I have started to hate the term “identify as”

[TheletterZ]

“Identify as” is completely meaningless and is starting to really annoy me.

i don’t identify as a a white middle-aged straight woman with brown (ok greyish) hair and eyes. I simply AM those things. They are facts that are real and unchangable. (Well apart from the age thing and that only changes in 1 direction)

I can dye my hair but as I have to keep doing it, it just underlines the fact my hair is brown/grey.

“Identify as”implies choice. I didn’t choose my sexuality, it just is. No one does. My sister didn’t claim to be a lesbian (with all the prejudice that goes with that) she simply is one. No choice is involved.

There is a clip on twitter from Elliot Page saying ‘30% of young people identify as LGBTQ+’ which shows how ridiculous the statement is. From my limited understanding LGB is around 5-10% of a population. So who are the other 20%? People who just claim to be part of the ‘community’ to feel special.

Sorry for the rant, I use my name on twitter and as a teacher I have to keep my views quiet and bite my tongue.

You know... that 'Miss Gerbil 2024 winner' image would look great on a T-shirt. 😉

😁

I just all seems so narcissistic to me.

"I believe it so everyone else has to or else" That's what it feels like.

And if you don't comply and accidentally mis gender someone or have a different view but are still respectful but maintaining facts then it's literal violence and hate speech.

I honestly didn't think we would ever reach this place. When I first started reading about it all on mumsnet I was of the opinion of well if they say they are women then let them be. How my views have changed!!! I am the total opposite now.

Sometimes I watch tik tok and the debates on there are wild. Anyone who doesn't agree just gets cut off and blocked. It's crazy to watch.

You are so right it does mean that

True. And also wouldn't be putting their parents/friends/partners through hoops because they can only eat macaroni cheese made in a certain way, and the peas have to be bloody square. See that going down well in 1870!

Before this particular question cropped up I would have interpreted the personal 'identify as' to mean 'feels strongly about that true aspect of the person's life or characteristics'.

For instance, two legally British people might consist of one who thinks of being British as just a fact, with no great importance and another, who 'identifies as British' and thinks of it as one of the central and important aspects of that person's whole life.

But in that interpretation the underlying assumption was always that the two people actually both are British. Now it would be possible for a person who has no ties the Britain to assert identification with the concept.

The problem, then, is how others should react to assertions of identity. Sometimes what a person asserts can be seen to be true by others, sometimes not, and in the latter case it may be a fact not observable by others or it might not be a fact at all. But when it comes to gender, we are expected to accept all assertions of identity.

This problem is made worse by the redefinition of concepts in such a way that it becomes possible to identify into them when it wasn't possible under the old definition. That's how 'woman' became an open-doors-all-are-welcome group, when it used to refer only to adult human female beings. And because it no longer even includes all female adults it is becoming impossible to discuss sex-based oppression and the group it targets.

As per PP I agree it is now commonly used to mean something that you are quite clearly not, but perhaps would like to be.

’Can you afford those new shoes Janet?’

’It’s ok, I identify as rich’.

’Are you old enough to have that pint of beer?’

’Yes, I identify as age 18’

This all counts as a win in my book.

It used to be the far right that was obsessed with identity. Now the Blue Fringes do it and claim it's progressive.

Yes, I think it did.

A lot of this was around the idea that we need to accept a person's own feelings about their relation to a category. SO - maybe they don't feel "disabled", or handicapped, or differently abled, or any of the other words that have been suggested to try and encompass these groups.

Which is all well and good. But in the end, most of the conditions that fall under these terms are objective, and there needs to be some common accepted term if they are going to be referred to at all. And in so far as we recognize them in places like schools, workplaces, or policy creation, is because they represent some kind of problem that needs to be accommodated or addressed. Discussions about someone's needs are usually around some kind of provision, and if they want to insist that they don't feel "disabled" and don't want others to view them that way, it raises the question why they need a special accomodation in the first place.

My key take away from this thread is that the crux of the trans debate sits with categorisation.

Our starting point is that we are all humans (this is the universal set in Venn diagram terms). There are countless ways of grouping the universal set. We might not like some sets being named or created as we would belong in them and don't want to think of ourselves, or others think of us, as belonging to that set (or vice versa). We might feel passionately about the creating of sets as they might have significant benefits for us.

Essentially, within this debate, people hold different views about which sets are important. The GC versus TRA debates on FWR often focus on the utility of gender identity sets and sex based sets.

Sometimes, when the utility of a set is clear, and people are concerned about who the set includes or excludes, some people obfuscate and make communication unclear, ambiguous or hard to grasp in order to try and change the inclusion/exclusion criteria. I think that this is done consciously by some (who are fully aware of what they are doing and why) and unconsciously by others (who have complex mental health issues).

All those arguing that it is incredibly complicated are overlooking the bigger picture that the starting point is a universal set of people/humans. The complexity comes when you start to create or propose sets that are poorly defined, the utility of such sets will always be questionable. Perhaps individualism will suffice in such instances.

I expect humanity would benefit from all of us paying greater attention to our belonging to the universal set of 'humans' and applying critical thinking to when our belonging to subset should hold significance. Having said that, subsets are incredibly important for a multitude of reasons - but context is everything!

So part of me wonders if the disability self-ID approach assisted in normalising all these other 'identify as' statements.

I think its more a case that it was co-opted. Its a useful term when its used correctly, and if there was a better an alternative the big companies would already be using it.

