[Umaeril]

Hi Slylord, I think my answers for #2 and 3 are about the same as yours. I am female and just feel more comfortable with a female avi (though I have one male avi at another site just for mule purposes). However, I don't care what others do and I never ever assume gender (or age for that matter). I try to tease it out if I want to know...sometimes if I know the person well I might just ask them outright. But most are just neutral to me.

I think though, that this neutrality sets up a wall in a way. Because in general we are a dualistic species, we can't help it. In my language there are few gender neutral pronouns or way to talk about someone without referring to gender. So I have a sense of not really knowing the person until I can establish what they are...to some extent.