Pronouns campaign being launched at work

It’s very clear that some posters on this thread don’t work, or at least not in a corporate environment. A pronoun campaign is not about respecting other people’s pronouns. There will be pressure to add pronouns to your email signature, your teams profile and your work HR system. There are likely to be badges with different pronoun options which people are expected to wear. There will be meetings and “training” events. And if the OP is a manager she will be told that “management need to show their support” or similar. How much pressure will depend on the company, but to suggest that the OP is being fragile or silly thinking about how to approach this is ridiculous.

You have no evidence of broad peer pressure compliance from simply respecting personal choices.

So why can't the employer respect the personal choice of those employees who don't want to put pronouns in their email signatures or be forced to deny the evidence of their own eyes by calling a man she/her or a woman he/him? Pronouns in English refer to sex, not performative gender, which is why our male cat is he.

My pronouns are "I" and "Me" ???

Please don't use that homophobic slur. It's as offensive as the n word and the p word.

The only “enforcement” that concerns me is the law.

People are absolutely free to believe anything they wish, but they don’t get to decide what everyone believes, nor to dictate their language.

We’ve been politely asked but that was back in 2019 or thereabouts! I ignored it and have never been asked. Those who did use them and have also fully embraced the flags in bio now seem to be taking them down. There’s definitely been a change in the last few years with only a last few remaining.

Various court cases (Yay for Sandie Peggie!) have thrown light on the need for managers to be impartial and neutral and this has definitely marked a change within NHS Scotland

I cannot add anything to the excellent reasons that others have cited, and admire those who have felt able to share personal reasons in their comments.

I wish you all the best OP.

The 'campaign' is simply promoting respect for other people's choices just like Pride does which by your logic is just another enforced 'ideology'.

Of course, people who love to toss around words like 'ideology' never seem to notice their own or their attempts at enforcement.

interesting pov, what a great contribution, glad you bothered to get involved with something so shallow to you.

This is like a drunk old man in a pub interrupting you when you are having an interesting discussion, thinking he knows best, you try to be polite but he quickly gets tiresome and predictable and boring.

Pronouns are an inherent part of the English language.

There wouldn’t need to be a “campaign” for everyone to declare them if “nothing had changed”

The campaign isn’t about “respecting a trans persons preference”, it’s about asking (telling) all their colleagues to both acknowledge and support a particular ideology.

As I said before, that’s not a neutral act.

I think sex matters has some guidance for staff in this position. I remember they advise using a phrase like " it's not a practice I follow", if you're not willing to explain your reasons.

Can you just not get round to doing it?

If anyone senior asks, you could say I'm not really comfortable with that. Same with anyone you want to be more open with, otherwise I'd just grey rock and say oh yes I'd forgotten all about that.

Someone left a rainbow pin in my tray at work presumably for me to wear, I just left it there, nothing's been said

If requesting whether you'd like to be known as a she/he/they is sooo concerning its worthy of consulting a forum I would suggest that person has bigger problems than they realise.

But didn't we all use pronouns before this was a thing? The only thing that's changed is respecting a trans person's preference so the fact that staff are asked a preference isn't the big deal you make.

@Gretel346

The OP says her work will be starting a pronoun campaign soon, in most people’s experience you get an email sent round asking you to add your pronouns to your email signature, that’s the basic level. Sometimes more things like pronouns on badges, or in meetings,
I don’t know what it’s like where you work, but most workplaces, if they send you an email asking you to do something, you are supposed to do it, or at least consider it.

Thats what the OP is doing. It’s not fragile to take your work requests seriously, and weigh up the implications, and consider making an ethical stand.

But the OP isn’t trying to make a “societal” decision, she asked very specifically how she could personally handle being asked to state her pronouns.

And the thread isn’t about “respecting another person’s pronouns” (that’s a whole different topic)

The OP’s employers have, by asking her to state (and advertise) her pronouns asked her to tacitly acknowledge acceptance of a very specific ideology. One which she doesn’t accept, support or believe.

That her lack of belief in this (and other ideologies) is protected in law hasn’t stopped her employer.

Putting pronouns on badges, auto signatures etc is not a neutral act. There are consequences for women in highlighting our sex.

And just because something isn’t written into a contract doesnt mean your employer can’t pressure you to do something against your will through setting cultural norms and peer pressure.

You’re right. Just look at gender ideology for example and what a shitshow that’s created. Basing entire societal decisions on stupid premises like “humans can change sex” and “gender identity is real”. Sooner that stupidity gets in the bin the better.

No, it's not pure speculation. We know preferred pronouns are a contentious issue and quite likely to be divisive, because they have been. Why stir the pot in the workplace by promoting them?

Pure speculation then. Saying something might be happening or happening in isolated circumstances doesn't qualify as evidence. If we based all societal decisions on such tenuous allegations rather than evidence we'd be in a hellava mess that's why this sought of speculative nonsense isn't taken seriously by anyone with working brain cells.

Someone wearing a cross or a kappa does not affect me. Having to police my language to use incorrect pronouns for someone or to put pronouns on my emails does. Why should I have to declare my “gender”

If you think that just because something isn't spelled out in a contract, it can't be part of the workplace culture, that's a bit naive.

So officially, pronouns may be optional, but unofficially is anybody's guess. OP may be lucky in her workplace and find that nobody cares. Or absence of pronouns may put you on the radar of somebody who is fragile about their own pronouns or over-zealous about other people's and on the alert for "microaggressions". And who will be backed by the management in the event of any dispute because the management want to be seen as "inclusive".

Women - and men - accused of transphobia have lost jobs or been harassed to the point where their job is no longer tenable. That's what all the employment tribunals have been about. Performative display of pronouns is part of the culture that leads to those situations.

I'm informed about the law which hardly compels self usage of pronouns. The only mention of it was brought up in Maya Forstater employment case which was it may be considered as harassment to deliberately misgender someone at work.

I think we both have to pay the OP the courtesy of allowing her to describe what is being demanded of her and her work colleagues. Unless you're better informed about her workplace than she is, of course. Are you?

Because there's no evidence of such.

Feel free to post employment contracts that state otherwise by all means.

Nope. Only by bigots who insist on coercing people into their quasi religious belief system. Most never check and don't care.

Stonewall them (pun intended) if they ask you. Don't respond to emails or messages about it at all suddenly say "Oh, sorry I am bursting for the loo" if they start on you, or that you suddenly feel faint. They don't deserve a response so don't give them one.

Or start shaking and say "You are making me feel so unsafe asking about this, I don't want my gender to be shared with anyone".