Since when have personal pronouns been a legal issue

[Spokk]

According to The Times, an extreme right professor has been refused a tenure at Cambridge. Reasonsble perhaps, but the aticle says that we are now bound by law to use doublethink and use he or she according to someone else’s preference. Am I right? Is this nuts? Shall we rename the country 1984 -Kafkaland?

Jordon Peterson is hardly extreme right. He is certainly a controversial figure, but a thought-provoking one who many students are interested in engaging with (there were queues around the block when he spoke at the Cambridge Union a while back). He is hardly Tommy Robinson, and he has a job at a Canadian university. Also, he wasn't turned down for tenure, but had an offer of a visiting fellowship rescinded following pressure from the vocal authoritarian woke brigade. In my view, the university is in breach of its legal obligation to protect free speech for giving in to this pressure and needs to be reported to the Office for Students.

There was a thread on here the other day about misgendering and the law, but ironically MNHQ deleted it . . . You can find an older one here:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3224023-What-is-the-law-regarding-misgendering-in-the-UK

I'm no fan of Peterson but I'd certainly not refer to him as "extreme right". Once Peterson is "extreme right" what do you call the real extreme right?

I think Cambridge were sensible to not give him a place. Imagine the university being flooded with Peterson ultra-fans, it would end up as a circus.

AFAIK, Jordan Peterson doesn't actually misgender anyone. He is a somewhat controversial academic, who shot to fame because he opposed a change to Canadian law (Bill C-16) that would enshrine the concept of gender identity into law as a protected characteristic, and ENFORCE the use of preferred pronouns.

He took a stand against compelled speech, on principle.

Meghan Murphy was also against Bill C-16 on the grounds of women's rights. She and Jordan Peterson both testified against the law, although it passed.

I believe we're seeing the consequences of that for women in Canada today, including with the ball-waxing case and Vancouver Rape Relief.

Whatever you think of Jordan Peterson, the fact he has had this visiting fellowship revoked is a real blow to the notion of academic freedom, IMO.

While most of what Peterson talks about is bog standard white male patriarchy that would have been uncontroversial 5 years ago, he has adopted a number of causes of the alt-right and he has a lot of views that don't fit with modern society (i.e. he is a homophobic, climate-change denying misogynist).

I don't agree with a lot of what Peterson says, but I think it's very dangerous to refuse to debate modern concerns and issues with someone that holds an opposing view who is willing to sit down and discuss those subjects in a reasonable fashion.

I also think that Peterson has tempered a lot of potentially explosive rage, caused by the masculinity crisis, among young men by telling them straight that they need to get their lives in order and look to their own failings first. His impact in this regard should not be underestimated. The worst thing for a society is to have a groundswell of rage-filled males.

Cambridge should not have rescinded the invitation, imv.

I think that Peterson has some interesting ideas. I don't agree with all of them - but there is no one who I agree with 100% of the time - and I think that he should be able to voice those views so that they can be debated.

It does seem a bit strange, considering how nasty some Cambridge people have been. Perhaps the student unions across the UK have been taken over by the professionally offended.

How many of us have been asked for our preferred pronouns in everyday life?

I've never been asked, people just go around assuming my sex/gender all the time.

Is it only certain groups of people that we need to check for their preferred pronouns? How do we know who's in this group and who's not?

"Is it only certain groups of people that we need to check for their preferred pronouns?"

There will be no need to check. You can be assured that they will tell you within seconds of meeting them for the first time. Or, like the Uni mentioned a while ago, they will be wearing a badge informing you of their preference.

Or woke employers requesting/requiring you to add your preferred pronouns to your email signature.