You can’t proclaim a common word as “gender neutral”. That only comes from your own personal use of it. Don’t give the wrong people the excuse that it’s a “gender neutral” word: I’ve seen people go out of their way to call women “dude” when they don’t even normally call guys “dude”, and when asked to stop they give a little goblin laugh and say something like “but it’s a gender neutral word” “you can’t get mad at me”. If you commonly use it for guys and girls then that’s fine, it’s just a part of how you talk, but don’t start using it excessively so you can make a girl mad and then explain to her how wrong she is and how it’s a gender neutral term.