On: XKCD's Randall Munroe on Google+ requiring your ge...

[klipt]

> "John was late for dinner. They were caught in traffic."

It sounds ungrammatical because the gender-neutral pronoun follows a gender specific name. The actual use is more like

"A friend of mine was late for dinner. They were caught in traffic."

[parfe → klipt]

This conversation is regarding asocial network where your name is always public.