Email Pronouns - Any Guides

[MittensForKittens123]

Im one of the more senior women in my workplace, we had a women’s forum last week, that I was unable to make due to a meeting clash. I got some feedback from it yesterday, and it included a newer member of staff asking for pronouns to be included on emails.

I suspect most of my female colleagues are the ‘be nice’ type, so I could really do with some advice on resources that point out why this is a bad idea for women.

Any help greatly appreciated.

There have been threads on this before. Start here https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4267415-I-need-explanation-of-both-sides-of-pronoun-in-emails-debate-please?utm_campaign=thread&utm_medium=share

Can you not just say no?

Just say no, we don't do that, we use our names.

OK, why did my post get insta-hidden? Are we not allowed to talk about maths?

They can include their pronouns if they wish, just like everyone else can not include them as they wish.

Just tell them you’re going to sign your emails The Captain. That’s what I used to say. Shuts them up

Why can’t they use their pronouns if they want to? As long as it’s not mandatory, surely people should be able to refer to themselves how they want?

Just say if they want to add their pronouns that's entirely up to them, but no one is compelled to do so, or even encouraged, particularly given the known negative unconscious bias when recipients receive an email from a woman.

The workplace is allowed a house style for signatures. Pronouns are highly unprofessional. When (general) you say they can refer to themselves as they want, you don't mean that at all, you wouldn't let them call themselves Fuzzikins Pompombum or something. Pronouns are a fad, they aren't special and deserve no more consideration.

In a pre iota workplace we were warmly encouraged to add pronouns with some horribly limp training from HR who evidently understood not a single nuance of this cultural language issue.

Very few of us didn't add them and zi know it was noticed that we didn't and it didn't help my career there.

Sorry, in a former workplace.

Absolutely not. It's very damaging to women

fairplayforwomen.com/pronouns/

I've shared this on previous threads - this is what I sent privately to my boss when we were instructed to add pronouns to our team profiles, email signatures etc. They made it optional.

I don't do pronoun statements. I won't be adding preferred pronouns to my staff page, and I do not consent to pronouns being added to my online staff profile, email footer etc.

I'm uncomfortable at this being introduced as an instruction with no opt out or acknowledgement that this may not be something that everyone wants to do. Compulsory pronoun announcements are not inclusive of people who are uncomfortable about their gender and do not want to make public statements about it, and are equally uncomfortable for people who do not consider themselves to have a gender identity independent of their sex and don't want to make statements about that either.

In addition, conscious and unconscious biases about women's voices and authority mean that drawing attention to a woman's sex in the workplace may make their work harder by activating and reinforcing unhelpful stereotypes. I don't want to be forced to do so when sex/gender should be irrelevant to my job.

This is a sensitive area, and I've no wish to cause friction or be forced to make some kind of stand in front of the team. I have no objection to other people sharing their pronouns, but stating my pronouns is something I will not do, just as I'm sure you would not agree to recite the Lord's prayer before a meeting.

How do you refer to yourself using pronouns ? “ Her went to Tesco at lunchtime and bought herself a chicken wrap ? . “ Herself copied the email to Sarah “.

Or is it “ Zeself bought zirself a chicken wrap “ ?

I'm a great believer in short sentences, pleasantly but confidently spoken. How about
'Pronouns on emails? I don't think so - they don't really serve a useful purpose, do they?. Let's keep it professional: names and job title'.

In my experience, the less said the better, getting into long discussions in the workplace usually doesn't turn out well, because ..have I got this phrase right? 'one word borrows another'.
Whereas 'let's keep it professional' isn't inviting a discussion - especially coming from a senior woman

I don’t know really, on ours they put she/her or he/him, so I would assume they want to be referred to as a she, so ‘she went to Tesco and bought a chicken wrap’.

Some put every qualification under the sun, some put Ms/Mr/Dr, some give all their holiday dates for the forthcoming year. Surely just each to their own. I don’t agree with being forced to put it on an email signature, but I can see why some people do.

A good friend of mine had a hard journey to get to where she is and she proud of being the first female chartered engineer in her family and youngest in her company. Her first name isn’t a common female name and she wants people to know she’s a woman as she’s proud of it and her achievements.

But @Fagli that's not referring to yourself by the pronouns - it's referring to somebody else. People who put them on email signatures are asking other people to use them.

My previous post still seems to be hidden. Clearly the mention of maths exams triggered the algorithm. Or maybe it was the pointing oit of sexism in the workplace.

I think it's more of an issue in America where people say "sir" or "ma'am" to people and you need to know which one to use. Here people have taken it up but the issue doesn't apply.

@WhatAMessWales thanks for sharing that, very useful response.

@NoBinturongsHereMate I hope your post appears as I want to know what the maths thing is.

@Alltheprettyseahorses thanks for the new user name inspo!

A few people who email me at work have pronouns in their signatures and I find it really triggering.
I wish there was a website for those of us who don’t believe in adding them to link to explaining why we don’t use them. I’d have that link in my email signature for everyone who emails me with pronouns. Fairs fair after all.

um....you do know 'I' is a pronoun, too, right?
So 'I went to Tesco at lunchtime,' would be referring to yourself, using a pronoun.

@Fagli they were asking for everyone to add them ‘in support’…

As my original.post doesn't seem to have come back, I'll try this in chunks to see if I can work out what triggered the post hiding.

I was suggesting that as this was raised by the women's forum, the first 2 points I'd raise are the risk of reinforcing workplace sexism and stereotype threat.