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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Line Manager just "come out" as Non-binary

532 replies

SpinningTooFastWantToGetOff · 07/02/2020 18:39

My line-manager emailed everyone in the office last week to say she was non-binary and we should use they/them pro-nouns.
Today I inadvertently called her she in an email to a colleague in another office, but line-manager was copied in, plus her line-manager. Are you keeping up? Confused
My line-manager responded to the email and added at the bottom a reminder about her pro-nouns.
I do not believe in the gender identity ideology and so object to being told to speak in an unnatural and incorrect way, but what I am incandescent about is being called out in front of 2 other colleagues.
Am I over reacting?

OP posts:
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Eckhart · 09/02/2020 14:39

Yes, a generalised, negative, assumption based view of a minority group.
As I said, I'd have thought feminists would know better.

R0wantrees · 09/02/2020 14:39

Meanings of words matter Eckhart

Justhadathought · 09/02/2020 14:40

Your point, R0wan|

And what exactly is your point? To me it seems to be the same point made over and over again.......and responded to in great detail, and with considerable effort by quite a number of people.

You are happy to use preferred pronouns in all situations....whereas many feel very uncomfortable and compromised by that for the multiple reasons given. What else is there to say?

Eckhart · 09/02/2020 14:42

just a minority of people are gay. Even if a high proportion of them are narcissists, there are still more straight narcissists because there are considerably more straight people.
What's your point though? Most narcissists are gay men? I love the effort you've put in to finding all those articles btw.

Bananabixfloof · 09/02/2020 14:42

That's because it wasn't about you
Eckhart in a previous post to me you wrote.
Bananais a person 'present' in a conversation when they are party to an email thread that mentions them? This is the reality of the OP

Where are my preferred pronouns in the reply?
Be honest, you forgot.
So when can I go to MNHQ to get you banned.?

Justhadathought · 09/02/2020 14:44

Yes, a generalised, negative, assumption based view of a minority group.As I said, I'd have thought feminists would know better

Again, you are assuming everyone holds to the same belief system as you. That there is a uniform group of people - who share immutable characteristics with each other......rather than certain groups being beholden to certain sets of beliefs or ideologies - which other people are in disagreement with.

Nobody can deny race or sex...they are immutable categories......not ideologically driven ones.

Justhadathought · 09/02/2020 14:47

just a minority of people are gay. Even if a high proportion of them are narcissists, there are still more straight narcissists because there are considerably more straight people.What's your point though? Most narcissists are gay men? I love the effort you've put in to finding all those articles btw

Except that is not what was said. I said some of the most that I have met"....... If you actually read the links you might find them interesting.

It seems to be acceptable for you, on the other hand to make wide ranging and sweeping generalisations, though. Was it you who reported my post - without even taking the trouble to look at the links?

SpinningTooFastWantToGetOff · 09/02/2020 14:49

@wellbehavedwomen
In a nutshell. Thank you 😊

OP posts:
Justhadathought · 09/02/2020 14:49

I love the effort you've put in to finding all those articles btw

More effort than you make on most of your posts, that's for sure. Not well thought through; and no consideration given to the responses that people have made to them; and no effort to made to link into any research or articles.

DiegoSaber · 09/02/2020 14:50

Where are my preferred pronouns in the reply?
Be honest, you forgot

She wasn't talking to you or about you in that post though. I know you're desperate to make your point here, but maybe try again later.

Eckhart · 09/02/2020 14:53

Oh, sorry banana I think I did say to remind me if at any point I forgot anybody's pronouns. It's hard to remember. I think I shouldn't be banned from MN just like op shouldn't be fired or reprimanded.

justhada You consistently misunderstand me. I can't be bothered to try, now. We'll have to leave it at that.

Eckhart · 09/02/2020 14:55

@DiegoSaber I've pm'd you.

Justhadathought · 09/02/2020 14:57

usthada You consistently misunderstand me. I can't be bothered to try, now. We'll have to leave it at that

Well you are not giving anyone much to go on......yet you seem happy to 'report' others in a way which few here are minded to do. I counter views and arguments with considered thought, personal observation and reflection and with evidence.....I don't resort to "telling the teacher".

ErrolTheDragon · 09/02/2020 15:00

It's hard to remember. I think I shouldn't be banned from MN

On that I expect we all agree... but, 'misgendering' can lead to deletions and suspension.

