to not want to sign off my emails with preferred pronouns?

[AlphaBites]

We've had an email do the rounds today at work saying in the next few weeks all staff are expected to sign off with their preferred pronouns, to save any embarrassment for any staff.

I don't want to.

Can I fight this somehow?

Hospitals and Drs are different though. I have refused to give companies a Ms/Miss or Mrs. In your case just give an initial for the first name. Or just say you do not want them to use your first name so will not be supplying it. If they want your business that will be fine, even if they think you are awkward.

@durgasrow If you have not declared your gender identity yet, then asking people to use pronouns not usually associated with your name is coming out. So I don't see how it applies to them at all.
So if Doug in building control asked me to call Doug she and her, then Doug would be clearly telling me that Doug is trans. And if Doug is still using the name Doug but asking to be called she and her, in my kind of industry Doug would at minimum get lots of eye rolls and more likely be told to stop being such a wally. Or by the very few slightly more woke, be assumed to be taking the piss out of actual trans people.

Maybe just try it composing?

But why? Why should I have to be rude just because others are?

The thread's moving very fast, but to clarify my 'the earth is flat' comment.

There really is plain pseudo-science being taught to children and adults. That we have 'sexed brains' and so on. The Allsorts pack really does state that it is acceptable to teach 'some, but not all, boys have penises and some, but not all girls, have vaginas' - they don't mean children who may have been born without parts of their reproductive system or lost them through illness or accident.

SO this whole pronoun business really highlights how many women feel that having thei sex emphasised is likely to cause them harm in many cases , wether it’s encouraging negative stereotyping or just reminding women of their status

I think it was only in the 80s that using ms to avoid signalling your marital status became accepted. Perhaps it’s time to go one step further and change language again to be more sex neutral. Do we really need titles? If he/she became they , once we’d got used to the change would there be problems ?

Calling someone by their first name isn't rude and if they use yours to you, then it's perfectly acceptable to do the same in return. We take our social queues f rom others. I'm done with you now though as it's got fuck all to do with this thread tbh.

Of course using someone's first name, uninvited, is rude in formal situations.

And my point was that when it was considered the norm to use Mr/Mrs/Miss after your name when writing letters or emails there was no need to indicate pronouns. Now that custom has appeared to have been stopped it seems that there is a void - people are unsure how to refer to others and so there's a move to indicate a preference by stating your preferred pronouns.

Other than that I guess we all adopt gender neutral pronouns at all times.

Op. That's a big nope from me.

If my work suggested this I'd simply refuse to do it. My work has been woke washed by stonewall so I guess it'll come. Funny though when I was sexually harassed for months, the response from someone senior was to tell me "it was just cultural "

Women don't matter at all to my employer. I'm too nice, I should have taken it further.

As for the "midwife" on this thread that likes to call women who disagree with them "cunts". Wow. Just wow. How to win friends and influence people.

I'll just carry on using people's actual names.

This thread is hilarious, Midwife my arse
I'm not calling a bloke she/her as it's a lie, they/them will suffice if in doubt.

Actually jennymanara any doctor who expects to use my first name may invite me to use theirs. If they wish me to use their title, as most do, they may use mine or at the very least ask if they may use my first name. If they do not wish me to use theirs and are uncomfortable with it they may not use mine. I am not subordinate to a dr and regard it as basic equality. My title is Mrs, I am married and chose to use it as is my right. I don't care a jot how anybody identifies but I will fight for anybody's right to be addressed as they wish and not to be subordinated by the self important.

Of course using someone's first name, uninvited, is rude in formal situations.

This is your opinion and you are welcome to state it, but it is not a fact. As my DM would say "you've a tongue in your head" If you don't like it, ask them not to. The accepted standard now is to use first names. It doesn't make a doctor or a teacher etc a better doctor or teacher etc if they are addressed Dr or Mr/Mrs/Ms/Miss.

@OhTheRoses I agree with you. I have found most young Drs introduce themselves by their first name now.

I’d probably honour my dad, he always says “call me anything you like except late for breakfast”

So I’ll be “PegLegAntoine (notlateforbreakfast)” please

If it's your pronoun of choice can't you be him he. Even as a woman. Then if you come face to face apologise for error, or say you hoped for a pay rise. Male named sellers on eBay make larger profits, one wee example where it's better to appear Male . I use Male sounding name on line apart from here.

I'd forgotten about this, I thought it never applied to me but it actually does. My ebay username starts with something like "tlm" which a lot of people misread as "Tim". The attitudes of people who do this are markedly different to those who either know or assume I'm a woman. When I reply to messages and sign off using my full name, I occasionally am asked if the query can be passed onto my boss (I don't have one). This is despite the fact that less than 10% of my sales are to men.
I actually know of a seller of typically masculine goods, who has never said outright that she is a man, but has implied it (she has a name which used to be unisex about 50 years ago, but now much less so- her customer base is mostly elderly, wealthy men). If she did not, her business would do much less well and her (extensive) knowledge of her stock would count for much less. She is currently very successful and I don't blame her at all for not correcting the assumption.
When my perceived sex has no effect on my income, then I will feel more inclined to pander to this sort of nonsense.

“This won’t work for me”

a bit like how orchestras started auditioning musicians from behind a screen and suddenly started employing more women.

Not heard that example - did read this
www.newscientist.com/article/2189197-women-are-finally-getting-equal-access-to-the-hubble-space-telescope/

The Hubble Space Telescope has a gender problem. For at least the past 16 years, female researchers have had their requests to use the world’s most important telescope accepted at significantly lower rates than their male colleagues. But a switch to reviewing anonymised proposals is changing that, showing that selection processes can be biased against women.

I read it in the magazine - need log in to read whole thing on-line -but was suprised - same story here but all visible.
www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/12/hubble-space-telescope-gender-disparity/578545/

@MoverOfPaper I like you.

I've read through all of this with real interest.

One thing that strikes me as I'm learning about it all is that, while it seems that a trans person might welcome gender neutral pronouns, surely they won't as that is the whole point? They're trying to get others to confirm (at least out loud) that they believe in the erroneous fiction that they changed biological sex from M/F or F/M.

I just have a feeling that gender neutral just wouldn't do enough as it would be insufficient recognition.

I go by they/them, so I'd appreciate people actually... using my preferred pronouns. I hate when people have an agenda to use she/her and give me dysphoria on top of what I already have.

My workplace has just signed up with Stonewall so I'm sure this nonsense is coming my way.

It's a hard no from me.

Similarly to a previous poster I would put
"not the cat's mother" in my signature. And then seriously question my future being employed there for much longer. My name does not need any further qualifier whether I am a woman or not.

"I go by they/them, so I'd appreciate people actually... using my preferred pronouns"

That's a whole other discussion to the question of whether businesses should demand that staff provide 'preferred pronouns' for themselves.

To quote a certain lady, "If anyone doesn't know what my pronouns are, they're probably a little bit simple".

In some jobs, being a woman is a big advantage. Not the well paid ones though.

"I go by they/them, so I'd appreciate people actually... using my preferred pronouns"

If you seriously ask for this at work and you don't work in a very "woke" industry, don't worry, everyone will soon know that you want this to happen.
In my industry this would be seen as beyond strange and everyone would soon know about it.

We've been signed up to stonewall for ahes and there has been no whisper of it. Possibly because I am the HR Director and they know my response would be "if that's direction we are heading in, happy to resign". Might be a good idea, I cd do with a change and am underpaid even within the sector vis my reputation professionally.