Comment on It bothers me when cat memes refer to the pictured cat as "he," but I can tell from its coat pattern that it's female. I may know too much about cats.

• ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

  I’m wondering what ratio of “gendered” languages uses the feminine genus for cats as opposed to dogs, as in “die Katze/der Hund”.

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  • Godric@lemmy.world ⁨22⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    Exactly! Is cats are girls and dogs are boys just a Germanic thing, or is it deeper?

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    • ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.org ⁨21⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      I’m Czech and it’s “ta kočka ♀/ten pes ♂” too.

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  • leftzero@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨21⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

    Many romance languages have both; for instance, in Catalan “gos” / “gossa”, “gat” / “gata”, in Spanish, “perro” / “perra”, “gato” / “gata”, or in French “chien” / “chienne”, “chat” / “chatte”.

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    • ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.org ⁨21⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

      See my other comment, the one with the emoji: yes, words like “tomcat” and “bitch” exist, but which is used for the species?

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      • leftzero@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨20⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

        In general the default for cats and dogs is the male form, though it can be ambiguous between male and don’t know / don’t care.

        For instance if you saw a random unidentified cat you could say you saw “un gat / gato / chat”, and it would be impossible to tell whether you were referring to a male cat or a cat of unknown gender (while if you used the female form it’d be unambiguous).

        Romance languages really could use a neutral form, but “gat@”, “gat*”, or “gatx” just don’t work when you try to figure out how to say them out loud.

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