What is a gender neutral replacement for man, guys, buddy, etc?
So I've realized that in conversations I'll use traditional terms for men as general terms for all genders, both singularly and for groups. I always mean it well, but I've been thinking that it's not as inclusive to women/trans people.
For example I would say:
"What's up guys?" "How's it going man?" "Good job, my dude!” etc.
Replacing these terms with person, people, etc sounds awkward. Y'all works but sounds very southern US (nowhere near where I am located) so it sounds out of place.
So what are some better options?
Edit: thanks for all the answers peoples, I appreciate the honest ones and some of the funny ones.
The simplest approach is to just drop the usage of guys, man, etc. Folks for groups and mate for singular appeal to me when I do want to add one in between friends.
Cunts
We can close this thread now. The question has been answered.
instance name checks out
Threadkiller
Found the Australian
In New Zealand of all places!
Kiwis call each other cunts almost as much as aussies. We insult each other just as much, but we have better taste.
And we taste better
They wish they could be our western island.
Oi! You're a good cunt!
I'd accept bloody beautiful bastards as well.
Fucks
Shits
Turds
Maggots
Ah, finally! A worthy alternative.
y'all
Y'all doesn't get enough love. It is gender neutral and extremely versatile.
Vosotros agrees.
Ustedes if you're less formal or you live outside Spain 😁
What a fun way to phrase that. You're not wrong but it's making me giggle.
Or in German: euch
I'm under the impression that you pronounce it the same way this cat looks.
You know... that's about right.
😂😂😂😂😂
I still wonder why English (a Germanic language) doesn't have its own pronoun for the plural 2nd person like German (euch) or Dutch (jullie), I think it kinda helps with distinction between talking to one person and talking to multiple people.
The problem is... what pronoun should we choose? I think "yinz" would sound kinda cool, but nobody outside of a very specific spot in the US actually uses it (other than myself I guess).
I agree. It's the plural of "you" that should be the official standard, since it disambiguates "you." It can even be broadened to include larger groups via "all y'all," as in, not just y'all in talking to, but all y'all in the house.
It can replace "guys", but not "man," though.
The plural of you is yous or ye. In Ireland at least.
It's become the go-to in my company
Do you work with me? I'm in the US south and my EU colleagues love "y'all" and have started using it (ironically or not :) pretty often.
Warms my heart.
A LOT of my company is remote, but we are headquartered in Providence Rhode Island.
It sounds cringeworthy if you're not American though. The standard way of saying it is "you lot" and other dialects, like mine, have "yous".
Here where I'm from in the US, you occasionally hear a "y'alls" and now I'm going to start using it as a cultural gap between your dialect and mine.
Where I’m from people just assume you’re a hick is you say y’all. It’s not very common in the northern, out Midwest of the US, but everywhere in the south.
I can't do it, I don't want to sound like I'm from the South.
If everyone starts using it, it won’t sound southern any more. C’mon, you know you want to.
Take it from them!
I use y'all a lot and im near Chicago
I've started using it and I'm Canadian.
I've started using it and I'm north of Canada ... In Detroit
Did you know that you can be north of Canada ... in California?
https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-75f887668c7f322a0dd1a226e128cea3
At a more northern latitude than part of Canada. Detroit is directly north of part of Canada
TIL
What in the world. They need to fix that on the next patch.
Me too, but I'm from 'round Minnesota so it's more like ja'll.
you'uns
Youse if you’re a Geordie.
further down under you may hear "hey, yous lot..."
yinz
For those not in the US south and afraid of being judged, "all" on its own is an option.
"Hi all" is unlikely to raise any eyebrows
"Hi everybody!"
Bingo. I use y'all for everything. Even the singular. It's casual, neutral and relaxed.
Scott the Woz on Lemmy? :o
"Hey y'all, Scott here."
yall sounds super trashy.
A lot of people use “folks” for plural.
I feel like “guys” is fairly un-gendered but people disagree with me. Personally, I haven’t used the word “guys” to refer to anything male in what seems like forever.
“Bud” and “fella” are good singulars.
I used to have a maths teacher who called almost every number "guy".
"And this guy goes to zero, while this guy goes to infinity!"
I'm a cis woman in IT, I'm guy, dude, man, bro... I don't really care. You can change to make a specific person feel more confortable but most woman don't care to be dude or guy
Bud is very rarely used for women (or at least for me), but it is one of my favourite things to hear tbh
"Guys" is ungendered.
