Itās not necessarily a social faux pas to misgender someone, thatās a myth made up by conservatives. Itās a faux pas to intentionally misgender people.
Sorta like if you call someone Jeb and they correct you and say itās Jed. It only becomes an issue if you insist on calling them Jeb.
Fair, but I donāt want every social interaction I have to be me messing up and apologizing to people that I have missgendered them. That sounds way more exhausting than current social interactions are for me, and I already find them exhausting.
I hear you saying you you would like a universal gender neutral pronoun. You rarely need to know someoneās gender when talking to them, just what pronouns to use.
Fortunately they/them works for this purpose, and is universally understood in English. Itās perfectly acceptable to refer to someone as they/them or their name when having a conversation not specifically about gender and preferred pronouns.
Not knowing someoneās gender has existed far longer than our modern understanding of the nuance of the concept.
Itās not irrelevant to everyone. We have a phrase that allows you to omit them, but that doesnāt mean that everyone wants to do that.
Additionally, having the concept is needed for people to talk about their experiences and figure stuff out.
Their need to describe themselves in conversations that donāt involve you is perfectly sufficient reason to have the words.
āConfuses youā is not a good enough reason to invalidate a core part of peopleās identity, particularly when it may have been hard for them to get things figured out.
Itās important to remember that gender is irrelevant, but only if itās someone elseās. It can be aggravating to be told that something you worked hard to figure out doesnāt matter when it very much matters to you.
Iām not invalidating it. You can have names for it. I donāt care. I just donāt want it to be socially required for me to know.
I donāt expect you to know what my favorite programming language is. So please donāt expect me to know what gender you are when it doesnāt matter for social interactions.
Rather, any conception of gender would arise from within, and be part of oneās self-identity, rather than a tool used by society to prescribe a role or identity.
That āprescribe a role or identityā is why itās useful to get rid of. It leaves people with more freedom to form their identities, not less.
It can be aggravating to be told that something you worked hard to figure out doesnāt matter
I very much like the gender identity that I have; thereās nothing wrong with that.
Iām not confusing anything. It kinda seems like youāre reading something different into what they were saying.
They seem to be saying the ultimately misguided but best possible interpretation of āyour gender doesnāt matter to me, so why is it something that comes up?ā.
Finding your own manner of gender expression and not having it pushed on you from outside doesnāt preclude having language to describe where you end up.
I know they werenāt saying āshut up about your gender, it doesnāt matterā. To someone who is working on finding themselves, or had to work hard to do so, the sentiment can come across that way. For all aspects of identity, people donāt want a ādonāt ask, donāt tellā style tolerance in a void. Theyād rather have the ability to express their identity, find community and so on.
As such, we need words to communicate these topics.
I very much like the gender identity that I have; thereās nothing wrong with that.
Iām happy for you! I am as well! Iām a little confused as to what that has to do with the bit you quoted though.
I mean it wouldnāt be every social interaction. Not even a majority. Something like 2% of the population identifies as something other than their assigned gender at birth, and the majority of those are transgender individuals who make it very clear how they want to be referred to.
Understand that these people will continue to have the same gender identity whether you understand it or not. The alternative to apologizing to people when you misgender them isā¦ not apologizing for it.
Yeah today. But we know gender is a made-up category now. And already itās starting to diverge. I can easily imagine 20 years from now there being like 50 different genders, and the amount of people who donāt associate with men or women will be much greater.
You do that already, and itās even worse actually because everyone has an even more individual and sometimes difficult to remember thing about them you have to balance in a social situation. Itās called a name. You have to be told it, you can easily forget it, and itās a social slight to call someone the wrong name. Right now gender expression feels uncomfortable to have to tell people because of the politisation and stigma pressed on it, but it doesnāt have to be anything different than asking for someoneās name to better address them.
Yeah but Iām okay with names. Iām not okay with genders. At a bare minimum to interact with people in society, you need to know a name, some kind of identifier. If I knew of a way around that I would suggest it. However, interacting with people in society does not require knowing their gender. At least now it doesnāt require it as itās pretty clear that gender is a made-up category.
