To not (yet) understand the purpose of pronouns in emails?

[Bobby80]

I'm aware this is a sensitive topic for some but I'm looking for some education on this. I didn't want to post in the gender issues boards as I thought I might come across as very ignorant and maybe I am! I also wanted a broad 'audience'.

Pronouns in emails- what's the purpose? Should I have my pronouns in my work email signature? We have no guidance on it at work so some people do and some don't. I don't feel the need personally to have a pronoun in mine but wouldn't want to offend others. Is the purpose of it for the send ie me or for the receiver or both? Is it really meaningful or a box ticking exercise?

Agree 100%

Too busy virtue signalling to consider people with disabilities. There are plenty of people with colour vision deficiency who would struggle to read that.

"transgender" is not a protected characteristic. Proposing to go through the legal process of getting a gender recognition certificate, getting a gender recognition certificate and having a gender recognition certificate is a protected characteristic. So is being a natal woman. So is believing that you can't change sex.

So shocked the OP hadn't returned to this thread

Said no person ever

Good job winding up the rabid MN feminists and letting them go off on one

Hope you enjoyed the entertainment OP

Do you think only women care about listening to trans experiences?

The most tolerant people I know IRL and at work are all men

Who put their pronouns on their emails without all this drama and fuss

Quite. MN is infamously transphobic and ignorant, not to mention (see replies to this thread) goady and catastrophising on this subject It's a harmless piece of information and entirely at the individual's discretion.

It’s akin to putting your political party allegiance, ‘Go Vegan’, ‘Rejoin EU’ etc in your email signature - although worse, imo - none of those causes seek to compel your colleagues’ speech. They’re just inappropriate, rather than inappropriate, narcissistic and controlling.

people have been quietly removing them at my work following a comms about OTT messy signatures and visual/screen reader accessibility. It is an improvement and I think a lot of people are relieved.

MN is not infamously transphobic. It is full of feminists who recognise the harm caused by pretending people can change sex. That is very different from saying that a man can't wear a frock and call himself Shirley without protection from negative outcomes. __

Mn is well known for transphobia. It is sadly the only thing most people know about mn. Obviously there is more to mn than this, but it is certainly the most well known thing to people who don't use the site.

This post is clearly transphobic. Describing a transgender woman as "a man in a frock called Shirley" is really offensive.

@Stompythedinosaur

They'll deny that's transphobic you just wait and see

The comments made on here about trans people if they were made about anyone else (women, black people, Ukrainian women, children, the list goes on) the posts would be removed and the posters banned

But MNHQ has their view on this and it's very clear they're aligned with the nasty comments as long as they're only targeting trans people.

The fact you can get a ban for calling someone the K word but not for calling a trans woman a pervert or drag queens disgusting, or saying a man in a frock is indicative of this site

Got this far and have something to say. I literally don't care if people use pronouns or not. Other people can stop getting hung up on "pronouns? surely I'm just going to write Dear Name?" - it is just a way of expressing a gender identity without writing "I'M TRANS" in their sig. It may or may not be helpful (you're expecting Dave to be a guy in a suit and it turns out to be a transwoman in a dress - you're already prepared for that)

is the thinking anyway.

I have a lived experience of being a woman so am better positioned to have a view about whether this is harmful to women. I'm not trans, so my role is to listen to trans people in respect of their experiences.

I am not going to use pronouns because I am a woman and I HAVE decades of not being taken seriously in a man's world as soon as colleagues/clients/suppliers get the slightest whiff that I'm not a man. I have carefully honed letter/fax/email texts over years to "de-feminise" them (and yes, it is a thing). I sign off with Initial+Surname and always have done - until i am sure i'm not going to be sidelined for being a woman.

And i WILL NOT have anyone telling me that because they personally haven't experienced that, I've been dreaming it all. I am aware of the "if everyone uses the pronouns in their sigs, people with different gender identities to their sex won't feel isolated or singled out" and i have some sympathy with it. But basically? if you are a bearded man in a suit one day with he/him and then a bearded transwoman in a dress another day with she/her - you're already noticeable. Dave from accounts also having pronouns won't change that.

Far better than pronouns in sigs we should be looking to make workplaces more accessible, more equal, and more respectful of each other. No matter what we look like or if we have different gender identities or whatever.

I won't use them in email because I've spent 3 decades in a male dominated industry trying to mask that I'm female by using a neutral name.

I won't use them in an email because gender identity ideology is like a religion and I don't care what religion people are.

I won't use them because I don't believe gender identity exists.

I won't use them because I think it's the height of masculine brutality to force a woman to refer to a man as she.

I will refer to people as they or by their name.

"Yes it does. I have a name that can have a masculine ending and a feminine ending. E.g: George/Georgia Alexander/Alexandra Daniel/Danielle Paul/Paula

My feminine name is clearly spelt in my email signature and I still get regretted to as a “he” “sir” “Daniel/Paul” multiple times a week. It’s annoying."

If people can't be bothered to read your name properly what makes you think they will read your pronoun correctly?

I too get a wide range of variations of my name in an email reply - and yes it's annoying. But it's annoying as it shows a lack of respect to actually be bothered to read my name. It's just plain rude.

