Banning the term "cis"

[OlennasWimple]

Apologies if this had already been done, but can MNHQ consider banning the term "cis", given how horrifically offensive so many users of MN find it?

I don't think I need to set out the background and reasoning to this request (but can do so if it would help!)

Late, sorry.

Show all children that they don't have to choose whether to be masculine or feminine - but don't tell them they can change their biological sex because they cannot.

I think gender identity is a horribly complicated area but I'm leaning towards this point of view really.

I think it's far, far more likely that "gender is a bullshit construct" than that "gender is actually real except that if your lived experience of gender doesn't match your genetic sex you can hormonally and surgically alter your physical sex characteristics to match your feelings".

If MNHQ is to be consistent, all misgendering must be considered unacceptable and that includes using "cis" to describe a person who does not accept that label.

Adding "cis" to the list of banned words (currently largely populated with disablist and racist slurs) would suggest taking sides before the argument is complete. As much as I'd like them to declare for gender critical, I can see why they wouldn't.

I just found this very interesting article on gender:

aeon.co/essays/the-idea-that-gender-is-a-spectrum-is-a-new-gender-prison

Really interesting. Might help some of the people here who don't get why we consider cis an insult.

From Vestal's linked article:

So if you want to call yourself a genderqueer femme presenting demigirl, you go for it. Express that identity however you like. Have fun with it. A problem emerges only when you start making political claims on the basis of that label – when you start demanding that others call themselves cisgender, because you require there to be a bunch of conventional binary cis people for you to define yourself against; and when you insist that these cis people have structural advantage and political privilege over you, because they are socially read as the conformist binary people, while nobody really understands just how complex and luminous and multifaceted and unique your gender identity is. To call yourself non-binary or genderfluid while demanding that others call themselves cisgender is to insist that the vast majority of humans must stay in their boxes, because you identify as boxless.

YYYY.

genderqueer femme presenting demigirl

The only reasonable (while polite) response to that is "that's nice, dear."

If someone came up to me and told me they were a "genderqueer femme presenting demigirl" I don't think I would actually know what to say. Apart from "huh?"

Very interesting, vestal.

Funnily enough, I'd returned to this thread to say, sod banning 'cis', what we should ban is 'gender' except for its original purpose in grammar.

Stop the mealy mouthed use of gender as a 'polite' synonym for 'biological sex' (fgs MNHQ fix the profile, anyone who can't bear seeing the word sex probably won't like MN). Stop the 'transgender' idea allowing people who are physically and hormonally men into biologically women's spaces such as the women's Olympics teams or refuges. Stop gender putting our children into boxes.

Didn't mnhq as they were changing the profile to "sex" a while back?

Venus- yyy from me too.

Ha. Was pissed off registering to the Guardianto comment and had to state gender. Didn't want to but really wanted to comment.

I had to fill in a referral form for an adolescent mental health service recently. It asked for not even 'gender' but 'gender identity' and the options were male and female. I definitely deleted it and put sex instead but I can't remember if I sent it that way or put it back.

I have been reading this thread, and others on similar subjects recently with interest.

The whole trans/cis/gender thing is relatively new to me, as in really thinking about it as opposed to it just being something that other people thought about. In real life I have never had anything like the conversations that are had on here, and have had very little contact with the trans community.

Anyway, the more I have read, what has interested me the most is the idea of gender as a social construct, and the reality that if there wasn't such a stigma attached to people of one biological sex dressing/behaving in the stereotyped way of the opposite gender then we wouldn't even need the word trans. The article the vestal posted pretty much sums it up for me. I've been trying and failing to articulate my feelings on the matter and that article does a perfect job.

So although I don't nessesarily think it needs to be banned, I do reject the term cis being applied to me. But, live and let live, people can call themselves whatever they want I suppose.

I just need to work out now how I can avoid gender stereotyping while raising my son. I think that is going to be a challenge seeing as it is so fundamentally ingrained in society.

Yeah, Eminy.

Big boys don't cry.
You run like a girl.
You throw like a girl.
Last one back's a sissy.
Boys don't like pink.
Boys are tough.
And all the sexism around children, all the time, even at school: www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/womens-blog/2015/feb/23/sexist-assumptions-young-children-gender-stereotypes

Apparently, on BBC one, Sunday morning live, this morning they are covering the Olympic decision about born biological men competing in womens races.

Just watched the discussion. It was actually impressively balanced.

Thank you for posting the link to that article Vestal - it was very well written and useful.

There were no women on to discuss this topic! How is that balanced?

Well, on the plus side they must have listened to the men on the anti side?
I'll find it on I player later

OK, I know the bar is set low for the BBC but for them this wasn't bad.

I winced when Kellie Maloney appeared but the presenter actually stayed neutral, which is a nice change. They had opinions on both sides and the tweets they posted were mainly anti.

Missed a off, but seriously - at least it means they can't blame a load of women just being sore losers

I often wonder if this whole ioc thing is actually an anti-trans thing in disguise...?

Kelley Maloney again? Was the same person wife beating boxer last time the bbc discussed it too? Does Maloney have a vested interest? Return to boxing perhaps?!

Rather proves the point that women's opinions are irrelevant except where those women have a Y-chromosome and a penis.

Just to update - I had an email from MNHQ today that said they are doing some more research and having a think again about this issue. So watch this space, I guess...

And I wonder if it would be helpful to send MNHQ any resources (on either side of the debate) to help their deliberations?

Ah ... Useful, Olenna, thanks. And thanks for considering it again, MNHQ

Pretty sure they can get any of the links they need from this and other threads!

Another one here who rejects the trashy meaningless word "cis".

Let's see if I've got it right. Some transactivists who believe they are women want women who are born female to be referred to as cis - even if many (most?) born females dislike the term or even find it objectionable.

So, what we have is mtts who believe they are women telling 50% of the population they are really cis women, possibly against their will: which means that these mtts who feel like a women actually are behaving in a ultra stereotypically male way i.e. telling women who they and what they should do. So these mtts are, in fact, being more male than born men.

Oh, the irony,