FEBRUARY 6, 2009 | Them/him/her
A: Well, you're right, from a strictly grammatical point of view, it is wrong to use "them" instead of "him/her". A lot of people adopted this way of speaking/writing due to the fact that it's much easier to use the gender-neutral word "them" instead of "him/her", or the word "their" instead of "his/her". It is more correct to say "Anyone who doesn't have his/her ticket will not be allowed to enter." than to say "Anyone who doesn't have their ticket...". HOWEVER, you should remember that there are mistakes that "hurt the ears" and mistakes that don't - in our humble opinion, using "them/their" in these types of situations is not a mistake that hurts the ears. In fact, like you said yourself, it's very widely used by many native speakers... do you remember the famous song by Sting - "If you love somebody set them free"? :)
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