Reconsider whether it's worth being friends with people that insist on fighting over the term "guys".
And if you are surrounded by a lot of particularly sensitive people, just call them "friend" or "friends". It works for people you both like and dislike. Glorious.
Sure, but as a professional (teacher) I’m not willing to put my career on the line by challenging a sensitive parent. A few years ago we were told not to use that word, and when it comes to things like that, I do as I’m told.
“Listen up you little shits”. Perfectly non-gendered!
That makes sense.
Teachers have to do a lot of stupid shit these days.
Aw yeahhhh, everyone's into guys 🫦
(well, except aro/ace people maybe)
Modifying my language choices is literally the least I can do to make people feel more included, so anyone who can't fathom doing that is for sure, not worthy of being a friend.
If you are in the Midwest, Guys is absolutely gender neutral.
Edit: downvote me all you want guys, it won’t change the truth.
Meh, people who want to fight over the term 'guys' are in the minority.
They can probably just be ignored.
It is indeed.
A wise man once said, "I'm a dude, he's a dudes, she's a dude. We're all dudes. Hey!"
Strange though, that when you ask most men how many dudes they've slept with suddenly, she's not a dude...
There's a very big difference between "dude", referring to someone you're talking to, and "a dude", referring to someone you were talking about.
Not to me there isn't...
It's like the difference between "my shit", "your shit", and "that shit". You're not actually referring to your own things as feces, or calling it "shitty". It's just your shit. As in "Don't touch my shit". But when you're referring to someone else's shit as "your shit" or "that shit" it's more derogatory. Like, "clean up that shit" or "get your shit out of here".
The context changes "shit" from derogatory to neutral. Similarly, "dude" can be both gender specific and neutral depending on context.
Note that people are still allowed to prefer not to be referred to as "dude", but it's a gender neutral term in many contexts nonetheless.
Then educate yourself. See definitions 1 and 2 for noun and definition for interjection.
Ive generally always agreed with the former comment, but I've heard this argument a few times and it does demonstrate the disconnect well. I've switched it up to a simple y'all.
Yep. Something that can only ever mean "neutral" or "man" isn't neutral
That's just how our language works. You can also use the word "fuck" in many ways that have wildly different meanings.
It's funny how "just how it works out" always leads to "neutral" words having double meanings that equal "man" but never "woman"
Maybe it's not "just how it works" and maybe it's just bias...
You're literally arguing that this word should specifically exclude women, while complaining that double meanings never include women. It makes no sense. Why wouldn't you want to take power over the word to make it apply to women too?
There is no world where "Check out that dude" will mean a woman.
It will always be "neutral" or masculine.
And that's not neutral.
I have zero interest in fake neutrality
That's because context matters.
"You're shit" and "You're the shit" mean completely different things
Of course. No one literally thinks that "dude" always means man.
The issue isn't the obvious truth of the different meanings. The issue is that those different meanings aren't neutral like they claim to be, because they rely on the idea of men being the "default" state of people.
There's a reason there isn't exactly a large number of words in use that can men "woman" and "everybody" and that's because most men would be uncomfortable with that.
Yet somehow, the opposite is fine?
As a former resident of San Diego I have no problem sleeping with dudes. Because everyone is dude.
People think they're clever when they ask "would you sleep with the dude?" My response is " bold of you to assume that I haven't." Everyone is dude. You can try to twist things as much as you like but dude normalization reigns supreme.
I was talking about the default assumptions people make when they hear the word. Your circumstances don't come in to it, unless your claim is that most people share your experiences
In San Diego the default assumption of "dude" is that it can be literally anyone or any thing.
The people there accepted this decades ago. It's not one person's experience. It's a shared experience of millions. It's a geographically specific situation with the Smurf language phenomenon. Any noun can be Smurf and everyone there understands the smurfing meaning when it's smurfing said.
Out of the mouth of babes... 🥰
I believe that sentiment was also uttered by another wise man. A man of his time. Mr. Jeffrey Lebowski.
In Australia the gender-neutral term is ‘Cunt’.
Try the following for groups:
Hey folks, how's it going?
Listen up assholes!
Greetings, gumshoes
I say "greetings earthling(s)" but I also like gumshoe! Also definitely adding "listen up assholes" to the rotation, my coworkers appreciate your suggestions!
Yo!
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
Yo!
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Hey white stains!