Eckhart · 09/02/2020 15:00

Ok then, justhad

As I said, let's leave it at that. You can keep arguing and attacking me if you want. I just won't be taking any notice.

Justhadathought · 09/02/2020 15:05

As I said, let's leave it at that. You can keep arguing and attacking me if you want. I just won't be taking any notice

Nobody is attacking you.......I'm responsing vigorously to your reptitive posts; having already given you the benefit of my doubt.

The reason that the OP was concerned and bothered by the 'reminder' to use preferred pronouns, was just like mine for feeling that you are not posting good faith.....It was not just a simple reminder - it was the implicit threat of reporting supposed misdemeanours that was registered. The walls have eyes and ears and you'd better toe the line...sort of sentiment. And we all know it.

Clymene · 09/02/2020 15:13

Thanks for that article R0wantrees - I hadn't read it before and it's excellent. Alarming to read the author lost her job for writing it though SadAngry

OldCrone · 09/02/2020 15:28

Eckhart
You seem to accept that people should be allowed to dictate not just how people address them when they are there (which is normally seen as a polite thing to do) but also how they should be talked about when they are not present.

Are there any limits in your view to what forms of address this could apply to? What about if someone decided that they wanted to be addressed as 'your highness' and referred to as 'her highness' in their absence? Is this similar to selecting which pronouns others should use? If not, why not?

Justhadathought · 09/02/2020 15:34

Are there any limits in your view to what forms of address this could apply to? What about if someone decided that they wanted to be addressed as 'your highness' and referred to as 'her highness' in their absence? Is this similar to selecting which pronouns others should use? If not, why not

To be expected to; to be prepared and happy to use 'your royal highness' pronouns or forms of address when requested, you'd have to believe there was such a thing as a legitimate 'monarchy complex'.

Indeed , where does it all end?

R0wantrees · 09/02/2020 15:39

Alarming to read the author lost her job for writing it though

Yes very & this is the current coersive context which women have to navigate.
Speeches from last night's Make More Noise event in Manchester will, I'm sure, have relevence so too Maya Forstater's appeal.

R0wantrees · 09/02/2020 15:50

In this Feminist Current interview Maria Machlachlan describes the impact & consequences of preferred/coerced/compelled (?) pronouns during the trial of T Wolf who was convicted of assaulting her at Speakers Corner.

(extract)
"MM: My experience of court was much worse than the assault. I was the one on trial that day and if it hadn’t been for the clear video evidence that I’d been assaulted, my assailant wouldn’t have been convicted, even though there were over a dozen witnesses who could have said what happened. I was asked “as a matter of courtesy” to refer to my assailant as either “she” or as “the defendant.” I have never been able to think of any of my assailants as women because, at the time of the assault, they all looked and behaved very much like men and I had no idea that any of them identified as women. After he was arrested, the defendant posted vile misogynistic comments on his Facebook page that no woman would ever make. He was also filmed aggressively intimidating a woman on a picket line, shouting obscenities at her. In what sense is this person a woman?

I tried to refer to him as “the defendant,” but using a noun instead of a pronoun is an unnatural way to speak. It was while I was having to relive the assault and answer questions about it while watching it on video that I slipped back to using “he” and earned a rebuke from the judge. I responded that I thought of the defendant “who is male, as a male.”

The judge never explained why I was expected to be courteous to the person who had assaulted me or why I wasn’t allowed to narrate what happened from my own perspective, given that I was under oath. His rebuke and the defence counsel’s haranguing of me for the same reason just made me more nervous and I so continued to inadvertently refer to my male assailant as “he.” In his summing up, the judge said I had shown “bad grace” and used this as an excuse not to award compensation. One writer said, “It was as if the state had colluded with the defendant to take one last stab at the victim,” and that’s exactly how it felt." (continues)
www.feministcurrent.com/2018/06/21/interview-maria-maclauchlan-gra-aftermath-assault-speakers-corner/

Eckhart · 09/02/2020 15:54

You seem to accept that people should be allowed to dictate not just how people address them when they are there (which is normally seen as a polite thing to do) but also how they should be talked about when they are not present

No, I don't. I've been talking about requests, reminders, and respect. Other people have been talking about dictating.

wellbehavedwomen · 09/02/2020 15:55

As I said, let's leave it at that. You can keep arguing and attacking me if you want. I just won't be taking any notice.

