The Great Pronoun Debate

But it does announce that you are a man and your are unjustly benefitted by this announcement.

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Exactly.

Hmmmm i’ve never thought of that before

Everything sucks lol

THERE IS NO WINNING !!!

I think putting pronouns works for the greater good though I think it benefits trans people and lgbt people And just shows that you’re a caring person in general. Like if you work for a totally cis white company and you’re a closeted trans person or a stealth passing trans person or an out gay person in real life who is not out at work because of “reasons” it’s cool to see that you have an OBVIOUS ally somewhere in the company that you can reach out to that would probably respect you and understand you and listen to what you say I think to me it’s basically like you’re just putting out a little beacon like a lighthouse at sea letting people know you’re a safe person to talk to and be friends with or whatever

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I was the first person in my company (5000+ employees.) to start doing this. It then became a thing, and now more people do it, including some of the senior execs.

A few observations.

  1. Most people don’t notice.
  2. A few people do and I had some great discussions with people helping them understand trans issues.
  3. I know there was someone in my team thinking about transitioning. They never spoke to me about it, but I think they would have noticed.

It’s mostly about being an ally, publicly.

I’ve spoken to a bunch of trans folks about it. It’s fairly consistent in “yes, definitely do it, but also please make sure we can walk through the office safely, and have somewhere to pee in peace at work”

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No, it’s the equivalent of wearing a mask during a pandemic. It may feel a little weird or awkward at first, but it’s ultimately not really a big deal and you get used to it pretty quick and it does some good for others at no cost to yourself.

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Okay.

Research (How Many Adults and Youth Identify as Transgender in the United States? - Williams Institute) tells me that <1% of people are transgender. Of these, presumably most (?) are displaying outwardly the gender they wish to be identified as. So you’re left with, what, 1 in 500 people who are either unidentifiable as the gender they want to be referred to as or want to use some nonstandard pronoun?

The way to be “inclusive” is to treat people with respect, not to pretend that this is some normal issue that everyone has. Having the 495 obvious cis people and 4 obvious transgender people go around announcing pronouns in order to supposedly make the one person who wants to be called “they” or something feel “normal” (which they won’t, because they’re still the only non-obvious one) is super dumb.

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It’s the equivalent of wearing a one layer cloth mask in a pandemic after 99.6% of the population has been vaccinated.

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This is very exciting; The Sandmann is my favorite graphic novel series by far! Desire in the comics is an explicitly androgynous character; there is really no choice here if you want to stay true to the source material. Is it known who plays the Prince of Stories himself? Or Lucifer?

Wrong. The way to be inclusive is to ask people if they feel included, and if not why not, and what they would like us to do about, and if their asks are reasonable then we accommodate them. There are lots of different groups of people that make up a small minority of the population that we strive to accommodate because it’s the right thing to do, the world is objectively worse when we kick those people into a closet and pretend their problems aren’t our problems.

If anything, your observation that this is a small issue affecting a minority of people is support for doing it. It’s hardly any burden at all to add this to one’s email, and to be respectful and act appropriately in the small number of cases where it pops up in day to day life.

Saying “we shouldn’t do anything about this because it hardly affects anybody at all” is EXACTLY the thinking that leads to minority oppression.

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Except that its even orders of magnitude easier than that.

I just don’t agree that it makes sense to change the way that everyone communicates in order to make a tiny group feel “included”, especially considering that it’s not going to work anyway because you still aren’t going to feel normal if you are the one person who wants to be called ze in a sea of people using the pronouns that correspond with the way they look.

And yes, there is absolutely a size threshold beneath which it makes no sense to try to make wholesale changes to things in order to benefit a group. Again, treat people with respect, anything else is unacceptable. But feeling like you are the unusual one when you objectively are is (a) not oppression and (b) not going to be fixed by my obviously male ass going around like “please use ‘he’ when you refer to me k thnx”

Hey. Just asking you to consider.

As a poster on a left wing board. I assume youve met a lit of deplorable types who are like

“Insert reasonable respectful request here” is dumb! Ive thought about it a bit (although not talked to anyone impacted, or read anything of significance) and im convinced im right!

What would you want that deplorable to do in this situation?

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How long do you think it took me to update my email sig? Im just curious what exactly "wholesale changes " are.

Sorry, which situation is “this situation”?

A situation where you come across a deplorable making a big deal out of something from an uninformed place.

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Actually. You know what. I was going to try the reasonable route here. But i reread some of your posts and fuck it.

Youve used the word dumb several times, made it clear you dont think trans people are normal and used “ze” dismissively to highlight your point. All while ignoring multiple people telling you that a) its a small thing b) a victimised group thinks its a good idea and c) that its an easy way to show youre an ally which is powerful and important

You say the main thing is to be respectful but you are being anything but

Its 2021. Youre being a thick obnoxious fucking twat about this and you need to check yourself. Its really not fucking complicated. Jesus.

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(1) You can go fuck yourself.

(2) Normal means “conforming to a standard; usual, typical, or expected”. Something that applies to 0.5% of people (and to be clear, I’m referring to an even smaller set because it has to be people who are not only transgender but whose preferred pronouns do not match their appearance) is not normal. That doesn’t imply it’s bad.

The wholesale changes are moving to a communication paradigm that revolves around people announcing their pronouns up front. Putting pronouns in your email sig (presumably people responding to your email will not be addressing you in the third person??) accomplishes nothing practical. If you want to signal you’re an ally to transgender people why not just put that in your fucking email sig?

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On further thought. Please DONT put your pronouns in your email sig. Ever.

A trans person might make the mistake of thinking you are on their side.

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If you think putting pronouns in a sig accomplishes something, presumably you would think I should do it regardless of my thoughts on the topic.

Im always amazed by idiots like you. Just because YOU have never spoken to a trans person, and are trying to figure this stuff out from first principles like its some kind of logic puzzle, you assume we haven’t as well.

Ill take my brothers opinion on my email sig over some dumb fuck on the internet busy chasing the trailing edge of acceptable transphobia.

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