Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Preferred pronoun labels at childrens event

730 replies

StopitSarah · 19/03/2023 20:21

I took my primary age children to a science event this weekend. It’s run by university students. Almost all of them had their preferred pronouns on their name labels.

AIBU to feel that was unnecessary and to feel a bit uneasy? One of my children wanted to know why “the man is saying we should say he/him. Isn’t that obvious?”

I asked one of the students who said it was to show support to any trans helpers and was for the benefit of the (adult) students, not the children.

I’m SO BORED and irritated by the trans agenda being every-bloody-where.

But AIBU? I had a good chat with one of the students and he said that they’re all science students and understand that woman = biological female is too simplistic. My brain exploded.

OP posts:
CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 11:53

To not care if they're misgendered (suck it up, or insinuated didn't happen) ot when one told you that they felt at risk for it.
Why should we have to conform to a feminine ideal?
Which viewpoint is propping that up again?!

lifeturnsonadime · 21/03/2023 11:53

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 11:51

It's not feminism to only care about some women you agree with but not others though.

I don't claim to be a feminist.

I'm not going to apologise for caring more about women incarcerated with rapists in prisons and female children who are led to believe they are born in the wrong bodies than a woman being mistaken for being wrong sex apparently for wearing the wrong clothes or for not wearing a badge.

CountZacular · 21/03/2023 11:56

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 11:47

Cross posted - look there you go @justteanbiscuits has handily answered, that saves you some trawling 🙂

That hasn’t answered my question at all. I asked what work badges would do to help in the general public. How would that have helped justjean be correctly sexed on an exchange trip?

I actually think it’s appalling what happened to justjean and I’m really concerned about the lack of safeguarding from the adults involved. I’m not sure self-pronoun badges would have made a lot of difference to the situation. After all, pronoun badges were designed to help trans people, not to correctly sex a person.

lifeturnsonadime · 21/03/2023 11:56

What feminine ideal are you talking about Creme Egg, are you OK?

I've repeated spoken about my daughter being gender non conforming and assumptions being made that she must be trans or non binary.

There is no wrong way for a woman to look. Being female is what matters, not the clothes or a badge. HTH.

lifeturnsonadime · 21/03/2023 11:57

I actually think it’s appalling what happened to justjean and I’m really concerned about the lack of safeguarding from the adults involved. I’m not sure self-pronoun badges would have made a lot of difference to the situation. After all, pronoun badges were designed to help trans people, not to correctly sex a person.

I know. The pronoun badge could have the opposite result.

Guess that's the fault of women or feminists though. It always is.

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 11:57

If you dont claim to be a feminist anyway, why do you feel told off when someone said you weren't the right kind of one then?!

lifeturnsonadime · 21/03/2023 11:58

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 11:57

If you dont claim to be a feminist anyway, why do you feel told off when someone said you weren't the right kind of one then?!

It was your intention Creme.

You were telling me I'm the wrong kind of feminist.

TBF I'm not bothered. I just whole heartedly disagree with you.

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 11:59

You were telling me I'm the wrong kind of feminist.
That wasn't me.
Are you OK?!

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 12:03

There is no wrong way for a woman to look
Agreed, but that's clearly not the case is it when people who dont do femininity to a sufficient standard get bothered is it?!

lifeturnsonadime · 21/03/2023 12:05

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 11:59

You were telling me I'm the wrong kind of feminist.
That wasn't me.
Are you OK?!

So what was the point of your post to me at 11.31.

and your statement

'That's not what's feminism'

if it wasn't to tell me I was feminising wrong.

lifeturnsonadime · 21/03/2023 12:06

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 12:03

There is no wrong way for a woman to look
Agreed, but that's clearly not the case is it when people who dont do femininity to a sufficient standard get bothered is it?!

Why is that the fault of other women?

lifeturnsonadime · 21/03/2023 12:07

And what sufficient standard are you talking about? There is no standard. Being female is the only standard.

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 12:08

@CountZacular That hasn't answered my question at all

Quelle surprise (which is why I didn't go trawling and do your work for you)

Ididn't want to be called Mr, or "the boy over there", or put into a hotel room with a male because the organisers hadn't noticed I was female!
How does that not answer?
Applies easily to working in public, in a supermarket etc.
Shop assistants for example do usually have ears and can hear customers.

PSNonsense · 21/03/2023 12:09

Agreed, but that's clearly not the case is it when people who dont do femininity to a sufficient standard get bothered is it?!

What, by being female?! That's the standard!

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 12:11

And what sufficient standard are you talking about? There is no standard

Exactly!! We agree, there is no standard when it comes to what we should look like, so that's why it baffles me that you're on the side who DO care what women wear, what we should look like/ how we should behave etc!!

tellmewhentheLangshiplandscoz · 21/03/2023 12:12

lifeturnsonadime · 21/03/2023 11:26

Well my politics isn't leading to rapists in prisons and children believing they are born in the wrong body. But you do you.

Or ...