Nobody's attacking you. They're making points to which you have no rebuttal. That's telling, no?

This is all part of a belief system that is allowing any male into any female space, as soon as they claim she/her pronouns. That's not hyperbole. That's simple fact.

The government's own figures state that one in fifty male prisoners are now asserting that they identify as women. Those holding that belief system state that should be taken literally, and they should be moved to the prison estate.

Every single prison reform charity has said males in the women's estate terrify those women, all of whom have suffered abuse from men in their lives, almost all sexual, and more than half sexual abuse in childhood. The presence of those males is traumatising in itself. And that's before you begin to consider that most women in jail are there for financial offences, and most men violent. So you are moving violent males - including rapists and killers - into the women's estate, despite that terrifying the women and despite the risks not being containable, because there are so few women posing that sort of risk. The obvious is happening, all over the world. And in most countries, nobody cares. They're all women. The females don't matter. Shut the fuck up. That's not hyperbole. That's fact.

The pronouns creep is a way of manipulating people into signalling that they do not protest this. That they do not object. And given Maya Fostater was sacked for simply tweeting, respectfully and on her own account, that she did not think a man can become a woman simply by saying that he is (she did not say this at work, or harass or 'misgender' - stupid idea, when the entire point of this is to ensure that if someone demands it you DO misgender - anyone) nobody dares say they think this is simply not true, with pernicious implications for women.

There are three ways of looking at what is happening in the prison example. One is that transwomen are as likely to be predatory criminals as anyone else, which given women are not, means the same single sex spaces must be retained. The second is that these people are not truly trans, but predators seeking to use trans as a means to access women to abuse, in which case the same single sex spaces must be retained. The last is who cares, females don't matter anyway - and that seems to be the present state of play, much as people hotly deny it.

At the moment, any man can turn up at Center Parcs, assert that their pronouns are she/her, and that male will immediately be allowed to use the communal women's changing rooms on that basis. We had a male person arrive on Mumsnet to gloat, in fact. That person, when it was carefully explained that male bodies in a communal space where women will be naked would cause unease and discomfort at best, and could retraumatise rape survivors at worst, responded by saying that the obsession with their body was really creepy. It was, you see, all about them. Actual female women were there as props in this person's fantasy world... at best. If that's not rather more than creepy, and well into disturbing as fuck territory, I'm not sure what is.

I was firmly on the side of the trans argument until quite recently, because I knew none of this. I assumed common sense was being applied, sex protections retained, and all we had to be was kind, understanding and tolerant, while our own rights and protections were retained. I went away and researched all this solely to prove that the arguments to the contrary were rubbish.

They were not rubbish. They were absolutely correct. This is the biggest single threat to women's rights in my own mother's lifetime - her words, not mine - let alone my own. If you think you have good arguments against the above, I'd love to hear them. Because to date, nobody has been able to make a single one that doesn't boil down to: women don't matter. Sports? No male advantage. The physical reality doesn't matter. Our ideology says so. All women's shortlists should remain female? OMG you're so bigoted! What about the women born with penises?!

You see in old money, that would make them men. And in history, men weren't discriminated against. Henry VIII wore what we'd regard today as dresses. You'd need to ask his wives how vulnerable and powerless that made him. Those he didn't execute, that is.

And that's been the basis of most societies for tens of thousands of years, so you'll need to explain why this brief, fifty year span in just some of the nations on earth has left our rights and protections impregnable, and why allowing males to self-ID into those rights, protections and provision at will isn't the most misogynist thing imaginable.

It's not 'just pronouns'. It's signalling that you agree with what is happening.

If you look near the start, I saw no problem with this. I was happy to use whatever pronouns people wanted. You know what's swayed me? As ever, the people in favour of using them. It's not women with these ideas who 'radicalise'. It's the people who think females should have no rights. Funnily enough, as a female I'm not down with that.

R0wantrees · 09/02/2020 15:59

If something is a genuine request with no demands made & there is free choice whether to respond as requested or not, why would there be a reminder?

OldCrone · 09/02/2020 16:01

I've been talking about requests, reminders, and respect.

My question to you still applies:

Are there any limits in your view to what forms of address this could apply to? What about if someone made a request to be addressed as 'your highness' and referred to as 'her highness' in their absence? Is this similar to requesting people to use specific pronouns? If not, why not?

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