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Moderated Using wrong pronouns= violence??

Steve said:
My daughter is 21 yo. Her boyfriend is 23. They have never encountered this issue of pronouns - I asked - and neither have any of their friends and contemporaries that they are aware of. They blithely continue to use he/she him/her as the norm in conversations.
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My kids are nearly a decade younger. They each have trans kids in their classes since elementary school. They make fun of me for assuming gender and use "they" more often than not.
 
arthwollipot said:
I said nothing at all about mental health professionals. Yes, they can certainly help. But emotional trauma never fully goes away, like a bruise or a cut does. It is a valid point to make a comparison to serious injury, which can leave scars and permanent disability, I will grant that. But someone who has undergone emotional trauma can never go back to their pre-traumatised state.
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Like any trauma, some may fade with time and professional assistance, and some will be permanently incapacitating. But you are unequivocally stating that emotional trauma is permanent. I disagree, as does my psychologist bride.

Not to put you on the spot, but can you cite a source for your unique claim? I highly doubt any mental health professional would make such a sweeping claim without the qualifiers that I suggested, and you are bracing against.

I am using the correct terms. AMAB and AFAB are standard in the transgender literature and in the community. And an OB-GYN will assign a gender according to the observation of the baby's genitals, not by randomisation. That's all straw on your part.
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Hyperbole is not straw. And yes, you are using the terms consistently with the literature. What I'm saying is that the literature is using them wrongly, and trying to slide some new starting assumptions in there. Some of us object to word games, at least on serious topics.

A newborn is not assigned male or female. It is male or female (sex ID). Their gender, whatever that may be, is not self identified yet, as a newborn has no concept of ******* social roles or how they view themselves. "This baby has a penis" is not an assignment. It is an objective recognition. "Assigned" carries the notion of variables or options. There are none at birth.

Yeah that's happened before, quite a few times. It has never caught on. They/them is easier to remember and has the benefit of being recognised as actual English words, used in an appropriate context. So yeah, vanishingly small, in practice.

Like I said, if you default to They/Them, almost nobody will complain.
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What may or may not be widely acceptable is not really the topic. The topic, as others have been hammering, is the UC Boulder guidelines, which are big ze advocates, as well as recommending ordering students to "never assume gender". That's getting silly. One can assume gender correctly probably north of 99% of the time, so there's literally no reason to play dumb during that big ol' 99%.
 
Upchurch said:
Just like they grew out of being okay with gay marriage, gay people in general, interracial marriage, civil rights, segregation, woman's suffrage, and abolition?

aaaaany day now.
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No, they will grow out of mocking people for not being as "woke" as they are.
 
Thermal said:
Like any trauma, some may fade with time and professional assistance, and some will be permanently incapacitating. But you are unequivocally stating that emotional trauma is permanent. I disagree, as does my psychologist bride.

Not to put you on the spot, but can you cite a source for your unique claim? I highly doubt any mental health professional would make such a sweeping claim without the qualifiers that I suggested, and you are bracing against.



Hyperbole is not straw. And yes, you are using the terms consistently with the literature. What I'm saying is that the literature is using them wrongly, and trying to slide some new starting assumptions in there. Some of us object to word games, at least on serious topics.

A newborn is not assigned male or female. It is male or female (sex ID). Their gender, whatever that may be, is not self identified yet, as a newborn has no concept of ******* social roles or how they view themselves. "This baby has a penis" is not an assignment. It is an objective recognition. "Assigned" carries the notion of variables or options. There are none at birth.



What may or may not be widely acceptable is not really the topic. The topic, as others have been hammering, is the UC Boulder guidelines, which are big ze advocates, as well as recommending ordering students to "never assume gender". That's getting silly. One can assume gender correctly probably north of 99% of the time, so there's literally no reason to play dumb during that big ol' 99%.
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Funny, I was assigned "male" as soon as I was born.
 
gnome said:
I can recognize a difference between promoting the idea and overreacting to people who take a different path.

It seems to me in most cases, regardless of what is advocated, if you prefer you can take your best guess even with he/she, and so long as you don't fly off the handle if someone makes a polite correction to their preference, you should be fine.

I think it's been pointed out that generally you're not going to get a bad reaction unless you make a point of using a different term after a direct preference has already been expressed individually. I won't say nobody ever has a different experience but it seems no more likely than someone losing their temper randomly over any other thing.
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Roundly agreed. My somewhat sledgehammered objection is the UC Boulder guidelines saying never to assume gender, and use the kicky "ze" pronoun (which doesn't even ******* exist). When presumably well meaning UCB students say that you should never assume gender, they are just getting stupid, and some mother ****** needs to reel them back in from their overwoke precipice.
 
