> >Er, the only suggestion I can offer here is the only one that I use for
> >myself personally, when confronted with a gender-specific pronoun used in
> >an impersonal sense.
> >
> >I just don't wrap so much of my self image up in what someone else
> >impersonally used as a pronoun when writing a manual.  And I save my
> anger
> >for those who MEANT to insult me.
>
> That is generally the case outside north America. I think this he/she issue is
> totally incomprehensible if English is not your native language.

Well, I was trying to stay out of this, but I can no longer resist.  :-)

I and a number of other people like to use "they" instead of "he" or
"she" when the gender is not known.  I know it's not gramatically
correct, but it will become accepted eventually if enough people use
the word that way.  It has the advantage of already being the plural
form.  The same thing can be done with "their" in place of "his" or
"hers".