welcome to the fest

i still can't believe made-up pronouns are a real thing. we're mocking some stupid shit that's a thing. yeah... sigh.

The pronoun thing is so annoying to me. I am so glad that Tat has mentioned it. I mean it is already pretty difficult for me to differentiate the sex of certain people I see so that I have to get creative in how to reference them in a polite way. I was brought up to say 'sir' or 'ma'am' and those words just want to tumble out even when I try to restrain them. - because I want to be respectful and polite.

Being schooled by someone to use some sort of made up reference that has not been agreed upon is ridiculous. The neutral equivalent to he or she is 'it'. But of course nobody wants to be called 'it'.

There is no neutral equivalent that I know of to 'sir' or 'ma'am'. Languages contain these references so we can be polite. Being polite goes a long way in defusing situations.

Demanding that people use made up words to reference your made up gender is not going to defuse any situation I can think of.

The fact that He/She/They is not considered enough for the populous as a whole often makes me want to climb the walls.

Sometimes I feel like the people who still insist on useing neo-pronouns are intentionally screwing with everyone. Most of the kids who were into it seemed to have given that nonsense up back in 2014, and now it just seems like a surefire way to make sure no one ever addresses you or wants to talk to you ever.

What's really sad is that the alternative pronouns have made it into the school systems in some places. It's easy to get into big doo-doo if a teacher doesn't use the "correct" pronoun for a child who identifies as something other than male/female and the traditional he/she. It's elsewhere as well. Occasionally I see a news article about someone creating a big stink because an alternative pronoun (generally something beginning with "x" but not necessarily -- seems there are as many alternative pronouns as there are alternative genders, and good luck keeping up with all of them) was not used, or the wrong alternative pronoun was used.

Insanity is becoming the norm. I wonder how long before legal documents all have to comply with whatever the "approved" pronouns are. Same crap, new packaging, and the packaging must be approved besides.

RikkiTikkiTavi wrote:The pronoun thing is so annoying to me. I am so glad that Tat has mentioned it. I mean it is already pretty difficult for me to differentiate the sex of certain people I see so that I have to get creative in how to reference them in a polite way. I was brought up to say 'sir' or 'ma'am' and those words just want to tumble out even when I try to restrain them. - because I want to be respectful and polite.

Being schooled by someone to use some sort of made up reference that has not been agreed upon is ridiculous. The neutral equivalent to he or she is 'it'. But of course nobody wants to be called 'it'.

There is no neutral equivalent that I know of to 'sir' or 'ma'am'. Languages contain these references so we can be polite. Being polite goes a long way in defusing situations.

Agreed. I've always been jealous that the Finnish language has no gender pronouns.

When speaking English my husband (and other Finn's I've met) occasionally swap pronouns by accident, especially when tired.

The first time we were faced with a social situation where introductions were supposed to include which pronouns participants wanted to use, with the implication being that it would be quite rude to get it wrong, he looked so panicky.