Hey Y'all, Watch Your Mouth

My greeting of choice when confronting groups of mixed sex people is y'all, ya'll or ya'all. I'm not exactly sure which way to spell it best, but there is one thing I am sure of regarding the colloquial greeting - you should think about emulating my greeting style. Prior to living at an ecovillage, I may have used the term "you guys" to refer to pretty much any group of people. However, since living at an ecovillage intentional community, I only say y'all, ya'll or ya'all when referring to a mixed sex group of people. I'm very adamant about my own use of the colloquial greeting. I learned the usage because at the ecovillage I lived at, a number of people looked down on the usage of terms such as "you guys" to refer to a group of people that included women. It made sense to me. It didn't seem like a big deal, but it made sense. So, the question, if it's not a big deal, is why change to the colloquial saying that is typically associated with the South? Because it's not a big deal. It's not hard to change your standard saying from "you guys" to y'all, ya'll or ya'all. Additionally, some people may prefer it. Makes sense to me.

However, I will add that saying y'all, ya'll or ya'all is not always an easy task to train yourself to do, at least for some people. While living at an ecovillage with people who were not fond of non-gender neutral greetings in mixed gender groups, I paid strict attention to my own use of such phrases. As a matter of fact, I became quite efficient in changing my prior behaviors. Armed with the knowledge that such phrases were looked down upon, I approached the ecovillage intentional community with determination. Not only was I going to refrain from utilizing traditional greetings that were only used due to outdated traditions, I would make a point of correcting others. At the community I lived at, there was one particularly bad offender. Ironically, it was a woman. Additionally, she was a member of the community. Every time she said "you guys," which was often, I calmly corrected her. She graciously accepted my correction and tried to improve on her ingrained behavior. After all, I was making the correction for her community, not for myself. Furthermore, community members were typically very receptive to such constructive criticism.

What I gained from the experience of attempting to change someone else's behavior, who seemed to have a much harder time with the change than myself, was an increased ability to change my own patterns of systemically ingrained traditional behavior, which is outdated. Now, I say y'all, ya'll or ya'all and am profoundly aware of how many people in today's society do not. I hear "you guys" everywhere. Everywhere. You'll notice once you begin to pay attention to it. I noticed and it's quite strange. Of course, if you desire to stop saying "you guys" to mixed gender groups of people, then you don't have to say y'all, ya'll or ya'all. There are other ways of circumventing the socialized phrase. You could say "you ones." A popular phrase at the ecovillage was "you Gaians" - as in a reference to the Earth and essentially meaning "you people of the Earth." This phrase is especially useful those who are new to changing their greeting behavior because as you slip up and say "you guys" you can fix yourself mid-phrase and say "you Gaians." So, here's to you Gaians. Think about watching your mouth, y'all, ya'all or ya'all.

LIVIN won't hold it against you if you continue to say "you guys" but it's no longer a part of LIVIN's vocabulary