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As a dude who build wire harnesses, I absolutely loathe when people call them male/female.
There are plugs and receptacles, and pins and sockets.
Plugs plug into receptacles. Receptacles get plugged into by plugs.
Pins plug into sockets. Sockets get plugged into by pins.It can get very confusing when you have a receptacle with pins or a plug with sockets and some chode says something gender referenced, such as "the male end".
Ok, are you talking about the plug? Nope, obviously they were talking about the receptacle, because it has pins, even though that's the end that gets plugged into.So frustrating.
...is it bad that as a trans man who knows nothing about electrical connectors, I still find this rant relatable? You'd think there would be some kind of terminology for getting your equipment to play with your other equipment, but no, and don't even get me started on what happens when it has to interface with organic systems...
In the connector world, we call it mating. In my previous comment, I should have said "mates with" instead of "plugs into", but wanted to make it simple and abundantly clear.
"Interface with organic systems" I actively laughed at this. I find your phrasing way funnier than it should be. Thanks for the chuckle.
But yeah, every word is a made up word, so make one up?
Definitely frustrating. Hard to imagine that naming these connectors were a right wing movement all those years ago. Glad we're actively calling it out to put an end to it. I also find it loathsome that one connector inserts something into another connector (Pin/receptacle). Connectors should be re-imagined and redesigned as simply mating surfaces (maybe mating isn't the correct term either), removing any predisposition to viewing them as male/female where something is inserted into something else
That's a nice idea, but unfortunately physics has determined insertion to be the best way to guarantee a solid connection.
There are other alternatives, such as pogo pins, but those are less than ideal in many use-cases.I think the most useful reconception is not to take “insertion” out of fields where it’s a useful, literal description, and instead, take it out of the realm of gender and sexuality, where it limits imagination. It’s 2023, and no one has to do things exactly like their parents did [at least once]. Unless they want to, in which case, great, but human bodies are extremely versatile.
…semi-relatedly, the issue with the kind of equipment I’m talking about is only partly terminology. It’s a category of similar items made by a variety of companies in different sizes and configurations, so standard terminology would not create standardization unless a lot of companies agreed to do it. It’s something where measurements often help, but there are also some more… innovative… designs where measurement is not applicable in the same way, and would be confusing.
My sister entirely refers to these as "the hole" and "the penis". In a progressive setting, neither of these terms are gendered.
Jst-sm are a nightmare to figure out. i know that the side carrying voltage is supposed to be the one with the plugs, but that one is hard to mount to anything. i hate and love them very much. they go against everything a connector is supposed to be (at least in my mind) and they are beautiful. highly recommend. at least for RC stuff.