Why is misgendering a big deal?

[FortunateCookie]

Hope someone can help because I’m really trying to understand why not affirming someone’s identity is that big of a deal.
I understand that it’s polite to go along with whatever someone’s chosen gender identity is, but I can’t believe that it’s actually a big problem if you don’t?
Surely if your friends and family accept your identity, it doesn’t matter if someone at work doesn’t?
Would it really make someone suicidal?
Do any of the trans organisations say why it is so important?
I just don’t get it.

The definition of woman is adult human female. It is a biological term and has nothing to do with the make-believe that is gender, which is complete bollocks.

To repeat. There is nothing innate about femininely or masculinely associated words. They are part of the social construct of gender, not an inherent association with sex.

Someone needed therapy from reading Mumsnet...I've heard it all now! And how can any woman with even a smidgeon of self respect lower herself by calling herself cis? 😖

To say you know someone's gender better than they do is to put your own experience of gender over theirs, and possibly their comfort. Essentially, you're arrogant and close-minded, which would piss someone off anyway, but as misgendering is quite personal and pretty much constant for trans people I think it can very easily hit a nerve.

Many women on this thread are constantly being told we are not allowed to define our own sex. We are gaslit, abused, and told we are bad for wanting to define our own sex, and we are threatened with actual violence (as in, being hit, not someone saying a word we don't like) when we define our own sex.

Where is your compassion for us, rosesandflowers? When do you tell the men that do this to us that they are arrogant and close-minded?

@rosesandflowers, I'm not transphobic, I just don't believe in your religious cult.

Wear what you like, call yourself wherever you choose, act however you want to (within the law) , it really doesn't bother me in the slightest, BUT nothing you do changes your biological SEX. Ever.

GibbertyFlibbert
Until you actually go out with a Trans Woman, for the day and listen to the comments and the sniggers, and the misgendering, You cannot comprehend just how difficult it is for them to lead a normal life, I have two great trans friends one you would not know in any way shape or form that she is Trans, but the other one its quite easy to see, but even when she is wearing a skirt or smart trousers and top she is frequently shouted at called names, and not nice names,
One prime example of how my friend was spoken to in a shoe shop was oh we dont do those in 10, anyway they are more suited to smaller dainty feet, Disgusting that they are treated this way,

There are no real definers of gender

This is an admission that it doesn't exist.

A word with no definition is just noise.
Words represent meaning.
They exist so we communicate with others.
They serve to share concepts and meanings with others.
This is what mutual understanding is.

There IS no meaning to gender.

What you want to do, is to force dissimilar people under the same banner with no justification at all other than you want it.

If gender has no definition then you can not claim that people share the same gender.

My experience with children and gender identity is that the younger they are, the less confusing it is.

Until the time comes when a self-identified trans-woman/man comes into their space and claims it. See women in sport - the recent Connecticut race where college scholarships are on the line because women cannot compete fairly against TIMs. Hormones don't remove your muscle, VO2, bone density and pelvic structure advantages.

See also all women shortlists in the Labour party; women's refuges being targeted because they refuse entry to male bodied persons because of the risk to the vulnerable women they are housing; language in the repeal of the 8th in Ireland being targeted because apparently we need to talk about "pregnant people" as using "women" is trans-exclusionary.

In addition to all that I find it very difficult to reconcile a school telling a child scientific fact in one lesson, then in the next telling them that verbalising and believing those scientific facts is discriminatory!

It's a modern translation to describe one of the original genders of ancient Native Americans. Two genders has always been a ridiculously simple construct and so the Native Americans had more - 7, I believe, though I might be wrong. Unlike most ancient societies, which almost always had terms for genderfluidity, they were held in great esteem and seen as very special by the Native American people

ERrr - I feel that you probably haven't actually read anything about this subject at all - for a start it wasn't 'Native American people' only some tribes - and people from these and other tribes, from what I've read, find this cultural appropriation pretty damn offensive.

I don't fear transpeople, I just view them as people suffering from a mental illness who need therapy treatment, and not validation.

“Because they don't 'just want to pee' or whatever, they want validation.”

Yes. If non- affirmation is so damaging then it follows that positive affirmation would be extremely rewarding.

And therefore something vital is being asked of the woman who needs a smear test. Instead of being the patient whose need should be paramount, she is instead either a cause of huge distress, or a way to experience this reward of affirmation.

Either way, it is difficult to see how her needs could be centred against the pull of such a powerful motivation.

So for an anthropologist, the observation that some (not all by any means) Native American cultures have Two Spirit people isn't evidence that there really are people out there with two spirits, it's simply evidence that this is a belief set which works for this society in terms of keeping things ticking over and allowing for fairly rigid gender (sex-role meaning of gender) boundaries to be maintained while giving an escape route to the people really made unhappy by these roles.

This is super interesting!

How gender/sexuality develops/changes/is defined as a construct, especially in different societies, is always super interesting to learn more about. I was reading an interesting book about Ancient Greece (that section was on sexuality, not gender, though) and how their views on gender impacted their definitions of sexuality.

My point was - in referral to this discussion - simply that Native America is possiblt the most commonly referred to culture of gender history. Someone mocking a term like two-spirit is an instant red flag that a) they're happy to mock before they learn and b) they haven't really learnt anything.

FermatsTheorum that's a great post. Do you mind if I paraphrase it for my local activists? We're having a good online chat at the moment about gender critical arguments.

I cannot believe the lack of understanding and empathy on this thread...

