Mandated to give my ten year old's pronouns - how to respond

I don’t think you understand what pronouns are. They replace your name (I/ she/ her/ my/ mine) Even if you only ever refer to yourself in third person (serafinasgoose will be home at 8 tonight, for example) other people will use pronouns (presumably she/her) about you. So yes, basic grammar means everyone has pronouns

Do you know what pronouns are?

• Cleverly.
• Angrily.
• Idioticly.

The first and third are not necessarily in conflict.

For anyone in any doubt, this is what a woman is:

Paris 2024 Olympics: Fencer Nada Hafez competes while seven months pregnant - BBC Sport

Presumably everyone has pronouns that they prefer to be referred to by though? Isn't that what we're talking about here?

Yes, being pedantic, I don't 'have' she/her pronouns but I would certainly correct someone if they referred to me as he/him.

And a small proportion of children, the ones who are distressed about their sexed bodies and disproportionately likely to be autistic, will be compelled to come out or else lie about their preference.

To protect these vulnerable children, make the question optional. It's really not a big ask.

Running - no one ‘has’ pronouns. They are simply words used to replace nouns, and they are sometimes based on sex.

So you still haven't understood the difference between using pronouns and "having" pronouns?

They don't. There have been clear explanations as to why given upthread. They are not difficult to follow or comprehend.

We don't have pronouns.

What are your adverbs by the way?

Very true about lingusitics.

I think the cognitive dissonance is higher in languages such as French when you are forced to speak about a man as though he female.

For example if I say "she is French" when referring to a male human being in English I only have to lie once. But in French "elle est Française" involes 2 untruths and twice the amount of double think.

Not that that makes it easy or acceptable in English but it is even harder and even more jarring in languages with gendered adjectives.

You make a fair point. There’s really nothing you can say here. There are posters claiming they don’t have pronouns 😬

@CheekyHobson Can you explain a system for those of us who are less gifted? I don't know how to memorise pronouns for lots of people, they seem arbitrary to me and it feels like a large volume of information with nothing to anchor it to.
I can remember faces but it takes time to memorise the names that go with them. Also once I have learned a name, I struggle to relearn it when it changes.
I don't struggle to memorise large amounts of other types of information. I suppose I might be gifted in that department.

It's forcing them to lie about their preference, not reality.

Or maybe you don't actually do it very much. Or maybe you are only used to speaking in English - in many other languages, changing a pronoun actually has a knock-on effect on other parts of the sentence. Or maybe you just don't fully realise how language works. I have a PhD in linguistics by the way and I can assure you it is far from simple.

Or maybe you don't actually do it very much. Or maybe you are only used to speaking in English - in many other languages, changing a pronoun actually has a knock-on effect on other parts of the sentence. Or maybe you just don't fully realise how language works. I have a PhD in linguistics by the way and I can assure you it is far from simple.

Haven’t studied linguistics formally though my job involves language. I have just lived the experience of adapting to different pronouns and found it not especially taxing, and have observed numerous colleagues and friends adapting with relative ease. So I don’t really get the angst. Maybe we are all genius outliers and exceptions to the rule!

I live in France and am a fluent French speaker.

Words in languages such as Italian and French do not have a sex. They are not male or female.

They have a gender. They are masculine or feminine.

And that is the proper use of the word gender BTW.

The word for strawberry is not female in French or Italian because words do not have a biological sex. It is a feminin gender word because grammar.

The words for girl or woman in French or Italian are also not female (see above for reasons). They are feminin gendered grammatical words words used to refer to beings of the female sex.

Only living things have a sex. Words are not alive or sexed and neither are the inanimate objects they refer to.

I just wanted to point that out because there is so much confusion nowadays about simple concepts (that everyone seemed to understand before genderist ideology came along).

The earliest recorded use of a gender neutral pronoun was in the 14th century.

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I'm sure you are right however accusations of literal violence when the wrong pronouns are used seems a relatively recent concept

no fucking nuance or care for others as human beings.

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I absolutely care about all other human beings. We all deserve to live our lives whilst remembering we share this planet with others.

I'm embarrassed that diversity and inclusivity don't extend to all people who genuinely need it and that respect and compassion often seems a one way street

I don't have to make you into anything, you're doing fine with your responses, or lack of, to all the points many posters have made about why this matters.

i don’t think you can presume anything about what the theoretical victim actually feels or what I would think about an individual case or what care I have towards women or victims of male violence in general.

As you’re clearly only interested in making me into a heartless bitch because my position on pronouns differs from yours, 👋🏻

TBH I’d even use the female pronoun for the rapist if shed been identifying as a woman for a considerable period of time before she was arrested, it just wouldn’t have any bearing on whether I thought she should be in a prison with other people with the same genitals or not.

And here we have it. The covers are off. A crime that can only be committed by a man, but because he's been lying about his sex since before he committed the crime, he gets pandered to - regardless of the effect that has on his victim, presumably. No care for women here, it's all about male feelz.

Wrong again.

it sounds like your job means it would be pretty hard for you not to do the pronoun dance.

It’s not a dance. If you are capable of remembering people’s names you’re capable of remembering pronouns as it’s very rare for anyone to have unexpected ones. It’s literally like remembering any other small personal detail about someone; their Mum’s name, a food allergy, where they went to school, how many kids they have.