Moderated Using wrong pronouns= violence??

[Upchurch]

And the UC Boulder guidelines seem to indicate this is so everyday an occurrence as to advise students to make no assumptions about anyone, and address them as "ze".
Got someone who keeps referring to the student guideline, you sure seems to forget an awful lot.

I didn't forget that that isn't what it says. It suggested any gender-neutral pronouns, of which it gave two examples. Only one example was "ze", but you are fully allowed to use "they" if that is a comfort to your sensibilities.

 

[Thermal]

I didn't forget that that isn't what it says. It suggested any gender-neutral pronouns, of which it gave two examples. Only one example was "ze", but you are fully allowed to use "they" if that is a comfort to your sensibilities.

And that would still be ridiculous. If you will excuse me, imma be normal and call female presenting females as "she" and male presenting males as "he" and wing the possibility of using non-prefetred nomenclature a few times across the generations (for which I would apologize and comply). There is no need whatsoever to treat every obvious male and female you meet as being so androgynous that you can't hazard a safe guess.

I mean, seriously. Walk up to a young lady in pigtails and a skirt and tell her you can't tell if she is male or female and your forced to ask. You'll be a big hit with the ladies. Not to mention getting hit by every guy you pull that **** on.

 

[johnny karate]

And that would still be ridiculous. If you will excuse me, imma be normal and call female presenting females as "she" and male presenting males as "he" and wing the possibility of using non-prefetred nomenclature a few times across the generations (for which I would apologize and comply). There is no need whatsoever to treat every obvious male and female you meet as being so androgynous that you can't hazard a safe guess.

I mean, seriously. Walk up to a young lady in pigtails and a skirt and tell her you can't tell if she is male or female and your forced to ask. You'll be a big hit with the ladies. Not to mention getting hit by every guy you pull that **** on.

The way you describe hypothetical human interactions makes it seem like you've never actually interacted with a human.

Who exactly is expecting you to correctly guess someone's preferred pronouns upon first meeting them? In what scenario are you even using someone's pronouns when you are directly addressing them, as opposed to just their name?

You're just making up nonsensical scenarios to create the illusion of a problem where one doesn't exist.

 

[Hercules56]

I didn't forget that that isn't what it says. It suggested any gender-neutral pronouns, of which it gave two examples. Only one example was "ze", but you are fully allowed to use "they" if that is a comfort to your sensibilities.

If somebody looks like a man I'm going to call them he.

If they look like a woman I am going to call them she.

Is somebody tells me to do otherwise I will consider it.

But the default will be he and she.

 

[Upchurch]

If you will excuse me, imma be normal...

Normal for who?

That's the problem with black-and-white thinking, you miss a lot of details. You miss that not assuming gender is pretty normal for the younger set, for example. You also miss out that asking about pronouns is considered polite and not an insult.

You can keep up or be that relative at family get togethers that no one wants to talk to for fear of setting you of on some transphobic rant .

 

[Thermal]

The way you describe hypothetical human interactions makes it seem like you've never actually interacted with a human.

Who exactly is expecting you to correctly guess someone's preferred pronouns upon first meeting them? In what scenario are you even using someone's pronouns when you are directly addressing them, as opposed to just their name?

You're just making up nonsensical scenarios to create the illusion of a problem where one doesn't exist.

I know you mean well and don't mean to be ignorant of the thread topic, but if you trouble yourself to actually read the UC Boulder guidelines in question, you will see that they actively warn against guessing at someone's gender. Here, I'll copy some for you:

If you don’t know someone’s pronouns, don’t assume gendered pronouns and use gender-neutral ones, like they or ze.

It is never safe to assume someone’s gender

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.

Do you understand what it means to never assume someone's gender? It means that the most feminine of women or the most masculine of guys you are literally expected to act stupid about, like a...what did you call it?...oh yeah, a human that never actually interacted with another human. Yes, the article advises to be just as stupid as you are playing at (no, I don't believe you are as dense as you are trying to make me think you are).

Basically, the UC Boulder article is a study in condescension. It spends a good quarter of it's words literally explaining pronouns at about a fourth grade level. This is directed at adult incoming college students, mind you. Evidently, they expect their incoming students to be remarkably uneducated in basic grammar.

But getting back to your astute criticism: not guessing someone's gender is what the whole thing is about, dumbass.

 

[Thermal]

Normal for who?

Normal for the overwhelming majority who can look at the overwhelming majority of people and can guess correctly if the other is a man or woman. It may continue to puzzle you, but most of us get by pretty well, and effortlessly correctly.

That's the problem with black-and-white thinking, you miss a lot of details. You miss that not assuming gender is pretty normal for the younger set, for example. You also miss out that asking about pronouns is considered polite and not an insult.