My 19 year old has recently disclosed to me that they are non-binary.

If I call them 'she' by accident I can see they are visibly distressed. It is about their identity and finding their place in the world.

Yes, they suffer from anxiety amongst other issues, but that doesn't make their feelings any less valid. And yes, I do believe continuous mis-gendering could lead to increased mental health issues.

If someone asks you to call them by a specific pronoun, be it him, her or they - is it really that hard to respect their request?

I suppose my take as a GC feminist is that it provides an escape route for those who are prepared to "change sex" in order to get away from rigid sex-based roles, but this is an illusory "escape". It provides no escape for those of us who are comfortable with our sex, but don't like the way society tries to shoe-horn us into sex-based roles. We'd rather like society to stop trying to do this to us. In fact, it risks doing the opposite - entrenching those roles still further, with an insistence that the only way out is to change sex. (Which is I think going on in quite a lot of cases of rapid-onset gender dysphoria among teen girls.)

Feel free DMC

from what I've read, find this cultural appropriation pretty damn offensive.

When random white people choose to use it instead of a Western term for "the aesthetic", yes.

From my understanding many Native Americans still identify as two spirit.

A word with no definition is just noise.

I said definers, not definition. Sorry if this was confusing, but it was my way of communicating that it doesn't have stereotypes attached to it, which is a fairly common belief.

Until the time comes when a self-identified trans-woman/man comes into their space and claims it. See women in sport - the recent Connecticut race where college scholarships are on the line because women cannot compete fairly against TIMs. Hormones don't remove your muscle, VO2, bone density and pelvic structure advantages.

This is hugely wrong and sports should be sex-segregated if they happen competitively. But that still won't make the concept of a trans person confusing. A child will be confused as to why it's being ineffectively dealt with.

I will say though that transphobes often get pissed when it's the other way round. Remember the trans boy that won the girl's boxing tournament - (actually, after requesting to be put in the boys one, and denied on the basis that it would be unfair to him.) He got slated.

No, I won't agree to change the language to mollify an anxious teenager. How odd that you expect the world to be so cosseting of her. I would advise learning to cope with anxiety and developing resilience will be more beneficial than encouraging her to get upset about a pronoun.

@rosesandflowers, if there's no definition or meaning for gender, how exactly can it cause so much 'literal violence' when someone doesn't go along with it?

Rosesandflowers you really need to stop using the word 'transphobes'.
Many of your posts come across as someone who is trying to think about stuff and then you use a term that pathologises people who hold different views to you. Not a helpful way to move forward in understanding imo.

Its funny isn't it how radical feminists are gender critical because gender is a social construct, however if someone wants to be referred to by a particular pronoun (which is also a social construct) thats a 'huge lie' and shouldn't be changed?

It seems as though some social constructs should be changed, but others (especially when used to dig at people they don't like) are inviolable.

The biggest lie here is that there isn't any transphobia.

Rosesandflowers
From what I've heard it's very similar whenever young children encounter it. I think it's a lot easier to get when you're a child.

You mean children don't know enough about the world to know when they're being lied to. If you tell them that people can be 'born in the wrong body' and can then 'change sex', they'll believe it.

Its not that adults don't 'get' transgender ideology, its that we have enough education and understanding of biology to recognise bollocks when we hear it.

RedPanda I am sorry that you have a child who is unhappy. I can understand that you want to be supportive and use their chosen pronoun.

However how does your child respond when they leave the house and people address them as "she" and "her"? From this point on I am going to refer to your child as your daughter - because it's valid to the point that I am trying to make.

At the risk of sounding blunt, is it counter-productive to accept the anxiety and work to avoid it, instead of encouraging and teaching resilience? Put simply, your daughter is going to encounter many, many situations and scenarios where people address her according to her sex. Whilst she has every right to want to express herself and define her own gender characteristics, surely she also needs to learn to deal with the fact that there are going to be situations where this is not possible?

And how can any woman with even a smidgeon of self respect lower herself by calling herself cis?

I seriously don't understand. It means I'm a woman and have a vagina. What's the issue? All I've got is some talk of stereotypes but I still don't understand why anybody could possibly get offended by it. It's just a descriptor.

No, I won't agree to change the language to mollify an anxious teenager.
What about an abusive victim that found it immensely triggering?
What if the person had been through conversion therapy?
What if they had a history of self harm or attempted suicide?

How far would you go to validate your principles?

how exactly can it cause so much 'literal violence' when someone doesn't go along with it?

If you mean violence towards trans people from some TERFS/transphobes, it's because they're awful people.

If you mean how does it affect trans people negatively if it's a construct, like I said before, just because somethings a social construct doesn't mean it can't impact life, negatively or positively.

If you mean why do people use violent language towards people or assault them when they misgender them etc. it's because trans people are people. They can be rude, threatening, frustrated, angry or violent just like any cis person can.

If you mean something else, can you specify?

abuse victim, sorry.
FFS. I need to start doing this on my laptop.

So.

Either it is a big deal that a trans person has their identity affirmed, (very distressing when not affirmed, extremely rewarding when positively affirmed) and therefore it should be recognised that this could cause a conflict of interest in some situations where affirmation or not is a factor (ie performing smear tests, working in a women’s refuge etc)

Or

It’s not that big a deal if a trans person has their gender identity affirmed and therefore they won’t be too offended if a patient asked for a female to carry out their smear or they are refused employment by a women’s refuge.