Itās not necessarily a social faux pas to misgender someone, thatās a myth made up by conservatives. Itās a faux pas to intentionally misgender people.
Sorta like if you call someone Jeb and they correct you and say itās Jed. It only becomes an issue if you insist on calling them Jeb.
Fair, but I donāt want every social interaction I have to be me messing up and apologizing to people that I have missgendered them. That sounds way more exhausting than current social interactions are for me, and I already find them exhausting.
I hear you saying you you would like a universal gender neutral pronoun. You rarely need to know someoneās gender when talking to them, just what pronouns to use.
Fortunately they/them works for this purpose, and is universally understood in English. Itās perfectly acceptable to refer to someone as they/them or their name when having a conversation not specifically about gender and preferred pronouns.
Not knowing someoneās gender has existed far longer than our modern understanding of the nuance of the concept.
Yes, this is what I mean. I am fine with they/them. I donāt need to know anyoneās specific pronouns or gender.
But if no one needs to know anyoneās specific pronouns or gender, then why have it as a concept other than as a niche topic of discussion?
Itās not irrelevant to everyone. We have a phrase that allows you to omit them, but that doesnāt mean that everyone wants to do that.
Additionally, having the concept is needed for people to talk about their experiences and figure stuff out.
Their need to describe themselves in conversations that donāt involve you is perfectly sufficient reason to have the words.
āConfuses youā is not a good enough reason to invalidate a core part of peopleās identity, particularly when it may have been hard for them to get things figured out.
Itās important to remember that gender is irrelevant, but only if itās someone elseās. It can be aggravating to be told that something you worked hard to figure out doesnāt matter when it very much matters to you.
Iām not invalidating it. You can have names for it. I donāt care. I just donāt want it to be socially required for me to know.
I donāt expect you to know what my favorite programming language is. So please donāt expect me to know what gender you are when it doesnāt matter for social interactions.
You are kind of confusing a systemic critique with some kind of personal attack against individual people.
From what seems like a decent enough article on Gender Abolitionism:
That āprescribe a role or identityā is why itās useful to get rid of. It leaves people with more freedom to form their identities, not less.
I very much like the gender identity that I have; thereās nothing wrong with that.
Iām not confusing anything. It kinda seems like youāre reading something different into what they were saying.
They seem to be saying the ultimately misguided but best possible interpretation of āyour gender doesnāt matter to me, so why is it something that comes up?ā.
Finding your own manner of gender expression and not having it pushed on you from outside doesnāt preclude having language to describe where you end up.
I know they werenāt saying āshut up about your gender, it doesnāt matterā. To someone who is working on finding themselves, or had to work hard to do so, the sentiment can come across that way. For all aspects of identity, people donāt want a ādonāt ask, donāt tellā style tolerance in a void. Theyād rather have the ability to express their identity, find community and so on.
As such, we need words to communicate these topics.
Iām happy for you! I am as well! Iām a little confused as to what that has to do with the bit you quoted though.
I mean it wouldnāt be every social interaction. Not even a majority. Something like 2% of the population identifies as something other than their assigned gender at birth, and the majority of those are transgender individuals who make it very clear how they want to be referred to.
Understand that these people will continue to have the same gender identity whether you understand it or not. The alternative to apologizing to people when you misgender them isā¦ not apologizing for it.
Yeah today. But we know gender is a made-up category now. And already itās starting to diverge. I can easily imagine 20 years from now there being like 50 different genders, and the amount of people who donāt associate with men or women will be much greater.
You do that already, and itās even worse actually because everyone has an even more individual and sometimes difficult to remember thing about them you have to balance in a social situation. Itās called a name. You have to be told it, you can easily forget it, and itās a social slight to call someone the wrong name. Right now gender expression feels uncomfortable to have to tell people because of the politisation and stigma pressed on it, but it doesnāt have to be anything different than asking for someoneās name to better address them.
Yeah but Iām okay with names. Iām not okay with genders. At a bare minimum to interact with people in society, you need to know a name, some kind of identifier. If I knew of a way around that I would suggest it. However, interacting with people in society does not require knowing their gender. At least now it doesnāt require it as itās pretty clear that gender is a made-up category.