What's up, cunts
Works best if they're your friends and also you're in Australia
Comrade.
☭
"Foolish mortals" is my go-to gender neutral form of address
I’m AFAB enby, saying “you guys” and calling me “dude” is fine. Those to me aren’t gendered anymore. The people who get offended at general terms like these for groups of people need to touch grass.
But if you’re dead set on it, embrace y’all lol. Just don’t say it with a southern drawl and you’ll be fine. It’s a fantastic gender neutral term. You can also just train yourself not to add in the “you guys” to the “what’s up” phrase, and maybe just say “what’s up with you?” “What’s up with you all?” Etc.
"Offended" is a bit of a strong word.
Many trans folks are, understandably, bummed out when gendered terms that refer to their AGAB are used to refer to them.
I don't think there's anything wrong with trying to avoid causing that brief moment of dysphoria. That just feels like a thoughtful and kind thing to do.
It’s good that OP means well, but also there are so many of us who do not care and are not affected because we know the speaker is using a generalized term and isn’t (usually) being malicious with it. I call several of my cisgender girl friends “dude” and “bro” and I’ll call men “girl” as a joke sometimes (like, girl what are you doing?). Many of these terms simply have completely lost their original gendered meaning in a lot of contexts.
I'm also on Team "these words have lost their meaning" but often feel opposite to OP's intent
When people go out of their way to force inclusive language to a degree that feels unnatural, and especially when I'm the only trans person in the room, it feels like I'm being singled out for my identity. It's extra uncomfortable when they make (often incorrect) assumptions about my body while doing so.
That said, I will also never fault someone for trying to be inclusive, and ofc always respect other people's preferences.
Good point dude
That's great, and it's nice that you don't have to deal with that jolt of dysphoria in those situations.
I'm simply saying that it's also common (and okay) to not be entirely comfortable with those terms. Especially from strangers or acquaintances.
I don't think seeking to reduce the linguistic pattern of male as the default is a misguided effort.
Yeah I agree, bro, but I wouldn't use guys or dudes on old ladies
Well no lol you gotta read the room sometimes 😅
No southern drawl? Y’all is like our one positive contribution don’t take it away from those of us who ain’t bigots
This is likely the best solution, but also a hard one. Thanks for the perspective though.
"Fuckers" is gender-neutral.
The simplest approach is to accept language is inherently gendered, and at a certain point it is exhausting to either take offense to everything or walk on eggshells.
I’m southern, so I use y’all almost exclusively lol
Mortals
Fucker.
Meatbags.
Negative, I am a meat Popsicle.
Everypony.
An oft overlooked option that leaves no one indifferent.
Cursed
But very truly
Meatbags?
All the alternatives make me cringe.
If someone is insulted that you use the term "guys" for a group, they're not worth being friends with. That's a lot of exhausting mental energy to deal with. Ignore 'em and move on.
I find "y'all" works pretty well, so does "folks" or even better "Fellow Workers."
“Y’all” is Texas’ greatest cultural contribution IMO.
Texas does not get to claim that 100%, Georgia, Alabama, the Carolinas, Tennessee, and Mississippi own a good bit of that
I've noticed people using these more but I hate them. It's a cultural thing. I'm a New Zealander and y'all sound American redneck to me and folks just sounds weird.
Rich coming from someone who says ‘nor’ instead of ‘no’.
/s
Seriously, I love NZ and can’t wait to get back there. I’ve only met a few shitty kiwis and they were all here in the US lmao
All it takes is using it for a bit, and it doesn't.
Nah. To me this is like suggesting to Americans that they start saying "good sirs" as a greeting. It grates
i disagree, good sir
Forsooth! You jest!
good point, bro
'round here "guys" has become gender neutral. But "folks" is my go-to.
I mean buddy is already gender neutral.
I say y'all. It's inclusive.
"Citizens". It has the added benefit of implying that you're an authority figure and they're in trouble.
Luckily service guarantees citizenship!
I would like to know more!
Comrades?
⚒️
Not everyone is a citizen in the place they happen to be. In my country, more than 30% of permanent residents are not citizens.
But they are still citizens (of somewhere)
Usually yes, but not always, some are stateless.
True
Folks.
Chat
This is a great plural term, thanks.
Fellow kids
Man, guys, buddy, etc
Just use them as gender neutral. Done.
Choom(s).
"My fellow great ape"
Dude.
I'm a dude. He's a dude, She's a dude. We're all dudes.
