How to react when your child corrects you about someone's pronouns?

[Thirtyfiveandcounting]

My dd is 12 & so far has had a very sheltered life. I am extremely GC & she has never asked about trans or non binary & does not have a phone . Anyways she had a sleepover with a friend in Sun night, she came home & was talking about a particular signed, I said he's a great singer & she said very crossly "they, he's non binary".. I didn't know how to react so I just said "that's me corrected!" to which she replied "yes it is" 😭 She said the girls mother then showed them a video of this singers new music video..
I think I should be blasé & not push my opinion which might push her into rejecting me? I don't want to get this wrong.

It's correct grammar. Perhaps since you didn't think it was incorrect either, you could stop pointlessly quoting me? Or if you're interested in grammar, go learn about it some more.

You have no idea at all of the number of times someone has presented to you as a girl/boy/man/woman and you've simply accepted that without having any idea that their "sex" is different to the gender they identify as.

I'd put money on zero.

To be quite frank the quantity and quality and significant biased publications in this area makes me source reputable sources only.

On brief review of who the directors were of certain sites and identifying who owns the URL provides sufficient evidence that the publication is wrote from one perspective only. Life isn't long enough to waste time on echo chambers.

Why is sex in inverted commas? Do you think it is a theoretical concept?

But if you don't read a wide range of sources from authors you may or may not agree with, are you not automatically casting yourself into an echo chamber?

@Whatever1964 Sorry to have rattled your cage. I am interested in grammar, very much so. I’ve already studied it at degree level but that was quite a long time ago. It’s a fascinating subject IMO.

@Marblessolveeverything

To be quite frank the quantity and quality and significant biased publications in this area makes me source reputable sources only.

I think that's a totally respectable position, if you don't have time, or don't have confidence, to evaluate things for yourself. It's how almost all of us operate for almost all of our knowledge, after all.

It does raise the issue of how you can determine which sources are reputable, before a new area of knowledge has fully crystalised. If you only want reliable sources, and don't want to do the evaluation yourself, you might need to wait it out and not hold any position too firmly until then.

Yes, I noticed that too. The funny thing is that the individual concerned had presented as male ( well, still does if you count the unshaven chin) and used and presumably approved male pronouns in the previous four episodes of the series. So this ‘Change’ to ‘non binary’ has happened very recently . BTW , is it possible to be a non binary Drag Queen, ( as they tell us they are in every episode?). Because if you are non binary, how can you dress up as / impersonate the opposite sex? Because you haven’t got a sex…..

meanwhile, another contestant was vocal about being ‘un gendered’ in their introduction, but as they have been very successful in the competition, and gained in self confidence by their own admission, they seem to be happy to be ‘she’.

Its a derail, okay, but it also demonstrates the fragility of self pronounced ‘identities’.

It must have been a very long time ago!

Its not possible to prove a negative but I am very very very confident I have never not been able to tell someones sex within seconds.

My child knows my GC views. This caused some arguments at first, but she has mellowed a bit and begun to understand the nuance even though we don’t agree on everything.

i also address all of her trans friends by their current pronouns. I have a list on my phone to help keep track.

@Whatever1964 It was, yes! Long before third person pronouns were used in that way. (In those days, people wore what they wanted, slept with whoever would have them and knew what sex they were).

And quite possibly, very confidently wrong- if my stepdaughter's experience is anything to go by.

Well unless you studied centuries ago I think you must have just not been paying attention? You certainly missed any discussion of prescriptivism. What kind of English or linguistics degree was this to leave you with only a basic understanding of grammar?

@MrsSunshine2b, it might be that people read your step daughter as a transboy/transman and are keen not to misgender. Or maybe as you say, everyone thinks your step-daughter is male. Does your step-daughter mind people saying ‘son’? What about ‘miss’?

But the thing is you can't possible state with 100% certainty "EVERYONE who doesn't know us assumes she's a boy".

People are polite. People don't care. People have their own lives to get on with.

@Whatever1964 I don’t think we had that discussion (or I missed it). We studied syntax. I did enjoy phonetics/phonology more though to be honest.

@MrsSunshine2b

It's impossible to know how many times one, personally, has misidentified someone's sex. So it's an interesting subject for research.

"there are several conventional signals that indicate a person’s sex through their faces, such as hairstyle, facial hair, clothing (hat, bonne), accessories, makeup, etc. However, research shows that even when all these traditional cues are removed, people are still able to identify sex with 96–98 % accuracy from facial stimuli (Bruce et al., 1993, Bruce et al., 1987, Sæther et al., 2009)."

There are obviously going to be exceptions, but on the whole humans seem to be extremely good at identifying sex from sight.

And didn’t reply to conciliatory responses with implied insults, either. Although age seems to have brought wisdom, in your case.

Sorry, you think sex isn’t a binary? What are the other sexes, then?

And by the way, no-one is ‘assigned’ a sex at birth.

I'd ask how she expected me to know random singers pronouns & why she felt snapping 'for getting it wrong' was an appropriate response, especially as the random singer wasn't present & would never know.

Ha. Or you could respect basic biology and people’s right to tell the truth.

I think you should chat with your daughter about this. Say that it’s rude to correct people’s grammar; it’s rude to compel speech and it’s rude to impose beliefs. Say you’re free to speak as you wish and she has no right to force her beliefs on you.

"they, he's non binary"

Corrects 'misgendering' and proceeds to 'misgender' as well. Funny.

I certainly wouldn't be pussyfooting around! She's 12, you're her mother not her friend and you have a responsibility to teach her manners and to educate her. It's not 'respectful' to tie yourself in knots over silly fads like people saying they're non-binary, it's just pandering to nonsense.