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MichaelBishop comments on Religion, Mystery, and Warm, Soft Fuzzies - Less Wrong
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But are "Women who would be annoyed by the statement 'Women are alluring'" a large potential audience?
I would think that the audience for this specific sentence would break down into (roughly):
a) Those it directly applies to (hetro males, bi females, etc.), who immediately agree 'Yes, women sure are alluring!' b) Those it does not apply to , but who regard it as complimentary (e.g. hetro females), 'Yes, I sure am alluring!' c) Those it does not apply to, but who understand its intention without feeling that it marginalises them. 'I don't get what the big deal about women is, but I know LOTS of people who find women alluring' d) Those it does not apply to, who feel actively excluded. 'I don't find women alluring, the author is trying to exclude me - he really should change the text to something that I like."
I would have thought that category d) is tiny.
Note to Emily: I am really not trying to exclude you or pick on you! I just find it really surprising you would feel excluded by a (positive, and relatively uncontroversial!) comment about women from a male author.
I agree with your main point,* few people will be bothered by such an example, BUT its easy to use more inclusive language, so in my opinion the benefits still outweigh the costs. So it takes us white hetero males from middle/upper class backgrounds a few extra seconds to come up with examples. I think we can handle it.
*I don't quite agree with your categories... people may find it complimentary, or at least not believe that the author is trying to exclude them, but still be distracted from the point of the sentence or be reminded that they are a minority in our community, a reminder some prefer not to have.