Yeah, in the 1970's, the "younger set" wanted to know your astrological sign. Now they want to know your spirit animal or alternative gender. If you feel like you have to rely on the demographic with the least maturity and life experience to bolster your point, you might wanna rethink your position. "The younger set" is not exactly known for its wisdom. .

You can keep up or be that relative at family get togethers that no one wants to talk to for fear of setting you of on some transphobic rant .

Ya, after I've expressed unequivocal symathy for trans people, that's totally likely. You so smart. Can you play schoolmarm some more? It's kinda hot.

 

[arthwollipot]

Well...yeah, much like an amputee learns to live around it. Am I to take it that you have no confidence at all in mental health professionals and treatments? Once any emotional.damage is done, it is permanent and incapacitating? I don't get where you are going with this.

If that's what you're getting from what I've been saying, then I have to seriously look at how I've been saying things.

The weirdest thing about trans arguments is that there is an unspoken acknowledgement that a trans person feels that they are an X in a Y body, basically either acknowledging a soul, or acknowledging an identification disorder, which would be a form of delusion, and don't skeptics generally not encourage delusions?

That is a mischaracterisation. Recognising that someone who was assigned male at birth is actually female neither acknowledges the existence of a soul nor fosters a delusion.

I mean, I'm fine with calling a trans person s/he as they identify, just out of sympathy for how disorienting it must be to feel like you're in the "wrong" body. But the whole steaming pile of gender justifications is misdirection, and throws the door open wide for bull **** gender IDs, which turns the whole gig into a joke, and hurts the original compassionate position.

I'd feel highly harassed by being told to refer to someone as a zir.

I went through this repeatedly with cullennz before he went and got himself banned.

The number of people who will insist on bespoke neopronouns is vanishingly small. They certainly exist, but in general nobody will complain if you use the singular they/them.

If somebody looks like a man I'm going to call them he.

If they look like a woman I am going to call them she.

Is somebody tells me to do otherwise I will consider it.

But the default will be he and she.

What if they look androgynous?

 

[Upchurch]

Just since the time I created this account, it wasn’t normal to need to guess wether a married person had a wife or a husband. And asking if someone had either a girlfriend or a boyfriend could get you beaten up.

Social norms change and progress and, somehow, we manage to adapt and not worry too much about it. It turns out, you can explain gay relationships to kids and it their heads don’t explode from confusion. Funny enough, they can understand transgenderism in much the same way.

“Normal” is relative, not absolute.

 

[Thermal]

If that's what you're getting from what I've been saying, then I have to seriously look at how I've been saying things.

You said physical injuries heal, but emotional damage can last a lifetime. Then you said that healing emotional damage meant learning to cope with it. Am I really that far out there interpreting it that way? Sure sounds like you don't trust mental health professionals to help heal.

That is a mischaracterisation. Recognising that someone who was assigned male at birth is actually female neither acknowledges the existence of a soul nor fosters a delusion.

Just trying to piss me off now, aren't you? One is not assigned male. One is recognized as biologically male. The OB-GYN doesn't play rock paper scissors to assign you one sex or another.

I went through this repeatedly with cullennz before he went and got himself banned.

The number of people who will insist on bespoke neopronouns is vanishingly small. They certainly exist, but in general nobody will complain if you use the singular they/them

I refer you again to the UC Boulder guidelines, where they suggest preemptively using "ze". They sure as hell don't think it is vanishingly anything.

 

[arthwollipot]

You said physical injuries heal, but emotional damage can last a lifetime. Then you said that healing emotional damage meant learning to cope with it. Am I really that far out there interpreting it that way? Sure sounds like you don't trust mental health professionals to help heal.

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.

Just trying to piss me off now, aren't you? One is not assigned male. One is recognized as biologically male. The OB-GYN doesn't play rock paper scissors to assign you one sex or another.

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.

I refer you again to the UC Boulder guidelines, where they suggest preemptively using "ze". They sure as hell don't think it is vanishingly anything.

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.

 

[Samson]

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.

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.

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.

In New Zealand there is no gender.
Sex is recorded at birth and goes on the birth certificate.
The new law is called gender recognition but it is sex that is legally changed. There is no gender on any birth certificate.
The closest I can think of is an innocent man who is legally guilty of murder.
Because sex is the only category on existing birth certificates it was deemed convenient that people will change their sex unconditionally from June 16.
This will make pronouns more or less mandatory in observance so I can see there being no grey areas in matters like sport. She will beat the women fair and square regardless of genitalia.
Likewise she will undress in front of girl children while fully intact as a male. There is no wiggle room at all.

 

[Lothian]

In New Zealand there is no gender.
Sex is recorded at birth and goes on the birth certificate.
The new law is called gender recognition but it is sex that is legally changed. There is no gender on any birth certificate.
The closest I can think of is an innocent man who is legally guilty of murder.

