Not using they/them pronouns

[Belafonte]

Our dd19 is gay. She is not a very happy girl. She lurched from one drama to the next and is surrounded by friends who encourage this. Recent events include declaring she has a particular MH condition (she does not and has since been told by gp and specialist), cutting her long hair into a buzz cut and waking up with a hangover to declare she’d been spiked. Plus other stuff.

The latest - and we have seen this coming for a while - is to say she is NB and ask for they/them pronouns. She has announced this on social media to an absolute chorus of stunning/brave congratulations but has not told us yet officially.

Initially I thought we should give her announcement as little attention as possible but am now thinking we may actually say, no, we love you but we will not be doing that, and here are the reasons why.

The reasons we would give are -

1. you are asking us to lie. We know you are a girl. We do not want to have to pretend that you are not.
2. we (as she knows) believe the ideology that pronouns are an extension of to be very harmful to women, children and gay people.
3. we especially do not want to ask her younger siblings to go along with this as we have brought them up to believe that you should be kind to everyone but that people can’t change sex and that there are two sexes.
4. we think non binary is a deeply regressive concept as it serves to entrench sexist stereotypes rather than expand the boundaries of make and female - why not just be a girl with a buzz cut?

We have enough faith in the strength of our relationship with her that she will accept what we have to say.

Would be good to hear other thoughts. Any non constructive posts from the monitors/TRAs calling me a bigot will be ignored.

I think that the more opportunity people have to see that they made an assumption they better

The more opportunity they have to judge someone before knowing their sex is more likely to undo their prejudice than education.

We don't educate recruiters about sex bias - that been proven to be ineffective/counter productive , we do blind recruitment instead

‘What I have done is not rub that in when she is distressed. This is not coerced speech.’

You’re right, it isn’t.

What is coerced speech is the insistence that others should do what you are choosing not to.

‘We don't educate recruiters about sex bias - that been proven to be ineffective/counter productive , we do blind recruitment instead’

And sexism in the workplace is still rife. Funny that.

Sexism is still rife but the proportion of women in out technical departments is now increasing and it has been shown that the biggest single thing you can do to overcome sexism is to get more women in place

Once you get to between 30 and 40% females then sexism reduces

Behaviour in meetings changes for example

So blind recruitment works better than education reducing sexism in a workplace

Blind recruitment isn’t the issue. By all means take the names off CVs.

Pretending we can conceal sex in everyday life (when know by looking at someone what sex they are) is ludicrous baby-bath water territory, and we’re not doing it.

My DD has also told us she is non binary. Her friends all call her by her chosen name and use they/them. I don't agree with this and feel it is simply a way of labelling the normal teenage feeling of being uncomfortable in your own skin. However, I am happy to go along with what she asks because I feel if I can do anything to help smooth her path through these tricky teenage years then I'm going to try. In her hearing I try to use they/them and don't refer to her as my daughter. I have changed her name to her chosen name in my phone and asked hairdresser/dentist etc to use her chosen name. I hope she grows out of this, but in the meantime I'm ok with supporting it. If she doesn't grow out of it, then I will embrace it fully.

Thanks everyone, some really helpful posts here, I’m going to use some of this when we speak to her.

I'm really sorry, I don't understand your last sentence here. Not being goady, I promise. To me, pronouns are a feature of our grammar. If people call me "she" (which they do, as I'm a woman) they are not passing comment on my views on gender.

We can't cancel sex in every day life and I wouldn't want to

But the less we emphasise social and conventional differences the less we reenforce the notion that there are a lot more differences than just biology

Totally agree with all this but the new insistence on pronouns isn't unique to English. I use 2 European languages in my professional life and inclusive pronouns (and endings, in these particular languages) are most definitely a feature now. I am pretty competent in my foreign languages but this takes a lot of additional working out for me.

Apologies for the derail, OP. Your plan sounds sensible to me.

OP I have to agree with you. I’m thankful I was brought up in a time where the aim was to try and breakdown stereotypes forced on women and not run away from them by calling yourself NB.

While I understand your reasoning for not wanting to go along with this your daughter is clearly struggling with something, hence the recent behaviour you have listed. She clearly
feels unsupported and lost. I think this is a “pick your battles” type situation. She will likely grow out of all this behaviour. She is lost and pushing boundaries trying to find her feet.

