Using sex-based pronouns instead of their preferred gender-ID pronouns

[DuesToTheDirt]

Has anyone ever done this? What happened?

I mean for people you know in real life, not on the internet, and for adults not children.

I would love to do this, though I don't suppose I will. But I feel that by saying "she" to refer transwomen I am being forced into a lie, that I am agreeing to someone's delusion. I try to avoid using pronouns, but realistically that just results in either not talking about certain people (which is definitely one strategy!) or using really convoluted language. It's all very well being "kind" to people, but it's certainly not kind on me.

Yeah. But you couldn’t disagree without telling me how ‘petty, self protective and ridiculous’ I am for disagreeing with you. For not affirming a human who identifies as a snake or lizard.

It is none of those three things. Affirming an extreme delusion is truly not a kind act. But you obviously feel that anyone who doesn’t is hateful.

My preference does not trump somebody's preference to be referred to using pronouns that cause me dissonance and their pronoun preference does not trump my preference to use sex based pronouns. Oh what to do?

Ah, fuck it. I'm not wasting my mental effort on their wants.

Well no. I said "it's" ridiculous. Not you. It's not about you, why position yourself in that way

What if you work with someone trans? Or have to serve someone trans?

Also not every transperson is noticable. You have probably seen people who are trans that you don't know as such.

Thanks for all the comments.

I feel trapped in this issue, as you can't realistically go through life avoiding using pronouns. Using names instead, saying "Jane said this, Jane did that," is clumsy, obvious, and difficult to keep up, and in any case shows that you don't agree to use their pronouns.

It's not like other differences of belief or lifestyle, as I have to participate in some way. Religious people don't expect me to pray with them, flat earthers don't expect me to help them plan a trip which avoids falling off the edge. If someone is racist or sexist, it's OK to call them out on it. But it's not (yet) socially acceptable to refuse to go along with preferred pronouns.

Eh?

No. He's a transman. Ironically one who agrees with most things on this platform.

I believe Transwomen are Transwomen. Transmen are transmen.

He is a biological woman who is happier and more comfortable living as a transman, presenting as male, and being perceived as male.

I haven't experienced this in person yet.
I'd like to think I'd call a man, a man.
I get called sir/Mr on the phone, despite all accounts only in my name because I live alone. They all have Miss on them. I don't mind too much, I have a deep voice, but for the love of all that's green and good, STOP REFERRING TO ME AS YOURSELF!!!

Yes a few times.
Once a person I was speaking to was tripping themselves up so much I said let's just use he, it's too hard having a conversation and tying yourself in knots when he's not here. . I could see the other person's shoulders relax and the conversation was much easier.

Another time with a friend over a sport person. She brought up how a man mediocre in their sex category for their sport could excel in the women's category. I think very visually and I couldn't make my mind translate the man with a manly bulge who towered over women on the podium into his preferred pronouns.

The article about Sascha Bailey really resonated with me. A couple of the transwomen I know have mental health problems, and I wonder now about the "suicide" theory - perhaps they wanted to kill off their old selves.

They now claim to feel like women, and want to be called "she". But as far as I can tell, they are no happier.

Did she ever go through a 'they/them' phase?

This 'transman' can wear she likes, have whatever hairstyle she likes and think of herself as whatever she likes. But she needs to realise that she does not and cannot control how others perceive her or think of her. She is an adult human female and the word we have for that is woman. And they are referred to as she.

In most situations whether you are male or female doesn't matter - so she doesn't need to worry. In the situations it matters, it tends to really matter and it's foolish (sometime dangerous) to lie about your sex.

Maybe think of these choices as a religion which is, after all choice. Free choice is the cornerstone of our society, & that's the least we can afford others

I do wonder where it will all end. I don’t see either side giving up any time soon. Even if pronouns are successfully compelled, so for example someone does end up using ‘he’ for a transman at work, what happens if that person pronounces ‘he’ in a weird or exaggerated way, drawing attention to the coercion? Who is going to police that? I’m really not sure compelled speech or trying to re-engineer human perceptions of reality makes for good human relations. And for those of you who say ‘you probably haven’t noticed’ - the genie is out of the bottle now, we’ve all been educated, and once you train your eyes, it’s hard not to notice. Few people can fully hide their past, there is always at least one person who knows, and truth wins out eventually.

Of course my rights and my view trumps everyone else's and is more important than anyone else's.

I'm a raging narcissist. I thought everyone knew this by now.

I worked on building sites for years. I was assumed to be a man at least a couple of times a day, despite the enormous tits and long hair.

And my mother growing up very rarely managed to call me the right name.

Funny enough i didn't feel the urge to throw myself on the floor and behave like a overgrown toddler when those things happened.

Josette's partner sounds a lot like some of the transmen I know - those who are genuinely indistinguishable from biological men. They can't control how others perceive them but the reality is that you would probably perceive them as men. Not all transmen are fourteen year old tiktokers with oversized glasses and elfin haircuts making absurd claims that nobody, NOBODY, even GUESSES they're female.

I have been in the position before of being casually introduced to a couple as "Mary and Bob," using male pronouns for Bob as a matter of course, and then much later on discovering that Bob is female. It would seem gratuitous to suddenly start using female pronouns in those circumstances when my perception is and was of a male. Very different, to my mind at least, to being introduced to "Mary and Bob" when Bob is very obviously a woman and the perception is a lesbian couple.

😆I get called by both the wrong name and the wrong pronoun frequently - and addressed as "sir" or "mate" quite a lot. I'm not offended by it, it's generally quite funny. I do remain baffled by the people who leap in to take offence on my behalf - I cannot imagine the level of tedium my life would have to achieve before I tried to borrow drama from strangers.

I agree. Even the seemingly nice trans people are still demanding that I call people like Amy George “she”. Which actually isn’t a very nice thing to do.

I use the correct (sex-based) pronouns if I’m fairly confident the person I’m speaking to is a fellow realist. If I think they might be captured and I don’t know them very well (so don’t want a row), I tend to use they/them. But also, I’ve got a friend who I love dearly who has been in my life a long time and we’ve each supported each other through some really rough patches. She is firmly TWAW so we both just avoid the topic, but if someone comes up in convo who is trans, I would use they and them with that particular friend.

I’ve got another friend who has a teenage child who identifies as trans. She is loving and compassionate with her child but is hoping they will desist. When we recently met up (without the kids), she kept ‘misgendering’ her child (using the correct sex pronouns) and she apologised to the group for it but we all said we weren’t offended and that our friend should use whatever language she wants to when she is talking about the very difficult situation her family is in. I had never had any GC conversations with this particular group of friends, so it made me sad that our friend thought she had to censor her own language because she didn’t know how we would react to it.

I hasten to add, she does use her child’s chosen name, and uses their chosen pronouns in other contexts.

No he didn't. He transitioned to a transman in his late 20's and is now 40. He was never NB.

If you don't know he's trans you wouldn't know. We look like a biological man and woman when out.

I actually was introduced to a man not long ago who I didn't know was trans until it came up in conversation. There are people who pass easily.

That's my point. Blair white passes well as a woman too.

On the other hand I know quite a few butch lesbians who are often mistaken for men.

Interesting language choice there. Butch lesbians are “mistaken” for men but when your female partner is seen as a man it’s not a mistake. What’s the difference?