Trans women sometimes feel uncomfortable when they are called dude, so if you're aiming for maximum comfort of people, dude is not a great choice.
Well, to make a more serious comment instead of just quoting an old song from an old movie, it's definitely most important to call people by pronouns that they prefer. That's the number 1 priority.
That said, I have some trans friends who don't like gender neutral pronouns in general. One in particular has explained how much she has gone through to be able to identify as a woman, and using "they" instead of "she" makes her feel like she still isn't a woman.
So the real answer is there's no one word that will make everyone happy. They best way to do that is to ask people the pronouns they prefer.
the best take. as with everything, there is no one size fits all solution
I never though about that aspect of it, thanks for sharing that friend's perspective.
Yep, especially your mom, she's probably the best dude
Hey !
I use "folks" a lot. "Howdy folks." I am also a Tarheel so I can get away with y'all. And howdy.
Guys is always fine as it refers to followers of Guy Faulks and pretty much anyone has probably considered blowing up parliament at some point.
Y'all
Cheese bags.
In the words of Kel Mitchell:
folks, y'all, youse
friends / friend
comrades / comrade
Folks or Everyone tend to be my go to.
Earthlings is the only valid option
Earthicans
Earthletes.
I prefer humanoids. One can never be too careful...
That was genuinely funny. Sry if you got the downvotes.
"Guys" is gender neutral already...
Fellow Earthlings
"What is up, my mammals?"
for singular use boo works, and plural you can say "hey, fuckos"
cousins
friends
y'all
neighbors
folks
party party people
fellow-travellers
and, of course
You forgot "comrades."
Step-cousins for extra pizzaz
Is buddy really a problem?
I'd be more worried that someone thinks I'm treating them like a dog, than a man.
"Buddy" elicits so many conflicting feelings in me.
I should have seen this coming a mile away
Yeah, I'm trying to avoid dude for that very reason. I just haven't found a suitable replacement for it yet.
Fellow humans
This is how you get a visit from humans at AARO https://www.aaro.mil
Guys is 100% gender neutral.
Also, can't go wrong with the old standby "Stay Fresh, Cheesebags!"
You're asking about a collective and also a singular...
Just in general I'd say that if you're trying to quit a habit around trans women, go the extra mile and quit it around cis ones too. For the collective "hey guys" I have no one-word replacement ("folks/folx" sounds equally southern and somehow more cringe), but you could replace the whole phrase with "hey everybody", "hi gang", "how are you all", or just "hey".
When speaking to any woman, I would advise against calling them "dude" or "man." Full stop. No further thoughts necessary on that one.
Sorry if it wasn't clear enough, I'm looking for general terms to use for all people, regardless of their gender, not just trans people.
There have been some good examples for groups, but nothing that fits well for talking to one person directly.
My personal recommendation is to drop the extra title entirely. For everybody.
E.g. instead of saying "great work man" just say "great work." It could help you prevent flubs later.
I do wish I knew some non-binary singular terms I could use, but none come to my mind
Yes, this seems to be the simplest answer, even if it will take a while to get used to.
I think I'm going to piggyback off inspiration of your question and ask my own, something like: "Enbies, how do you prefer partners or others refer to/about you?"
BTW, sorry for misunderstanding the goal of your post, but I appreciate your (and others') replies here.
Dipshits
Fellow bipedal meat-things.
I bit the bullet and was the cringy person at work who said "peeps". After a few months of do this, it was amusing to see the word spread until my boss's boss started saying peeps in meetings.
Greetings, Programs!
…User!
My darlings, tell me everything.
Peeps
Note: You will sound like a tool if you say this.
"What's up everypony?"
Later Cheesebags!
*Stay Fresh Cheese Bags
That’s the one!
Buddy is masculine?
Peeps
Gang
You could copy Scooby do and refer to the group of people as 'gang', 'team' works too
Comrade
Peeps
"Gentels and Ladymen“
My go-to is folks, but 1000 others have mentioned that already. So I will throw in "people".
"Hey people, how's it going?"
That works for me
I just omit the unnecessary words or use their name. That works OK, although I'm awful with names so usually it just becomes "Good job!" or "What's up?".
