

Whitey, evidenced since at least the 1830s, has been used by black Americans to disparage white people, especially implying oppression and racial discrimination. By at the early 2000s online, whitey was spelled phonetically at yt.īlack slang has a history of alternate spellings (cf. Yes! There is nothing wrong with using the word folks! It is still a great gender-neutral word and can be a wonderful catch-all term for a certain group of people you are referring to.The yt in yt folx appears to stem from the slang term whitey. Make an educated decision, not an ignorant one.

Folx vs folx go free#
There is no harm in learning about the use and terminology of a new word, and if you’ve educated yourself and decided that it doesn’t fit your purposes, feel free to disregard posts like these. I want to make it clear that this is not the case! The English language is constantly changing, with new words and phrases constantly being invented. A new push to use these new terms might be misconstrued as attacking those who don’t want to use it, or those who have used older terms in their past writing and discussion.

Why is there controversy around the word?Īs with most new phrases and terminology, there will always be pushback from those with more traditional mindsets on why these words are unnecessary and useless. The spelling of folx itself, interestingly enough, has already existed for centuries, but it was always used as a word with the same definition of folks. and Ms.) in the 1970s that might have caused the reinvention of the spelling folx as an inclusive version of folks. The true history of the term is widely debated, but many point to the popularization of the term Mx. Source: Terra Incognita Media What is the history of the term? Think of it as a way to progress past narrow definitions of gender, like how the term Latinx has replaced the use of the gendered terms Latino or Latina. Yes! The New York Times published an article that discussed the growing use of the term womxn, which they defined as a term that includes “women and those affected by misogyny, or women-related issues.” The x in womxn is used as a signifier that whoever is using the term is referring to not just women who were included in the historical mainstream definition of women, but anyone who identifies as a woman, including all cis and trans women. Basically, when an organization uses the word folx, they are intentionally letting you know that they are accepting towards marginalized identities. While folks is already a gender-neutral term, changing the spelling of the word signifies the inclusion of BIPOC, queer, and other marginalized communities that have been historically excluded from mainstream usage of folks. How was the term invented? And how does one use it properly? To learn more, check out a handy FAQ guide for the term folx below! What does folx mean?įolx is most used as a more inclusive version of the common term folks. But as the term folx gains wider acceptance among the general public, more questions are raised as to why it exists in the first place. You have probably seen the word folx used in various media, and especially in progressive news media sites.