If gender was irrelevant to you, surely you wouldn’t have just told us what your pronouns are. Those of us who do not believe in gender or who see it as a damaging social construct don’t tell others what our pronouns are because we don’t need to. We just expect people to do what has always been done, which is use the pronouns corresponding to our physical sex (which is usually obvious to others). And we also don’t really care how others refer to us when we aren’t present.

This.

It depends if you think someone is using pronouns because of /as supporting gender

If you feel those pronouns are just part of how people expect you to conform

I'd say, ' when I'm speaking with you - I will use you. Always. You. When I'm not with you, it's none of your business what I'm saying or what pronouns I'm using.' Then I'd offer her a copy of 1984.

My DD is a teacher in a girls secondary school, ages up to 18 years old.

Atm on average, each class has around 25% NB GN pupils. It’s the current fad. As time moves on, the majority of that cohort will move on to another trend. Young adults almost need something to rebel against and to push your tolerance. Someone once told me it’s a bit like how, when we get on a rollercoaster, the first thing we all do is push against the restraint bar to test it. We want to know it is firm and secure and we can rely on it - even if it constrains us.

You being very understanding and not making a big deal out of it is probably the best approach. It’ll either frustrate the hell out of her - if it just a trend - or if long term she genuinely is NB, proof that you are supportive and non judgemental.

If it’s any comfort, my DD that is now the teacher, was one of the most contrary young adults ever. At the time she told us we were controlling, determined to stop her fun, made her life unbearable and that we were totally out of touch with the real world!

We've seen this on you tube compilations from Tik Tok. One girl was gender fluid so she had a different coloured bracelets you needed to remember the code. Pink and purple was for when she felt like girl, blue and gree for when she was a boy and yellow for non binary. stereotypes of pink and blue. So you had to look at her wrist to know which way she was feeling then decide the bracket to get the pronouns right. Honestly the self entitled narcissism was laughable. I'd would be like yeah I can't be bothered with you as you are way too hard work. So actually they exclude themselves with this nonsense.

Really interesting to read these views.

I personally would think, @tabby@tabbycatstripy stripy that it's even more important

I think you risk irrevocably damaging your relationship with your child if you don't accept who they are.

Oops!

I feel it would be even more important to use correct pronouns (she her) for my daughter. As I feel I would need to be a safe space for her to still be able to treated as a gender non conforming girl rather than a boy. Id personally use acquaintance and friend's preferred pronouns out of politeness, but I'd feel the stakes were higher if it was my own daughter and would not want to use their chosen pronouns. I think giving teenagers an easier 'out' from their chosen rebellion is helpful ie stopping the affirmation getting out of hand and taking over everything (like several detrans woman have talked about).

I really really love your way of doing it @JellySaurus

Yes, it’s a difficult decision because (in reality) it’s probably better for the child for the people who really love them to be an anchor in reality. However if I really believed I’d lose my relationship with them, I would make my beliefs very clear but I would do what they asked except and until it was harming them (any talk of changes to their body or involvement in what I would consider self-harming behaviour like going online to an extreme extent etc).

I use 2 European languages in my professional life and inclusive pronouns (and endings, in these particular languages) are most definitely a feature now

please Tell me this isn’t happening with German. The grammar fucks with my head quite enough as it is.

The worrying thing about this fad though is that is has been fueled and actively promoted by adults and powerful lobying campaigners. I wish it was just a bunch of rebellious youths but it is much more than this.

😂These are Romance languages. I don't know about German but this seems to be everywhere so I'd be amazed to discover that German was an exception!

Some really sensible posts here, I hope they help, OP.

I'm always interested when reading articles written by detransitioners, how often they describe feeling a need for control and language being a means by which to have that control over others, with the lobby guidance on abandoning and separating from those who resist that control. It reminds me a lot of other forms of body dysmorphia such as anorexia where distress goes hand in hand with a lot of controlling behaviour and seeking of control. However adults are never exhorted there to agree unconditionally with their anorexic child on their perceived body image, or to actively enable them in continuing weight loss, because while the child will perceive this as very unkind, the parent can see the bigger picture and has the child's long term best interests at heart.

I agree there is a lot of middle ground between using language that you do not agree with and which is actively making you feel that you're speaking a lie that causes harm, and avoiding language that a person has shared they do not want. For example there are many posts on MN where posters are not willing to use 'she' for a person they perceive as male, but will use the person's name instead.