Funny story time: in English I find this is not so bad. In French it's worse. In Vietnamese it's awful. We have dozens of pronouns. They're not only mostly gendered, but contain information about their age and perceived status relative to you. It's a 3-dimensional matrix where the axes are approximately gender, age/hierarchy, and degree of relation (inlaws/blood relations/strangers). You even get a different word for yourself in some of these situations. Then sometimes there's a numerical rank inside each pronoun e.g. male uncle, my spouse's family, 3rd oldest.
The language is already at maximum pronoun burden. Honestly it would just be easier if we called each other 'human' or 'comrade' or 'citizen' or something equally encompassing. It's exhausting as a non-native speaker (and you are not ever allowed to use their names, that's considered super rude).
Guy:innen
What's poppin primates‽‽‽
"Mate" is always a good option, I wish it's used more universally in the States, too.
cumsplats
Folks for groups and friend for individuals is my go to. Comrade if you want to be spicy
"What's up dog turds?"
"How's it hanging, dingleberry?"
"Nice job, Captain Hazelwood!"
I do actually know someone who speaks like this.
Friend
I've started using "hello chums"
Chaphop increases
i find myself using "friend" a lot lately. dunno if that's a great replacement.
I'm not your buddy, guy!
Bitch or bitches
Come on, bitch is as gendered as dude and guys /s
What's up carbon based earthlings.
Whenever there's any question, I usually open with "sup, dogs" in my most serious voice, then continue to deadpan refer to everyone as dog, such as "and you, dog, I need to check the grist mill, thank you dog". Fifteen years in and no complaints so far.
all friends everyone folks peeps team
If you're only addressing one person then it can be left off entirely.
You can't say glip-glop! That's their word!
It depends on who you’re talking to. Many people don’t care about saying “guys” as it’s so universal. However, if you’re unsure or meeting new people, that’s where you’d likely want to change it up.
Hey friends! (This can be used for strangers too) What’s happening my peeps? Hello everyone! Hope you both have a good weekend
Or just What’s up? Hiya! Hey [insert their name]
Chooms
I like what they use on the Bananas Podcast. "Guys, gals, and non-binary pals."
Matey/mateys, scallywags
As much as I so dearly love the word scallywag, it already has an extremely rigid place in my vocabulary as a cat-exclusive term.
I sound even more southern than I am because I say "y'all" frequently to avoid gendered pronouns. People, you, and we are often good. I think my favorite is "you folks".
People here are not understanding that language changes with location
Exactly. As great sounding as some of these suggestions are, if I were to call an acquaintance or a stranger cunt I would be crucified.
"YOU PEOPLE" 😂 I'm kidding
Guys is probably the most neutral of the ones you mentioned.
I've found a lot of success using pal for the individual and folk for the group. Such as "Jesse is my pal", or "Hey folks."
....oh shit. Palworlds a thing now. Don't use pal.
Potential litigants
Mate Cunts Dickheads
"Hello, losers"
Earthling...Terran - I don't care how awkward it sounds. It's awkward for me to change might as well make it awkward for everyone.
Edit: just me being cranky... Normally I go out of my way to make people feel accepted.
Dude
I tend to use "folks" for my usual gender-neutral collective pronoun.
I don't think "dude" is a real issue, is it? Here in Australia, I'll happily use mate for any gender, and I often hear other genders do the same.
Of course, we also tend to unnecessarily shorten (or lengthen) people's names here, and those always get used:
Even our Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, is Albo. You get the idea... ;)
You could go with the classic Appalachia (Pittsburgh more specifically) … “Yinz”
yinz is new to me, is it said with some kind of accent?
No accent, it’s a derivation of the Scots-Irish “yous ones.” Here’s the Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yinz?wprov=sfti1#
Dude its OK for me because you Know, the dude.
Pacifist as fuck, its a good name then. I don't feel it like man, etc. Even the majority when using it don't think about lebowski.
If i name someone dude, there is more than "man" behind. But I'm maybe wrong ?
Edit : oh sorry realized plurials.
People fine for me, its just an habit to change really. Or hey guys and girls or better, hey girls and guys 😂
But as non English speaker I could use dude for the group, and a my lady for her, if there is an fellow trans with me. Not others ofc. Will check thé answers for real lol
Dude isn't quite there yet. The phrase "I fuck dudes" has only one interpretation still.
There are still lots of reasonable women who don't want to be called dude as it is still associated with masculine people.
Mistake ive edited. Bad reading at first. I've respond imgining me self speaking to a dude of me. Not at a group. Individually, no way I call a miss "dude".