Allowing people to change sex is in your view a tragedy equivalent to an innocent man bring accused of murder. Ummmm

Because sex is the only category on existing birth certificates it was deemed convenient that people will change their sex unconditionally from June 16.

Unconditionally you say? Everyone in New Zealand changes sex on June 16th. Well it will make the men's Rugby world cup more open.

This will make pronouns more or less mandatory in observance so I can see there being no grey areas in matters like sport. She will beat the women fair and square regardless of genitalia.
Likewise she will undress in front of girl children while fully intact as a male. There is no wiggle room at all.

Don't know what sport you play mate, but generally here we don't have young girls in adults changing roomx.

 

[Samson]

Allowing people to change sex is in your view a tragedy equivalent to an innocent man bring accused of murder. Ummmm

Unconditionally you say? Everyone in New Zealand changes sex on June 16th. Well it will make the men's Rugby world cup more open.


Don't know what sport you play mate, but generally here we don't have young girls in adults changing roomx.

We do.
Public swimming pools.

 

[Ryan O'Dine]

On the one hand, we have trans allies who are willing to use any pronouns requested. On the other, anti-trans won't go past he/she. I suspect the middle is vast and can acclimate to "they" but, like Thermal, will have a problem with off brand pronouns. For this reason, I feel the trans community would do well to seek buy in from the middle.

I don't believe the invented pronouns have any deep root meaning in themselves, and everybody will be asked to use them. So ideally this should be a conversation where mutual agreement is the goal.

 

[Hercules56]

If that's what you're getting from what I've been saying, then I have to seriously look at how I've been saying things.

That is a mischaracterisation. Recognising that someone who was assigned male at birth is actually female neither acknowledges the existence of a soul nor fosters a delusion.

I went through this repeatedly with cullennz before he went and got himself banned.

The number of people who will insist on bespoke neopronouns is vanishingly small. They certainly exist, but in general nobody will complain if you use the singular they/them.

What if they look androgynous?

Only encountered that once in my life.

 

[Upchurch]

On the one hand, we have trans allies who are willing to use any pronouns requested. On the other, anti-trans won't go past he/she. I suspect the middle is vast and can acclimate to "they" but, like Thermal, will have a problem with off brand pronouns. For this reason, I feel the trans community would do well to seek buy in from the middle.

I don't believe the invented pronouns have any deep root meaning in themselves, and everybody will be asked to use them. So ideally this should be a conversation where mutual agreement is the goal.

Time will tell, but I’m pretty sure few, if any, on this board will make that agreement. I’d argue that my kids’ generation already has.

 

[Steve]

In my entire life, in the real world and online for me it's been a grand total of zero. (ETA: Have to put in -of course - as far as I can recollect.)

(That is working in or for large companies with HR departments desperate to show they do something, that is working in "customer facing" roles and with entire teams of people the incel movement rejected as being too weird and introverted for them. And in my personal life knowing a diverse group of people.)

And yes I would think it ludicrous if someone wanted me use a new word as their personal pronoun but you know what - I'd try. It's no skin off my nose, pronouns are not something particularly important for me and I already try to remember many folks' foibles and strange little ticks as it helps to keep life running smoothly.

I suspect that the only reason you would wish to use a third person (because that is the only context in which these pronouns would be used) pronoun regarding a person you had encountered exactly once is if you were telling someone else about the "ludicrous" word they chose to use as their personal pronoun. A self-fulfilling request on the part of that person. If they had not made that request the encounter would have no significance and you would very likely never mention that person at all.

Of course if this turned out to be a person you encounter repeatedly then I agree that using their chosen pronoun would be the right, and simple, thing to do.

 

[Steve]

Time will tell, but I’m pretty sure few, if any, on this board will make that agreement. I’d argue that my kids’ generation already has.

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.

A small sample for sure, but it makes me wonder just how widespread this issue is among the general population of even younger people. I can see it coming up in colleges and the like where social activism is common, and certainly in populations where other-gendered persons are more concentrated. And I suspect over time it may well become more prevalent in the population at large. But right now, for me, it is an academic (and educational) discussion on this forum only with no current or expected real word application.

 

[gnome]

You said physical injuries heal, but emotional damage can last a lifetime. Then you said that healing emotional damage meant learning to cope with it. Am I really that far out there interpreting it that way? Sure sounds like you don't trust mental health professionals to help heal.



Just trying to piss me off now, aren't you? One is not assigned male. One is recognized as biologically male. The OB-GYN doesn't play rock paper scissors to assign you one sex or another.



I refer you again to the UC Boulder guidelines, where they suggest preemptively using "ze". They sure as hell don't think it is vanishingly anything.

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.