Pronouns in email signature

[thirdfiddle]

I'm sure this has been discussed before but couldn't find a thread. People are talking about getting everyone at work to put their pronouns in their email signature. I really don't like the idea. Why do they want us to do this, and can anyone suggest a good neutral way to answer if asked why I don't?

Hopefully won't come up as immediate colleagues are very cynical and liable to silently roll eyes at any such initiative that gets off the ground rather than enforce it.

I'm so glad I've managed to avoid coming across this, and it's just as well as I would instantly judge anyone sufficiently pretentious to do this. I thought "reaching out" was the lowest point in corporate speech, but this may beat it.

And yes rainbows everywhere. No-one's interested in your sexuality beyond in the sense of how's the family/what are you doing at the weekend. It's like a giant corporate game of "share if you care about cancer".

You wouldn't put your disability, your age, or your sexuality in your email signature so why your sex?

I agree.

I have a unisex name and work in engineering. I'm probably misgendered about 3 times a week, every week, for the last 20 years.

Along with such gems as "Oh I thought an engineer was coming to visit" and "all these women in engineering, is it some sort of feminist plot?"

Still alive. Still no real urge to announce my pronouns.

My welcome letter from my current employer was addressed to "Mr".

I can't understand why it's suddenly been so important when it's just been a joke to and about me for two decades.

My name is also a man's name and I quite like people not knowing my gender or sex when emailing etc. Right or wrong I think it helps me be taken more seriously in a very blokey field of work. I think I'd refuse and say it wasn't important how people address me so I won't, other people can do what they like. If pushed, I'd say it was no one's business here what my gender or sex is.

My workplace is very keen be inclusive (not to the extent of promoting enough women or BAME candidates to senior roles, though - they don’t mean that sort of inclusive!), and one article on the intranet encouraged us to include our pronouns in our email signature to “normalise” the practice to support our colleagues.

I’ve only ever seen one person do it, a woman with an obviously female name. If it ever becomes mandatory I will steal some of the ideas here, or quietly ignore it.

Load of rubbish. Pronouns are for ME to use when I talk about YOU in the third person when you won't even be there and if you think you are so special that you have the right to control my thinking 24/7 by trying to enforce what words I can use, then you really, really won't want to know how I'll be talking about you.

I'd be tempted to put:

Pronouns: Stop talking about me behind my back.

My work is cosying up to Stonewall and rainbow lanyards are on order.

I'm dreading the move towards performative stupidity.

If it ever comes in where I work (rainbow lanyards have arrived already) I shall steal *gcacademic" recommendation and use it/it and tell anyone who objects to stop kink shaming

include our pronouns in our email signature to “normalise” the practice to support our colleagues.

People who suggest this really haven’t thought about the impact of gender stereotypes on women.

I tried the "pronouns: any" at a very woke event about three years back. And yet when the list was circulated of what we should call each other, I'd been listed as she/her.

Funny, that.

(I declined to take part in the event at all, after that.)

Like most of you I don't get this. Pronouns are used when you are talking about someone who isn't there. I was taught it is rude to use a pronoun if the person being referred to is present.

In a face to face situation if A says something which B wants to endorse or refute , A will say I agree with/ object to what B has said. One always uses the person's name.

If A can't remember / doesn't know B's name , A will / should fudge it in some way to avoid using just a pronoun , because of the "who's she? the cat's mother?" mantra.

(as aside there was a recent thread where some posters started referring to me as "she" rather than my name and that felt quite rude and dismissive)

I was taught it is rude to use a pronoun if the person being referred to is present.

If you address them directly, it's natural to say "you" - we use pronouns all the time (we, I...) But it is likely to be rude if you turn to Fred and talk about "she" in front of whoever "she" refers to.

"I'm sorry, I'd rather not focus on my genitals while I'm at work"

I'm sure they'll try and explain why it's not about your genitals, thereby making it all about genitals

But it is likely to be rude if you turn to Fred and talk about "she" in front of whoever "she" refers to

That is what I meant. The use of 3rd party pronouns when the person is present is rude.

I do actually see the logic in asking everyone their pronouns though. If we only asked mannish looking women or effeminate men it could risk offence. And we do normally need to refer to someone in the 3rd person whereas we don't need to know their sexuality.

I actually support those who are transgender or confused to be known how they wish to be known however I think the default option should be assumed, in most workplaces there will be zero trans staff. It's political correctness. I am a woman it's blatantly obvious I don't need to tell people

"I was taught it is rude to use a pronoun if the person being referred to is present."

'I asked Jessica what Jessica thought and Jessica said that Jessica was considering several solutions to Jessica's problem ."

"If we only asked mannish looking women or effeminate men it could risk offence."

It has been shown time and time again that the more a woman's gender is referenced, the less she is respected in the workplace. So, no thanks. I'll risk offending a few ambiguously named, ambiguously appearanced people (which has happened precisely once in my life) if it means I get the scant respect I get these days as a woman.

But if you're not sure, as I'm not with many of my colleagues in Asia, you just rephrase things - "Sao told us..."

"First I will tell you about my research on pronoun use in woke circles, then Emma will present her paper on misogyny in the workplace".
Is that rude to Emma?

I have yet to meet a single colleague who wasn't obviously male or female though. Very occasionally someone I've only had email contact with may have a unisex or unfamiliar name - but then it's quite useful to check your prejudices, it shouldn't make any difference to how you interact with them after all. And if I need to know whether to ask them to join the women's football team (ha, unlikely!) then I can ask a colleague if Alex is male or female and Alex isn't around to be offended.

"First I will tell you about my research on pronoun use in woke circles, then Emma will present her paper on misogyny in the workplace".
Is that rude to Emma?

No, that's fine. I think most people know the difference between speaking about someone in the third person when they're there, but you're addressing everyone else - as is often done when introducing a speaker; and when you're talking about someone in front of them as if they weren't even there and aren't really relevant. I'm sure there are cases where it's not always clear-cut, though.

I work for an international company, and many colleagues I have not met face-to-face. If they don't have a profile pic, I have pretty much no way of knowing without directly asking them, and I have no reason to do that. I want to know if they can check cables in a network switch, not which loos they use.

I have met a couple of people where they're not obviously one sex or another. I will make inferences if I'm introduced to John or Emma, but Alex or Sam... You work round it, and then it gets to a point where it''s embarrassing not knowing, but being British, we're past the point where I could just ask, so I just have to emigrate to Outer Mongolia instead.

People who suggest this really haven’t thought about the impact of gender stereotypes on women.

It has been shown time and time again that the more a woman's gender is referenced, the less she is respected in the workplace.

merrymouse and IAmAlwaysLikeThis have it spot-on. The more i think about this, the more dangerous I think it is.

I was just reading an old article about how tech start-up money is given much more to men than to women. We've all seen those blogs and twitter thread where bloke changes emails with a woman colleague for the day and is all OMG at how badly they are treated. Hell, we all know why "Currer Bell" and "George Elliot" and "James Tiptree Jr" wrote under the names they did.

And now we are being persuaded that it's progressive to constantly remind everyone we interact with by email that we are women.

I want to see an impact assessment done in every workplace as to how it affects women's careers before i say this is OK.

I have not added pronouns to my sig block. I spent too many years in a military environment being called sir (because, you know, there aren’t any women in the military) to give a fuck. I know that sooner or later I will be told to - there have been many ‘suggestions’ - but right now I have bigger gender fish to fry.