Colleague has complained about me using wrong pronouns

[CandyCane103]

Name changed but have been on mn for a fair while now.

I work in a role which requires me to do casework supporting vulnerable people. I am supporting a member of staff with some cases that fall under my specialism. We've always got along well and I've really enjoyed working with her. I've been here a number of years, she is 6 months in. One of her cases is a non binary person, and she emails me occasionally for advice as it is a long and complex case (has been ongoing for months now since before she joined the team). I usually get it right but have occasionally written 'she' by accident. They have a female name and I am not intentionally using 'she', it just naturally happens. Instead of speaking to me about it, she has made a complaint to my line manager, who has had a word. Line manager was fine about it and it wasn't a telling off. More of a passing on a message.

Now feels very awkward and think my line managers advice to her was that she should speak to me in the first instance. I really want to raise with my colleague that she should have spoken to me instead of running straight to my line manager. Not sure how to handle this as I've never had a complaint from a member of staff and it has ruffled my feathers.

Would you just leave it be?

Like the people who say I have no problems with gay people, I just want them to be gay behind closed doors so I never have to see two men kissing or holding hands. How can you not see thats the same thing and it's prejudice?

Gay men holding hands and kissing aren't removing anyone else's rights are they?

No male is female, as a scientist you KNOW that, especially when you say you recognise that sex and gender are different things. Any male who is using female single sex spaces is engaging in behaviours which harms women because we have no idea which ones genuinely have gender feelings and which ones are using this to get access for nefarious purposes. The better way is for ALL males to understand that they are not and can never be female and to stay out of those spaces .

I agree it has become a legal issue that is why the Supreme Court had to hear a case last week presented by For Women Scotland on the meaning of Sex for the purpose of sex based provisions! If males and their advocates hadn't presented and demanded access on the basis of a falsehood in the first place women wouldn't be being harmed by males in single sex spaces and women wouldn't now be having to fight for sex based rights to be reinstated.

I don't have a problem with non binary people nor any person who wants to express their gender in any way they see fit UNTIL that starts encroaching on the rights of others. Non binary people are making unreasonable and unnecessary language demands to validate their beliefs, gay people do not do that.

I do own my views, they are simply that SEX matters and that the minute gender ideology clashes with sex based rights there is overreach. I don't want to keep trans women out of women's single sex spaces because they are trans I want to do that because they are MALE.

Complaining to your manager about it instead of mentioning it to you, looks terrible for her. It is so easy for her to say ‘remember it’s they/them’. It just makes her seem difficult and incapable of working with others

@SerenePeach
I agree that sex and gender are different things. So:

a) Three or even four genders sounds like a good idea to me. Why do transwomen want to say they're women when that word is already taken, instead of having a different term?

b) The pronoun fixation is bollocks because pronouns are about sex, not gender.

I'm a little confused here, but has the client indicated their pronouns?

world culture isn’t a thing where someone decides to sit down and pick the bits they like from around the world though.
It’s not a good argument.

If someone prefers another culture the answer would be to move there. We don’t have 3 genders. We also only have 2 sexes. Gender is a social construct which has no defined meaning anyway.

I bet that poster feels a bit dim now!

Since gender is entirely imaginary, there can be as many of them as you like.

If you're both illiterate and innumerate you might even invent a third gender and call it "non binary".

All human and the vast majority of animals societies have exactly two sexes though.

Why would a third gender make anyone illiterate or innumerate?

Yes gender is a social construct. So there can be three if a society seems it so. And some do.

I was referring to this is an example that three genders can and do exist. Just because westeners think there are only two genders that doesn't make it a fact. It makes it an opinion.

It's not irrelevant that it happens in other parts of the world just because you think it is and non binary people don't need to move to another country to be accepted. You may as well say that crocodilesn existing in Australia is a rubbish argument for the existence of crocodiles because you've never seen one in England and Australia is irrelevant to an English person.

A very large proportion of women do not see men (TW) as women and don't wish to have their privacy, dignity and safety rights taken away because of the belief of a group of men, as opposed to the biological fact that we know that they are not women. If they had any respect for women at all they would be campaigning for a third space, instead they choose to put themselves above all and steal our spaces instead, which then forces us to get naked in front of a man we don't know. It's a disgrace.

Then why refer to gender at all when the fact that there are only 2 sexes was stated?

Literally no one is saying that anyone needs to move countries.

Just that they are t going to start attributing pronouns to 'gender' instead of sex because you want them to.

Couldn't agree more.

That's why refusing to acknowledge your sex by declaring yourself non binary is also a nonsense, and bugger all to do with 'gender' - we keep being told there are 11853 'genders'. Yet binary = 2 things.

Control F is your friend here - search for she/her and change if you find any.

So this colleague took it upon herself to be annoyed on behalf of the client, who did even know a mistake had been made? I honestly can't stand people like that. I would just leave it as it is OP, as others have advised. Don't give this nonsense any more headspace.

You sound very ignorant, and the OP should feel bad about misgendering, it’s not a perfectly normal thing to do

Yes as unfair as it is just use the client and keep your distance

Actions like the one from OPs colleague are often done in the name of inclusivity but they are actually rather nasty and alienating. Being reported to your manager for an honest mistake is upsetting. No one wants to work with people like OPs colleague because they create discord.

Using pronouns aligned to sex is something the OP has been doing her whole life and her culture has been doing for centuries.

Why on earth should she feel bad about it?

SundayDread literally said that.

If someone prefers another culture the answer would be to move there. We don’t have 3 genders.

Because the whole discussion is about gender. Or have I slipped into an alternate universe....

Well that's clear enough isn't it. If that's their preference - move.

However they can live here perfectly well believing they are non binary but not imposing that belief on anyone else.

People that indulge in self-indulgent fantasy for attention don't get to make demands. The person is correctly-sexing them. Not 'misgendering'. The other person is misgendering themselves.

Btw, OP hasn't said that her colleague ever corrected her even once before going to her boss.

In the opinion of fact and science. I bet you'd argue that the earth is flat or triangular.

'Gender' does not exist, its a man-made misogynistic construct. ONLY sex is real. And the charity is a SEX-based one. Not an 'identity' based one. Otherwise the client could easily go to a male or 'non-binary' one. You might be easily brainwashed by bs, but most of us are grounded in reality.