Gender of the Computer!

A language instructor was explaining to her class that French nouns, unlike their Englishcounterparts, are grammatically designated asmasculine or feminine Things like 'chalk' or'pencil,' she described, would have a genderassociation although in English these words wereneutral.Puzzled, one student raised his hand and asked, "Whatgender is a computer?"The teacher wasn't certain which it was, and sodivided the class into two groups and asked themto decide if a computer should be masculine orfeminine One group was comprised of the girls inthe class, and the other, of boys Both groups wereasked to give four reasons for theirrecommendation.The group of girls concluded that computers should bereferred to in the masculine gender because:1- In order to get their attention, you have to turnthem on.2- They have a lot of data but are still clueless.3- They are supposed to help you solve your problems,but half the time they ARE the problem.4- As soon as you commit to one, you realize that, ifyou had waited a little longer, you couldhave had a better model.The boys, on the other hand, decided that computersshould definitely be referred to in thefeminine gender because:1- No one but their creator understands their internallogic.2- The native language they use to communicate withother computers is incomprehensible toeveryone else.3- Even your smallest mistakes are stored in long-termmemory for later retrieval.4- As soon as you make a commitment to one, you findyourself spending half your paycheck onaccessories for it.