A Spanish teacherwas explaining to her classthat in Spanish, unlike English,nouns are designated as eithermasculine or feminine.'House'for instance,is feminine:'la casa.''Pencil,'however,is masculine:'el lapiz.'A student asked,'What gender is 'computer'?'Instead of giving the answer,the teacher split the class into two groups,male and female,and asked them to decidefor themselves whether'computer'should bea masculine or a feminine noun. Each group was askedto give four reasonsfor its recommendation.
The men's group decided that'computer'should definitely beof the feminine gender('la computadora'),because:
1. No one but their creatorunderstands their internal logic;
2. The native languagethey use to communicatewith other computers isincomprehensible to everyone else;
3. Even the smallest mistakesare stored in long term memoryfor possible later retrieval; and
4. As soon as you makea commitment to one,you find yourself spendinghalf your paycheckon accessories for it.
( THIS GETS BETTER!)
The women's group,however, concludedthat computers should be Masculine('el Computador'), because:
1. In order to do anythingwith them,you have to turn them on;
2. They have a lot of databut still can't think for themselves;
3 They are supposedto help you solve problems,but half the timethey ARE the problem; and
4. As soon as you commit to one,you realize that if youhad waited a little longer,you could have gottena better model.
The women won
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