Do pronouns feel alien to anyone else?

An email? The perfect, neutral, asexed form of communication, but that space is so unacceptably neutral and advantageous to women that sex has to force its way in? I have to remind my boss I'm female every single time I contact him even though he has surrounded himself with a male coterie in a highly female team? Why would anyone ask me to do that?

This. 100% this.

Physical dysphoria manifests differently for different people, and it does not have to apply to every aspect of one's body.

Not all trans people experience genital dysphoria for instance, and are content keeping genitals as they are.

So, a trans man seeking to have the physical characteristics associated with man, such as flat chest, body hair, won't necessarily feel uncomfortable with carrying a kid.

But that doesn't somehow "cancel out" the social dysphoria that comes with being referred to with feminine terms and labels like "woman".

OP - I get what you are saying. By using pronouns you are suggesting that you are fitting in to a series of stereotypes that you don't necessarily buy in to

Yes. I think I get what OP means. At work my sex is irrelevant in most contexts. Its almost certainly irrelevant in terms of the email recipient. If they don't need to know it, there is no need to draw attention to it.

it makes a political statement and a sex stereotype statement I don't want to make.

In my professional role I'm sometimes referred to by my profession instead of my name. That's not an insult, it just recognises that my profession is the reason I'm involved in the case and it saves time, especiallyif there is more than one 'Permanent' involved. I'm always referred to as Ms, not Mrs or Miss, at work because it is to some extent accepted that marital status can be private information in the workplace. Now sex is also being argued to be private information, and there's certainly a legal and feminist argument for that, it's also the basis of the GRA. So therefore in public environments it does make sense to argue for a policy of desexing language where it refers to identifiable individuals. There is no argument for desexing language in relevant group contexts such as pregnancy or pay/employment/abuse statistics.

Instead we have the opposite situation- identifiable individuals must be able to have personal sexualised profiles in the workplace, while anonymised groups have relevant language removed from public information about their group. I find it absolutely insane.

Yes. I would like to know the answer! I've just posted a thread about a transman I know and I am trying to understand it. Afaik this person transitioned physically because of dysphoria of the female body - are you saying this is NOT the case?

Is the use of pronouns mainly for those who don’t feel they look the way they should for the sex they identify? Is it to save the embarrassment of being misgendered?

@Zerogravity
I'll just repeat the question I asked in another thread. Do you actually care for the answer, or are you just trying to pull a gotcha, and are going to argue against anything I tell you?

So what is it that transmen reject about being female? If it's not the physical difference to men what is it?

Sorry, Employee*

For the same reason we refer to people by names instead of "Employer #2562".

Why not just use they/them and Mx as a standard for all? I wouldn't like it either personally, but who cares - it is much more arguable and defensible as a corporate policy than fannying about with individual preferences.

You're under the false assumption that trans men share your view of pregnancy as "something only women can do".

Because if we must have those categories, then the ability to choose gives people greater freedom, live their lives the way they wish to live.

I would 100% support giving women with endometriosis greater freedom, to live their lives the way they wish to live. Wouldn't it be wonderful if they could choose an identity that was free from pain.

and yet despite some transmen apparently suffering so badly from gender dysmorphia that they are triggered by the mere use of the word women and have ti have it erased from all the things, they’re fine to have babies literally the one thing that only women can do

right

no thank you

Trans men can get pregnant also, and I don't get why you can't respect their wishes to not refer to them as women.

Because, obviously, women are the ones who get pregnant, bear children and the most likely to be raped. So we need to define in law what a woman is. We're also the sex with the historic record of oppression and disadvantage.

If you can't grasp that, you are either stupid or deliberately obtuse, and I can't do a lot to help you.

@DontLikeCrumpets that's a lovely poem (with a bit of a snigger for "sod"), thank you for sharing. I liked the edit too. It's noticeable how altering a few words changes the meaning from the mystical to the material.

When I get an email with pronouns in the signature it's like a slap to me. As historically pronouns have been associated with sex, and using them carelessly has been considered rude ('who's 'she', the cat's mother?') is what I was taught. It's like Ash Sarkar's twitter bio ('Fucks like a champion') - its just something she has chosen to write but it's shocking in that context, off-putting. In the same way when I read pronouns in a work email I feel I've been taken out of a work space I can exist in where sex doesn't matter except in very defined ways (maternity leave and accommodations to pregnant colleagues, a colleague having treatment for testicular cancer, and I work in healthcare so it's relevant in case histories) and I'm then in a space where my sex is so central that everyone is writing it in their emails. I mean, what the fuck? An email? The perfect, neutral, asexed form of communication, but that space is so unacceptably neutral and advantageous to women that sex has to force its way in? I have to remind my boss I'm female every single time I contact him even though he has surrounded himself with a male coterie in a highly female team? Why would anyone ask me to do that?

That's what I feel about pronouns, if anyone wants to know. Yes I know sex and gender are separate. And I still think that in real life it is practically quite difficult to separate them. Being asked at work to pretend that I do have a work gender but don't have a sex, even though only my sex has ever affected my life, is nasty and oppressive. Does anyone really think if I suddenly put 'they/them' in my emails that I will rapidly become part of my boss's favoured group? Because if so I submit that you're living a fantasy.

Gender identity does not have to align with gender expression at all. Gender identity is not at all dependent on "stereotypes". Butch trans women exist.

What is it then? Please explain. Why do some males believe they are women?

That’s great, I’m all for greater freedom, honestly. The problem that I see is that people who genuinely don’t have strong innate sense of a gender identity are being compelled to declare one anyway. Fortunately for me, email signature pronouns are optional at my workplace, but I’ve heard from people who feel under considerable pressure to declare without an option for “any” or “no preference” being available.

Fine, live your life the way you wish. But accord me the equivalent and stop shoving your dogma down my throat.

Because if we must have those categories, then the ability to choose gives people greater freedom, live their lives the way they wish to live.

Why do you insist on demanding it? Why does personal belief need social and legal reinforcement?

If "nothing needs to be said", then why do you insist on saying it? Why does "biological reality" need social and legal reinforcement?

And then you call being trans a religion.