Pronouns in email

A senior colleague of mine with a gender-neutral name kept getting Mr’ed due to sexist assumptions and so she put her pronouns in her sig pretty early in this trend as a result.

Actually another thought - as a lot of people here have observed, men have "selective hearing" down as a fine art.

Men have no problem ignoring something or just making some non-committal noise, and then just carrying on doing whatever they want to do.

That really is the best approach for a lot of this stuff - why even feel you have to justify ignoring it? Women need to get the hang of doing this. A man would not feel he needed to "explain" anything. Has the OP actually been asked to explain anything? Maybe it might come to that, but in the interim, forget it. I suspect it's unlikely to get to the point of them compelling it and confronting refuseniks.

Similarly for a lot of Woke tantruming. Just ignore them.

Just watched a good little 15 minute segment by Benjamin Boyce talking about a .

*comfortable I meant

If this tries to get introduced in my work there's not a chance I'll be doing it. If there's a fuss I'll explain I feel like I'm being discriminated against for not feeling comfortable to do it.
I'm a female. I'm not putting my pronouns in a work email which is meant to be a professional setting.
It's my decision if I want to put pronouns in an email, You should not be having to force people to do so. It's funny, it's spoken about doing these things to make others feel comfortable and feel inclusive, but if someone isn't comfortable doing so, it's considered poor of them. Funny that. Guess it's not about ensuring all feel uncomfortable.

Like it was ever unclear what sex and/or gender the bearded man named Jeremy, leader of a party that’s never had a female leader was but, oh! The rapture in the ranks!

On another thread someone mentioned that people in her DHs company were told to add pronouns. Iirc, The blokes mostly took the piss and the idea was quietly dropped.

It just seems like the sort of daft idea the stupid women in HR would come up with. This sort of social stuff is a woman thing. Anyway, the woman suggesting it probably has a too-high pitched voice that's outside the range of male hearing.

Going along with corporate nonsense is not very manly - it's a sign of weakness.

Any man who does do it is likely either riding the misogyny train or trying to impress some woman who's into it.

I also thing a lot of men would be a bit embarrassed to do it in case other men took the piss. "What's this 'He/him' gobshite, eh Bob? Hey guys, looks like Bob was a bit worried people couldn't tell she was a bloke! "

1) Why have men not participated in the move to add pronouns? Is it because they think they're above this silly nonsense? Is it because they don't see why they should have to affirm their obvious maleness? Or something else?

Jeremy Corbyn announced his pronouns.

1) Why have men not participated in the move to add pronouns? Is it because they think they're above this silly nonsense? Is it because they don't see why they should have to affirm their obvious maleness? Or something else?

On another thread someone mentioned that people in her DHs company were told to add pronouns. Iirc, The blokes mostly took the piss and the idea was quietly dropped.

• 2. If someone's name is ambiguous (either because it's non-gender identifying like Alex or Sam, or because it's a foreign name you're not familiar with) what should you do if you want to refer to them in the third person? Use "they" and "them"?

This is pretty common. Using 'they' as a singular for a person of unknown sex has been commonplace for centuries so you can do that. Its so normal it's not really obvious in speech unless someone is labouring the point. And it's usually not too hard to write emails without any third person pronouns at all.

I have some questions:

1. Why have men not participated in the move to add pronouns? Is it because they think they're above this silly nonsense? Is it because they don't see why they should have to affirm their obvious maleness? Or something else?

2. If someone's name is ambiguous (either because it's non-gender identifying like Alex or Sam, or because it's a foreign name you're not familiar with) what should you do if you want to refer to them in the third person? Use "they" and "them"?

3. What about intersex people? I should think it could be quite "triggering" to have to assert your gender if you have a DSD.

Also for those fearing sexism, for most (not all admittedly) your name shows that you identify as a woman

Are you suggesting that if you have, for example. “Mum” in your username you are identifying as a woman?! That is the very definition of transphobia.

Please do better.

It amazes me how we are expected to indulge such silliness in the workplace.

I think I prefer this one. It would be much more interesting to implement.

I'd quite like misogynistic, ablist, Anglocentric nonsense to 'get in the bin' tbh. But if people want to persist in it that's their choice.

"My pronouns are sex based just like my oppression"

I can't remember which poster said this but I intend to use it if ever I have to!

Mumofbees: saying it should be a choice is enough to get you called a transphobe or a t**f. And if everyone else is doing it you are likely to be noted as a transphobe, even if you might actually just be struggling with your identity.

Demands for pronouns are so disablist. It causes my godson with ASD acute distress because he sees it as lying, especially when the person asking for he/him pronouns at school is obviously to his eyes a she/her.

My brother has a brain injury which has affected his memory and communication skills and he lives in fear of making a pronoun mistake with one of his (hundreds) of students and getting a complaint made against him.

slow to post sorry.
So you are saying that one side of the argument should do as you say and the other can do as they feel?

@MumofBees what if the person hasn't decided yet or hasn't come out to their work world. Why do you get to tell them when they do this.
I agree with upthread pronouns are going to be deemed oppressive and transphobic soon because not every trans person will be comfortable with telling everyone.

"Having pronouns" is the latest fashion of a subset of the middle-class intelligentsia. Participating in this ritual is the new way of marking out who is U and non-U. No company that takes social mobility seriously should be promoting this.

Sorry yeah, I do think it should definitely be a choice. No one should be made to disclose anything about themselves that they don't want to. I can understand why you would and wouldn't one to. Your identity is your choice alone.

But all the GC transphobe nonsense can get in the bin.

Sammiesnake (pronouns: undisclosed)
That may make it seem that it is computer generated.