I have slipped up, yes. I think I've made three mistakes in the last three years, all of them more than two years ago. This is a person I saw pop out of their mother - a life habit is not something that changes instantly. It takes a little while to get used to, but it is not difficult to do. Once you've got it in your head, it's there. I implore you to make the small effort it takes.
Mate, if there were any other task -- say, doing something on the computer -- that you still got wrong at all after many years of doing it, and having all the incentive in the world to get it right, I'm sorry, but nobody would call it easy.
But more importantly, no matter how big or small the effort, you don't get to decide for me that I MUST care about your pet issue. Out of all the issues -- ranging from world hunger, to global warming, to Apple vs Microsoft vs Linux, to whatever -- that I might devote my limited time and mental capacity to, you have unilaterally decided that YOUR issue is THE one I MUST have in the top X that I actually care about and devote an effort to.
Sorry, but... what in Lucifer Morningstar's good name do you think gives you that right? Do you think you're royalty, or...?
I don't even care if it's a big or small effort. You don't get to unilaterally decide that I need to do it.
Jesus F Christ. Forget "cancel culture" or whatever, THIS is the real problem of the modern age: people thinking they're entitled to tell you that THEIR pet issue -- be it gender, Apple vs Microsoft vs Linux, saving the polar bears, or whatever -- is THE one you should have at the top of your list to care about. And taking it as some kind of hostility if you don't actually care about what they tell you to.
You are directly insulting them, and me, by deliberately and maliciously misgendering them like this. Please stop.
If you're that easily insulted that people don't bend over backwards to obey what you unilaterally decided should be one of their top concerns to devote their effort to... GOOD. Spares me the time to write an actual insult, and it's less likely to annoy the moderators
Also, how do you know they are a guy? I've just told you they're not. I didn't tell you their gender at birth because it's none of your business. You just assumed it.
I don't. I just don't give a flip. I just took my usual default. And yes, I've referred to very binary women as a "he" before.
I really was serious before that unless I'm actually intending to hump someone -- and doubly so about people over the Internet -- I'm like the Warhammer 40K Orks: everyone is one of Da Boyz. Just some of Da Boyz is funny shaped.
I might go for what looks like the obvious pronoun if you're in front of me and your clothing/haircut/makeup/whatever suggest an obvious "he" or "she", but otherwise you're a "he" as far as I'm concerned.
And on the bright side, it keeps me from doing "oh, she's only saying that / having problems with that / whatever because she's a
woman" bulverisms.
Furthermore, my child is not likely to be your concern. Other people will be your concern. The way you are treating my child is the way you will treat other people, and that can be harmful. In my opinion it is no different - no different - to calling a homosexual by a slur.
No it's not. One is caring enough one way or the other to use a slur, the other is not giving a flying f-bomb either way. And again, you don't get to decide what I should care about.
And anyone who thinks that refusing to let them dictate what I should care about is no different from actual hostility... yeah, well, that's exactly the kind of entitlement I was talking about.
Sorry. Nobody personally owes you anything, much less to let you write the list of what they should care about.
It is not acceptable in polite society, and there will be social consequences. This is not me cancelling you, this is me pointing out that you are on the wrong side of society. A different wrong side from racists and homophobes, perhaps, but still the wrong side.
The key difference being that racists and homophobes are actually against you being X, while I don't care at all either way. You're free to do whatever you wish. I won't try to stop you, but I won't be your champion either. But apparently just the fact that they can't unilaterally tell me to be in their camp, is insult enough for some people. Heh.
Sorry, but that's how everything else works in a modern western society. Again: nobody personally owes you a damn thing. Whatever positive rights you may have, they're handled by government agencies out of my taxes. Everything else is entirely voluntary.
You're free to believe X or do Y, as long as they're not illegal, but nobody has to bend over backwards to help you do that. Regardless of whether it's starting a business, getting a better job, starting a cult of Alduin, getting a date (same sex or otherwise), or identifying as an attack helicopter: go for it. But nobody owes it to you. We're not stopping you. We might even cheer at you if you succeed. But nobody owes you any care or effort towards whatever your issue is.
-- to everyone else we really aren't.