Women and girls losing places in sport,

Women and girls losing out spaces in shortlists

Young people being enthusiastically put on a pathway of irreversible drugs

Same young people removing healthy working body parts and replacing them with flesh to mimic non working ones

CountZacular · 21/03/2023 12:13

@CremeEggQueen JustJean was a child when this happened. She could have worn a pronoun badge (I’ve said many, many times individuals are free to do so but don’t compel others) but self-declared pronouns do not correctly sex someone. And if my child was placed into an opposite sex room for no other reason than a pronoun badge I would hit the roof. It’s up to the adults to make sure safeguard the children - not for the children to do it themselves.

CountZacular · 21/03/2023 12:16

Applies easily to working in public, in a supermarket etc.
Shop assistants for example do usually have ears and can hear customers.

and so by this, are you confirming that pronoun badges should be worn everywhere all of the time?

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 12:22

CountZacular · 21/03/2023 12:16

Applies easily to working in public, in a supermarket etc.
Shop assistants for example do usually have ears and can hear customers.

and so by this, are you confirming that pronoun badges should be worn everywhere all of the time?

I'm saying that I think it's a good idea for people to wear one when it clearly helps everyone, whether they're trans or not trans.
That doesn't mean I'm saying everyone has to wear one because I say so before anyone starts, wear them only if you want to.
Others can do as they like and not wear.
Which I'm sure was the case in the OP but here we are pages later because some say that they shouldn't be worn full stop as they're nonsense etc!

DdraigGoch · 21/03/2023 12:31

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 12:22

I'm saying that I think it's a good idea for people to wear one when it clearly helps everyone, whether they're trans or not trans.
That doesn't mean I'm saying everyone has to wear one because I say so before anyone starts, wear them only if you want to.
Others can do as they like and not wear.
Which I'm sure was the case in the OP but here we are pages later because some say that they shouldn't be worn full stop as they're nonsense etc!

Show quote history

So you are saying that everyone ought to wear one.

How do they "help" everyone? When there's sex discrimination in the workplace it often helps women if their sex is unknown (when communicating via email for example) because some men can be very uncooperative when they know that they're dealing with a woman. Obviously those men need to change, but until they do women have to play the game if they want to get ahead.

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/what-happened-when-a-man-signed-work-emails-using-a-female-name-for-a-week_n_58c2ce53e4b054a0ea6a4066

What Happened When A Man Signed Work Emails Using A Female Name For 2 Weeks

Boy, was he shocked.

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/what-happened-when-a-man-signed-work-emails-using-a-female-name-for-a-week_n_58c2ce53e4b054a0ea6a4066

justteanbiscuits · 21/03/2023 12:41

I shared my experience, not because wearing a badge would have helped me, but just as examples for all the people in this thread claiming that misgendering a) doesn't happen b) surely doesn't upset the person and c) if the person had just dressed a bit more feminine it would have been fine. It was simply explaining that actually, yes, mis gendering happens, and it can actually be quite upsetting.

A short haired, tall, friend, post double mastectomy was quite regularly misgendered. She wore baggy clothes as she was, unsurprisingly, quite self conscious about her post mastectomy body. And she had short hair as chemo does that to a person.

And there HAVE been people on this thread suggesting if someone "chooses to dress like a man, what do they expect". At no point did I dress like a man - unless jeans and tshirt is considered "dressing like a man".

Misgendering can be upsetting. It seems that plenty on this thread cannot get their heads around this fact and fall back on the good old "well, she was asking for it by what she was wearing.." trope. We wouldn't accept that in any other situation, but why in this one?

justteanbiscuits · 21/03/2023 12:48

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 12:22

I'm saying that I think it's a good idea for people to wear one when it clearly helps everyone, whether they're trans or not trans.
That doesn't mean I'm saying everyone has to wear one because I say so before anyone starts, wear them only if you want to.
Others can do as they like and not wear.
Which I'm sure was the case in the OP but here we are pages later because some say that they shouldn't be worn full stop as they're nonsense etc!

Show quote history

Exactly. The OP was "I don't want people wearing pronoun badges around my children". You explained really well why, actually, for you, a pronoun badge would be useful.

But others have tried to sling 14 tons of other mud at you and anyone else agreeing with your experience when that isn't actually what is being discussed.

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 12:49

Misgendering can be upsetting. It seems that plenty on this thread cannot get their heads around this fact and fall back on the good old "well, she was asking for it by what she was wearing.." trope. We wouldn't accept that in any other situation, but why in this one?

Yes and the "well it wouldn't bother me if it ever happened to me, so why should it bother you?"

lifeturnsonadime · 21/03/2023 12:51

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 12:11

And what sufficient standard are you talking about? There is no standard

Exactly!! We agree, there is no standard when it comes to what we should look like, so that's why it baffles me that you're on the side who DO care what women wear, what we should look like/ how we should behave etc!!

I think you are confused Creme.

Very confused.

The only side that cares about stereotypes is the one which says that if you like feminine things as a man you must be a woman, or vice versa.

CremeEggQueen · 21/03/2023 12:51

In fact that seems an awful lot like the same behaviour as " well I love a wolf whistle, it's flattering, why would you get offended, get over yourself "