Lol I’m sure the usual “you’re all nasty transphobic bigots” suspect will have reported all the actual transphobia on
this thread

knowing that sex is immutable and cannot be changed is not transphobic nor is knowing that research shows women are disadvantaged at work by drawing attention to their sex

I won't use them because I think it's the height of masculine brutality to force a woman to refer to a man as she.

If you think that's the height of masculine brutality then I'd say you've lived a very charmed life.

My friend is transgender and puts her pronouns in her email signature as she is still part-way through her transition so doesn't feel she looks fully "feminine" yet. She said she likes that a lot of people also do this now whether they are cisgender, non-binary etc because it means that her displaying her pronouns doesn't automatically out her as trans.

Also as someone who works with a lot of people from different countries with names I've never heard of and don't know the gendering of, I find it very useful to know their pronouns!

"Ok, so me choosing to use pronouns might harm me, but how does it harm others?"

Turn this around - how does including your pronouns help others?

Either it's helpful to one group, but then we do have to acknowledge that it is at the expense of another, or it's not helpful at all.

I don't get why you'd ask this on Mumsnet, you know the answers you're going to get here!

Well there are a wide range of answers so stick that in your pipe and smoke it.

The whole Terfnet from outside makes me laugh when i regularly see on twitter things about "sucking my lady dick death to terfs" and when it is called out as misogynistic it is dismissed as only words. But we have all seen the "literal violence" references to being misgendered by accident.

So here's the thing. I'm not a Terf. I literally want the entire universe to live their best lives without harming others. I'm quite the fan of Jeremy Bentham also, so i also belive that if you can improve the lives, even marginally, of the majority, you should be doing that.

I also believe that a society can be judged on how it treats the weakest in that society and we should treat minorities with dignity and respect.

None of that is incompatible with being a staunch feminist, a trans ally and a supporter of women's rights (including their right to sex-based services where wanted/required)

my reading of MN has shown me that outside FWR any anti-trans posts are likely to be zapped. And even on FWR they are treading a fine line (that i have, as yet, failed to identify). I watch aghast as statistics are manipulated - and how the old adage of unifying against a common enemy (who is causing most of the VAWG and transwomen and transmen? who?) has fallen by the wayside in favour of groups of people shouting (on occasion vile slurs) against other groups of people.

But one thing that is guaranteed to make me roll my eyes. "what? we don't use pronouns to talk to the person when they are present" (assuming you mean 3rd person prononuns, because you almost certainly do use pronouns). It isn't about "PRONOUNS" it is about being open about your gender identity. And/or sex. And not everyone is comfortable doing that for various reasons that are not related to anyone else. That should also be respected.

She said she likes that a lot of people also do this now whether they are cisgender, non-binary etc because it means that her displaying her pronouns doesn't automatically out her as trans.

i would be very happy to refer to your trans friend as she, if that is her desire. I would be pointing out, howerver, every single occasion where upon discovering that i am not a male engineer as expected but a female and then expected to:
refer a problem to "my boss"
make the tea
take the notes
collect for someone's birthday
suddenly started communicating with my much younger male subordinate
etc ad infinitum

and then ask why she thinks i should leave myself wide open to that happening over and over. Yes, she would be more comfortable and i appreciate that. But making her comfortable puts me at a disadvantage. Why should she, newly female, get to undo all my hard work striving to head that off at the past (I've described how i do that on various posts over the years). So in that case I'd politely decline. And i would hope that would be it.

"Also as someone who works with a lot of people from different countries with names I've never heard of and don't know the gendering of, I find it very useful to know their pronouns!"

You realise that obliging people to say stuff isn't good.
I hope your friend has a comfortable transition and if I accidentally misgender them when I meet them, I apologise. I am not committing an act of literal violence by doing so. And telling me I am will make me think they are not a serious person.

That just shows people don't pay attention or read signatures. Putting your pronouns in an email signature won't cause someone who sees "Alexandra" and writes "Alexander" or "Alexandria" to change.

I must receive an email everyday where someone has used a similar but incorrect name for me despite my name being fully spelled out in my email address and email signature. Those similar names are all female in my case because there is no common male name that is similar but it is the same problem with Georgia/George/Georgina/Georgie/Georgiana.

It’s interesting you mentioned your friend. I have a trans woman friend (though she considers herself transsexual, not ‘transgendered’). She’s actually really offended by pronouns and absolutely hates being asked. Her thought is that she’s gone to the effort of looking feminine, changed her name to a feminine one that her pronouns should be assumed like every natal woman.

Trans people aren’t a hive mind either and I wonder if you consider other voices from the community or just the loudest?

😂

I don't feel the need personally to have a pronoun in mine
So don't do it. People will be offended/oblivious/judgemental either way so you may as well do what is best for you.

It’s a statement of allegiance to the ideology that believes physically male people should have access to female spaces whenever they want and females should just put up with it despite the safeguarding implications, problems for muslim women etc.

It’s a statement that you don’t think for yourself and allow others to tell you what to do.

It’s an attempt to lower the debate to “the righteous against the bigots” instead if having a rational discussion about it all.