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Thermal said:
Roundly agreed. My somewhat sledgehammered objection is the UC Boulder guidelines saying never to assume gender, and use the kicky "ze" pronoun (which doesn't even ******* exist) or they. When presumably well meaning UCB students say that you should never assume gender, they are just getting stupid, and some mother ****** needs to reel them back in from their overwoke precipice.
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FTFY
 
"Try to introduce yourself with your own pronouns so that everyone you meet knows that you’re a safe space and that you won’t assume a person’s pronouns. It also prompts them to provide pronouns without it being awkward. (Ex. “Hello, my name is Alex and I use they/them/theirs pronouns.”)"

No....no....no.

I will NOT be introducing myself by saying "hi, my name is George. My preferred pronoun is "he".

******* ridiculous.
 
Hercules56 said:
"Try to introduce yourself with your own pronouns so that everyone you meet knows that you’re a safe space and that you won’t assume a person’s pronouns. It also prompts them to provide pronouns without it being awkward. (Ex. “Hello, my name is Alex and I use they/them/theirs pronouns.”)"

No....no....no.

I will NOT be introducing myself by saying "hi, my name is George. My preferred pronoun is "he".

******* ridiculous.
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Well, refusing a courtesy that won't cost you anything is also information rich communication.
 
TurkeysGhost said:
Well, refusing a courtesy that won't cost you anything is also information rich communication.
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Yes, I refuse to say such stupid things.

Anyone with eyes and ears knows I am a man.

If you need me to tell you which pronoun I prefer before we can engage in conversation, you can turn around and walk away.
 
Darat said:
FTFY
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If someone wants to use "they", that's fine. I think it may be interpreted as wearing a transphope badge, but that would often be contextual. Someone is living as a woman? She's a she, done and done, as far as I'm concerned.

Do you agree with the guideline that gender should never be assumed? "Never" seems a pretty strong word.

ETA: I'm not arguing about using "they". I was arguing that the very insertion of "ze" is freaking stupid. It doesn't matter if they presented reasonable options. They shouldn't be pushing stupid ones for any reason.
 
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Hercules56 said:
"Try to introduce yourself with your own pronouns so that everyone you meet knows that you’re a safe space and that you won’t assume a person’s pronouns. It also prompts them to provide pronouns without it being awkward. (Ex. “Hello, my name is Alex and I use they/them/theirs pronouns.”)"

No....no....no.

I will NOT be introducing myself by saying "hi, my name is George. My preferred pronoun is "he".

******* ridiculous.
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How long have you've been a student at UC Boulder?

That aside - can you imagine someone introducing themselves as Mister Smith! Why do we need to know they are a mister - ridiculous.

Times change, customs change, either change with the times or don't, it's your choice.
 
Darat said:
How long have you've been a student at UC Boulder?

That aside - can you imagine someone introducing themselves as Mister Smith! Why do we need to know they are a mister - ridiculous.

Times change, customs change, either change with the times or don't, it's your choice.
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I don't expect this to become a real long-term sociatal phenomenon. More like a short-term silly fad.
 
Thermal said:
Roundly agreed. My somewhat sledgehammered objection is the UC Boulder guidelines saying never to assume gender, and use the kicky "ze" pronoun (which doesn't even ******* exist). When presumably well meaning UCB students say that you should never assume gender, they are just getting stupid, and some mother ****** needs to reel them back in from their overwoke precipice.
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I think it's a fallacy to say that a word "doesn't exist". Every word "didn't exist" until it came into popular usage. Some neologisms stick, some don't.
 
Thermal said:
If someone wants to use "they", that's fine. I think it may be interpreted as wearing a transphope badge, but that would often be contextual. Someone is living as a woman? She's a she, done and done, as far as I'm concerned.

Do you agree with the guideline that gender should never be assumed? "Never" seems a pretty strong word. ...snip...
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I think it's a good point and we should try to make as few assumptions about each other which does include their gender or sex. I also know there is no way I'm not going to make pronoun gender and sex assumptions, it's part of how I was trained and is pretty much "automatic". If I was today an 18 year old student at UC Boulder I think I probably would (as they say) try to follow the guidelines, and that wouldn't be fighting against over 50 years of assuming someone's gender or sex so would become as automatic for that 18 year old as they age as my assuming gender and sex with pronoun usage is automatic for me.
 
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