When treating people with respect is just too difficult for some.

[sock puppet]

Why did pronouns develop on a gender basis in the first place? Was it so important to identify one's gender every time a pronoun is used by a speaker? Seriously?!

Just this past Sunday, I was speaking the an older individual, who questioned why "Ms." is used instead of "Miss" and "Mrs." I asked why the marital status needs to be identified? After all, at once time Master referred to an unmarried male and Mister to a married one, but society has long ago by and large dropped use of "Master" and simply refers to married and unmarried males alike, now simply "Mister." Was there pushback to that, like I am still hearing 40+ years after "Ms." first started being used? For decades after the title for men stopped distinguishing between married and unmarried males, the titles distinguishing married ("Mrs.") females from unmarried ones ("Miss") persisted.

The pronoun situation is similar. Why does it yet persist? I would ask the aunt these questions, why it is so important to her when speaking and uses pronouns does she feel it necessary to identify the gender?

It varies among languages. In English, first and second person pronouns are genderless; only third-person pronouns are gendered. If I recall my smattering of Navajo correctly, not only was the third person pronoun genderless, it didn’t distinguish between animate and inanimate. But, At the same time, the word for “it” was different depending on the shape and number of the objects.

So many different ways of talking about the world.

Thanks, Res Ipsa.

[Moksha]

I find the pronoun they when applied to a single individual very confusing, like somehow the trans community has achieved mitosis.

[Res Ipsa]

I find the pronoun they when applied to a single individual very confusing, like somehow the trans community has achieved mitosis.

LOL! I hear ya. Hearing “they” used as a singular pronoun is like fingernails on a chalkboard to me. But I’m getting used to it. And it’s less clumsy than “he or she.”

[Gadianton]

"they" is actually useful. With the rise of applications like Microsoft Teams and Slack, especially with the pandemic, if you work for an international company it isn't wrong to use "they" with anybody, particularly if you don't know the person. Just a couple of weeks ago I shot myself in the foot referring to a "he" as a "she" because it was a name I'd never heard of applying to a dude, and because the person was based in the southwest I didn't question it. Sure enough, it was an international guy who happened to live in the Southwest.

[Jesse Pinkman]

This is when you tell your kid their TBM aunt is a bigot.

Text my trans kid got from my TBM sister in law:

https://i.redd.it/7d244b6n0ewd1.jpeg

What the ever-loving F***!?

Has she ever heard the phrase, “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.”?

So sorry this happened. I hope that your child is ok?

[msnobody]

"they" is actually useful. With the rise of applications like Microsoft Teams and Slack, especially with the pandemic, if you work for an international company it isn't wrong to use "they" with anybody, particularly if you don't know the person. Just a couple of weeks ago I shot myself in the foot referring to a "he" as a "she" because it was a name I'd never heard of applying to a dude, and because the person was based in the southwest I didn't question it. Sure enough, it was an international guy who happened to live in the Southwest.

I have patients who I sometimes have to call and have never met, whose names I cannot determine if they are male or female. It’s not uncommon to have a she and a he in a dictated results notification letter.

[Res Ipsa]

"they" is actually useful. With the rise of applications like Microsoft Teams and Slack, especially with the pandemic, if you work for an international company it isn't wrong to use "they" with anybody, particularly if you don't know the person. Just a couple of weeks ago I shot myself in the foot referring to a "he" as a "she" because it was a name I'd never heard of applying to a dude, and because the person was based in the southwest I didn't question it. Sure enough, it was an international guy who happened to live in the Southwest.

I have patients who I sometimes have to call and have never met, whose names I cannot determine if they are male or female. It’s not uncommon to have a she and a he in a dictated results notification letter.

That’s one of the things I love about my health care provider. In my profile, which I can electronically access, I can choose to specify my preferred name, sex assigned at birth, sexual orientation, and gender identity. This is great, not only because the Dr. knows whether to consider any health issues that effect specific subgroups, it also means that everyone from the check-in person to the Dr. calls me by the name I’ve actually used all my life instead of my legal first name. Anyone in the system knows how to address me with little to no effort.

[malkie]

I have patients who I sometimes have to call and have never met, whose names I cannot determine if they are male or female. It’s not uncommon to have a she and a he in a dictated results notification letter.

That’s one of the things I love about my health care provider. In my profile, which I can electronically access, I can choose to specify my preferred name, sex assigned at birth, sexual orientation, and gender identity. This is great, not only because the Dr. knows whether to consider any health issues that effect specific subgroups, it also means that everyone from the check-in person to the Dr. calls me by the name I’ve actually used all my life instead of my legal first name. Anyone in the system knows how to address me with little to no effort.

I'm curious: does that mean that you like them to call you "Res", or do you prefer "The Thing"?

[Res Ipsa]

That’s one of the things I love about my health care provider. In my profile, which I can electronically access, I can choose to specify my preferred name, sex assigned at birth, sexual orientation, and gender identity. This is great, not only because the Dr. knows whether to consider any health issues that effect specific subgroups, it also means that everyone from the check-in person to the Dr. calls me by the name I’ve actually used all my life instead of my legal first name. Anyone in the system knows how to address me with little to no effort.

I'm curious: does that mean that you like them to call you "Res", or do you prefer "The Thing"?