mean.

Sexism isn't about being "mean", most of the time. It is about treating women as an afterthought, as objects, even. You would not be mean to an object, either.

And if I am part of a group that consists of both women and men (even if there's only a single man in there) and you call this group "guys" then I will not know whether you view "guy" as neutral term, or if you simply chose to ignore my existence and feelings.

Calling a woman "hey guy" is okay, because then it is obvious you mean to use it as neutral.

Calling groups of people "men" will not be offensive if, and only if, you commonly refer to the two sexes as "wifmen and weremen". (If you are eccentric enough to do so, congrats, you get to call a group of people with me in it "men")