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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!cbdkc1!desoto!packard!hoxna!houxm!whuxlm!akgua!sdcsvax!sdcrdcf!barryg
From: barryg@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Lee Gold)
Newsgroups: net.women,net.singles,net.nlang
Subject: Re: Word for SO,lover
Message-ID: <1744@sdcrdcf.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 9-Feb-85 06:45:11 EST
Article-I.D.: sdcrdcf.1744
Posted: Sat Feb  9 06:45:11 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 10-Feb-85 06:28:46 EST
References: <213@ttidcc.UUCP>
Reply-To: barryg@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Lee Gold)
Organization: System Development Corp. R+D, Santa Monica
Lines: 17
Xref: watmath net.women:4426 net.singles:5823 net.nlang:2559
Summary: 

The original poster on this didn't like the term other and suggested using
hubstitute or wifstitute to specify gender.  (And just when some of us were
figuring out we could get a gender-neutral honorific suitable for Unix
by M*.)

Back in the Dark Ages when I took Psych, "significant other" meant someone
who occupied a quasi-parental role (e.g. a grandparent, uncle, aunt, teacher).
I'm not yet comfortable yet using it in an erotic context.

On the other hand, our crowd does call commensal bedmates (i.e. sex partners
with whom one shares living quarters) by a variant of the Census term.
The 1980 Census referred to such people as "Person of the Opposite Sex
Sharing Same Living Quarters" (pronounced POSSSL-CUE).  In order not to
discriminate against gays, we say "PASSL-CUE" (with an implied substitution
of "attractive" for "opposite").

--Lee Gold