You people
Remember, non binary ppl exist too! (in reference of "both genders")
The term "fucker" covers all bases.
But what about asexual people?
Since the term isn't about actual sex, it's fine
Would all genders be a better way of phrasing that?
Yep!
Great, thanks!
"Buddy" is gendered?
Yep. It's a name for teen boys or for men that are significantly younger than the speaker. Typically said by men rather than women too.
No one says "Hey buddy" to a teen girl, or to a woman a couple of decades younger than them
Interesting, I use it pretty much interchangeably with "friend".
I do
I'm not no one. Buddy can be used for pretty much anyone. You're definitely right about it addressing younger people though.
My boyfriend’s nephew calls me buddy and I am a woman about ten years older than him, we are both adults so he isn’t a confused toddler either. It might vary regionally. It simply means friend in our case. I don’t think he is trying to make me out to be younger than him. Maybe it is his way of declaring I am “one of the guys”, however.
i only use buddy for dogs and puppies
Alley cats
I just call everyone "man" and "dude", irrespective of gender/sex ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
"Hey, y'all."
And I'm not Southern. I get funny looks around Boston, but, I love "y'all".
"Yous badly-aimed batches of ejaculate"?
It depends on the group and setting. I use folks and y'all a lot, but don't put a heavy southern drawl on it. Sometimes I say homies or party people. Really, in an unprofessional setting I try about anything I can that could be considered a term to group people. I jumped in a Discord call the other day with two of my buddies already in there and opened by referring to them as bromosexuals. I try to have fun with it but professionally, folks or everyone is what I use most.
gamer(s)
apes!
Pal, bud, friendo, sport, tiger, chief, boss.
Carbon-based life forms
Everyone, you all, y'all
All, team, friends, everyone, folks (preferably prefixed with “howdy”)…
chum
comrade
lemmies
Dude
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
Dude
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
I'm just going out on a limb to remind people it's totally ok to say sup man to legit anyone. People that care about that stuff are people you can choose to change it for if you want to be around that type of person.
Dudes is fine - folks and yall also work. I use yall all the time even though I'm now in Canada and have never lived in the US south.
Guys, I think, is still a bit too gender associated but it's borderline. Man is often used in a gender neutral manner but it is very easy to misinterpret and a transwoman could reasonably assume you're trying to troll them.
You've also got fella and feller, I think the latter one is more gender neutral than the former.
I worked at a restaurant in Ohio in the early 2000s. Had a group of ladies come in once, probably in their 50s. Got super offended when I gave the standard "hi guys!" greeting. However, where I grew up, that had become a gender neutral greeting.
If you want to remove gendered pronouns entirely, "y'all" is what I would go with. I think the UK frequently uses "you lot", but that probably does not sound great to most in the US. I suppose "folks" is one that might work, but seems to rub some people the wrong way.
I typically go with something like, "howdy, folks".
"What up, gangstas?"
Esteemed personages.
Is this bait?
What I use is y'all or folks for plural, and dude for singular.
Why are you trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist? Linguistics don't care about genders in biological sense.
Both my partner and I use "dude" interchangeably for all genders. They're NB for context
amigo
Fellas
edit: please correct me if you believe I am wrong, I am open to discussion.
I feel like "guys" is definitely colloquially gender-neutral in most contexts.
"Fireman" is clearly a patriarchic term that literally has "man" in it. In English "firefighter" is commonplace nowadays, but in my native Finnish, a lot of professions have "man" in the term, much in the vein of "policeman", "ombudsman", the Finnish equivalent of "janitor", roughly translated directly as "building/house-man".
We've replaced loads. Most of them are good. Some new terms feel natural and get taken into use, but replacing "man" with "person" rarely works for us without feeling incredibly awkward to use.
So my point is that we can reclaim those terms as gender neutral. Context matters. N-word being acceptable among black people is completely acceptable (and actually a very nice tool for emphasis when properly utilised), and it's even in songs without anyone accusing the artists of racism. (Well, for pop songs at least, no racist hillbilly songs made it to that level.) That being said, it definitely doesn't take away from it's power as a slur if someone uses it in such a way.
So I suggest we'll just use "guys, bro, dudes" as gender neutral and rely that people will understand from context when they're actually used to address men/exclude women etc.
Also, isn't "buddy" sort of neutral already? *goes to check* OoooooOoOooooh, it's from "brother" originally. Guess it's not as neutral originally.
Well that's s new one for me.