Is it though? I cannot for the life of me see where it is more useful than just "disabled" or whatever other team people use at a given time.

People might not "feel" like they are disabled, but for the purposes of the communication, they are or are not needing or entitled to some kind of special provision.

If there is a need to clarify something like a legal recognition of disability we can just say that - are you legally disabled, have you been assessed as x, y, or z, etc.

I am also really uncomfortable about groups seeking to reject the term disabled, especially when they are offended by the use of the term. This implies that there is something bad/wrong with being disabled. I honestly don't think disabled people are 'less than' and would prefer people worked together to change perceptions than try and distance themselves from the notion of disability

But what does it mean?

I also think there needs to be some acceptance around the idea that in some instances there may be different options for language, that different individuals prefer, but that doesn't make the ones they don't prefer offensive. And it's not necessarily appropriate to correct people when they use a work that is in general use but isn't the one you personally use.

I haven’t read all the posts, but this is a great, grown up discussion, which is refreshing.

Maybe “I identify as” should be changed to, “I have chosen to be….”

All aspects of character, personality or preference have been turned into discrete identities. 'Identities' are labels which people now use to signal belonging to particular social groupings. This most likely stems from the social media habit of listing one's allegiances and so on at the top of the personal bio. Everything must be signalled and openly advertised so that others can identify whethere they might be interested in you or not.

Psychologically speaking the identity is the core and stable sense of yourself - which holds it all together. It is an integrating factor, not an add on or a costume. Identity evolves with time and experience.

Identifying with something or someone implies fellow feeling, empathy or alignment; whereas identifying as something suggests that one is playing a role, performing something.

I have come to believe that those who are most influential in gender identity groups and those who are allies focus on three gender identities and never talk about the many others. They seem to actively avoid discussion about those other gender identities.

They also avoid all discussion on other identities such as those people who have extreme body modification to resemble lizards, snakes, vampires . Because how can they, extreme trans activists, make claims that their identities are more valid and more deserving of being made into law than those non-gender related identities when those other identities have used the same arguments?

And so the cherry picking of discussion points goes on and I notice that there are less and less people supporting the inclusion of male people in female single sex spaces.

I'm not convinced that it works. My son "has chosen to be" a woman, but that doesn't make him my daughter, does it? Maybe he thinks it does, but I haven't chosen to be the father of a daughter. I don't understand why his viewpoint is valid, but mine is invalid. And no-one who gives him a second glance thinks he's a woman, though he's quite good looking (though the receding hairline is going to be an issue for him). It's much simpler to stick to verifiable definitions, and work towards "femininity" being acceptable in men and "masculinity" in women.

Identify as neurodivergent really boils my piss. No, it's a condition. You need a proper diagnosis. I have ADHD but I didn't go around declaring it before I'd been consultant diagnosed and I certainly didn't choose to have it.

👌

I don't know, I've found it incredibly useful within disability discussions. "Identify as" has been used for years now to indicate a stance on the person-first vs identity-first language debate, and allows people to express their relationship with disability as a whole. I identify as autistic- that is, I am diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder- which in disability circles is correctly assumed to mean "I prefer being called autistic to being called a 'person with autism.'" I also identify as disabled, something not all autistic people do, because I personally feel it has been disabling throughout my life. Especially combined with various chronic health issues, I do consider myself disabled. I've never had anyone use that statement to doubt my diagnosis or question my experience, at least not within autistic or disability-focused community discussions.

I do agree that the phrase has escaped containment from the areas in which it is useful, though. I just don't think that's a reason to cast aspersions when it's used in sensible contexts.

@gayhistorynerd in contrast, I find “identify as” frustrating (and often very offensive) when talking about disability!

I don’t “identify as” being disabled: it’s a material fact about my body. It is something I am. I am increasingly frustrated by being asked whether I “identify as” being disabled, particularly when those questions are at the beginning of a process to establish reasonable adjustments. In some situations, I have found that I must declare that I “identify as” being disabled in order to access these adjustments - that is, the form shuts down if answer no to this “identify as” question.

How I “identify” has no impact whatsoever on my need for eg wheelchair access, sign language interpretation, or the support of a service dog. (Although it may have a lot to do with how I feel about needing these things.) I see this shifting language as similar to the way language has shifted when we talk about sex and gender - i.e. that the gender one “identifies as” is now expected to override the reality of the sexed body. I am concerned that in the long run, this language shift will not help those of us who are disabled.

(I do of course recognise that some people find identifying as disabled as useful for many different reasons, and I do not wish to discredit that or suggest that those who find it useful should stop using it. But just as many of us do not have a “gender identity” that is separate from our sexed bodes, many of us also do not have a “disabled identity”, even though our bodies are disabled as a matter of material fact. 😊)

Identifying as something is literally a form of identity politics - whereby assuming a particular identity tends to correlate also with holding to a prescribed or particular set of behaviours, attitudes, beliefs, political allegiances and so on.

Maybe “I identify as” should be changed to, “I have chosen to be….”. I agree. Some things we can’t choose - sex, ethnicity, diagnoses of quantifiable or professionally assessable medical or neurological conditions. I can identify as not being disabled. I don’t have visible signs of it but have a missing collagen protein which causes all sorts of mayhem . Doesn’t matter whether I identify as having the syndrome I nave, but the results of genetic testing and that of my siblings and DC, says otherwise . As a PP, identifying as something sounds self absorbed and rather entitled.