'Mx' and non gender specific pronouns.

[ponderingturtle]

One problem with these gender-neutral pronouns is that there are so many proposals to choose from. If at least interested lobby clubs could unify on one proposal and push that, you could actually see it in more widespread use.

I suspect that when one comes about it will likely be shaped in a large part by having a well liked character in a highly popular fictional area have a preference.

 

[Peterson]

The plain fact is that the drive for non-gendered pronouns is not driven by the existence of gender-ambiguous people. Instead, the impetus is the fact that everyone should be referred to by a nongendered pronoun unless or until their own personal preference is made known.

The identity of the public bathroom I use should not drive the pronoun by which I am addressed.

Do pronouns refer to the sex of the individual or their gender?

 

[Corsair 115]

Expect the usual suspects to rant on how this will cause the end of civilisation and/or is a "SJW" plot.

I would say the "SJW plot" is this:

"people who identify as neither male nor female".

What, I wonder, will be the honorific for those who identify as a gender-neutral attack helicopter?

 

[sir drinks-a-lot]

In a story published last Wednesday the New York Times included a new honorific, Mx. ["mix"], in a story that quoted one Senia Hardwick, a bookshop employee who didn’t want to be assigned a gender by the newspaper.

Do they work at Women and Women First?

 

[wareyin]

I seem to recall reading a Sci-Fi novel wherein they used just "M", gender non-specific. I'm not sure how it's pronounced, though.

Isn't that what M Night Shyamalan is going for?

 

[TragicMonkey]

I seem to recall reading a Sci-Fi novel wherein they used just "M", gender non-specific. I'm not sure how it's pronounced, though.

Dan Simmons, the Hyperion series. I kept mentally reading it as "Monsieur", which added another level of weirdness to the books, as everybody was not only futuristic and in space but also French and (in my mental processes, anyway) Poirot.

 

[wareyin]

Dan Simmons, the Hyperion series. I kept mentally reading it as "Monsieur", which added another level of weirdness to the books, as everybody was not only futuristic and in space but also French and (in my mental processes, anyway) Poirot.

I'll have you know that M the Shrike was/will not be French!

 

[BardKesnit]

This by the way, is why I think the fight for transgender rights will be more difficult than the fight for gay rights. Even though homosexuality is rare, it is common enough that, given the size of a typical person's social network, they know at least one or two gay people. Once gay people started coming out of the closet, people had to deal with it. It was harder for people to think of homosexuals as "others", when some of them are friends or family. The same is not true in the case of the transgendered. Most people will not even have acquaintances, let alone friends or family, that are transgender. And even then, not conforming to the "pronoun binary" is even rarer, since if you do know someone who is transgender, they will typically want to be referred to by their identified gender's pronoun.

While you are correct that TG people want to be referred to by the pronoun they identify with, I disagree that TG people are as rare as you might think. I also disagree, to a small extent, with the idea that people don't know someone who is TG.

In the past year, I have found out that two friends of mine from when I lived in Florida have begun transition. At the time I knew them, I would never have suspected, but they are happy. One of them had been hiding it and denying it to herself for decades until she just couldn't deny it any more. (See Kristen Beck, US Navy SEAL (Ret.) and transwoman)

With respect to not knowing someone who is trans, I think it is more appropriate to say "don't know they know someone who is trans." I know a few transmen, and you would never guess that they had been born female. Transwomen don't tend to stealth as well, but they can and do do it.

English already has a perfectly usable gender neutral pronoun - it.

On another forum, someone posted that it wished to be referred to as "it." That set off pages of argument over whether it is acceptable to call a person "it," even if that it the person's choice.

 

[TragicMonkey]

I'll have you know that M the Shrike was/will not be French!

The Shrike is obviously French: he's all pointed wit.

 

[arthwollipot]

Non-gendered pronouns have been proposed since at least the 60s. They've never caught on. People seem to prefer the lack of ambiguity, though the recent increase in acceptance of non-gender-binary-ness may give it the impetus it needs.

Dan Simmons, the Hyperion series. I kept mentally reading it as "Monsieur", which added another level of weirdness to the books, as everybody was not only futuristic and in space but also French and (in my mental processes, anyway) Poirot.

Poirot was Belgian.

 

[Corsair 115]

While you are correct that TG people want to be referred to by the pronoun they identify with, I disagree that TG people are as rare as you might think.

Depends on your definition of 'rare'. According to Gallup polling, the percentage of the population in the U.S. who identify as LGBT is 3.8%. Those specifically identifying as trans were 0.6% of the population.

(This Gallup poll from earlier this year found that Americans greatly overestimate the percentage of the population who identify as gay or lesbian. The mean guess was 23% of the population; the actual percentage who identify as LGBT was 3.8%.)

 

[cullennz]

I've said it before. I'll say it again. Just call everyone "mate"

 

[pipelineaudio]

Expect the usual suspects to rant on how this will cause the end of civilisation and/or is a "SJW" plot.

I think its the opposite. Things like this will take away a lot of what the SJW's use for fundraising and manufactured outrage. I'm all for mx!

 

[Corsair 115]

I seem to recall reading a Sci-Fi novel wherein they used just "M", gender non-specific. I'm not sure how it's pronounced, though.

I remember in the early Star Trek films the officers, regardless of whether they were male or female, were addressed as "Mister".

Seems to me that's at least as good a solution as inventing a bunch of new terms—just strip the gender expectation off of an existing term and use it for everyone.

 

[Slowvehicle]

Do pronouns refer to the sex of the individual or their gender?

"Gender is no substitute for sex...but neither is anything else!"

 

[phiwum]

(This Gallup poll from earlier this year found that Americans greatly overestimate the percentage of the population who identify as gay or lesbian. The mean guess was 23% of the population; the actual percentage who identify as LGBT was 3.8%.)

Holy cow. I can't imagine how the mean could be so high.

I could imagine a lot of people saying 10%, because that was a commonly repeated estimate, but 23%? That suggests that a substantial portion thought more than one in four are LGBT.

 

[TragicMonkey]

Poirot was Belgian.

He was a waffle? That makes his detective successes all the more impressive.

 

[Metullus]

Poirot was Belgian.

At least he identified as Belgian, which is the important thing...

 

[Corsair 115]

Holy cow. I can't imagine how the mean could be so high.

I could imagine a lot of people saying 10%, because that was a commonly repeated estimate, but 23%? That suggests that a substantial portion thought more than one in four are LGBT.

I was amazed too when I saw the results of that poll. The one-in-ten figure has been floating around for a long time, so how folks could then more than double that baffles me.

 

[Aepervius]

In a story published last Wednesday the New York Times included a new honorific, Mx. ["mix"], in a story that quoted one Senia Hardwick, a bookshop employee who didn’t want to be assigned a gender by the newspaper. Link.

The Washington Post has decided to permit employees to use 'they' to refer to "people who identify as neither male nor female".



Expect the usual suspects to rant on how this will cause the end of civilisation and/or is a "SJW" plot.

Or simply a linguistic question.

English has he , she and it. French has He and She. There is not it in french there is no neutral and there is no gender neutral for anything. All object are a she or an he, there is a the-he and a the-she (le , la) a a-he and an a-she (un une). Pretty much only plural does not indicate a gender.
Having a gender neutral stuff would be tacked on from Anglo-germanistic languages. That is not the only languages where this happen.

Language shapes culture and vice versa. As such is it really inconceivable that people would have extreme difficulty of accepting a gender neutral honorific when their own language , culture, and perception of non-assexual animal life is that it is always male female and not male female neutral ? Even the fish or amphibian which switches have as stable state female and male.