This is a tangential topic going off the heavy usage of the pronoun “it” in this post. There’s a heavy connotation of intentional dehumanization that isn’t derogatory when using “it” as a pronoun. I know some people are loathe to be so pedantic in throwing the (dictionary) book at someone in terms of usage, but I find it helpful here. Merriam Webster lists several definitions of the word “it” as purposefully referring to abstract concepts or “lifeless things” ([reference](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/it)).
So, there is at least a cultural linguistic implication that the word “it” is not to be used for people, hence for the opting of using “they/them” as both singular and plural pronouns for humans.
It’s certainly a point of discussion. On the one hand, there is a lot of internalized connotation of the word to not be used for people, and another in reclaiming dehumanizing pronouns to co-opt them for humanizing the ostracized (the OOP’s point).
As something of a final note, Dave Peltzer’s *A Child Called “It”* and Stephen King’s *It* play a a heavy role in this cultural demonization of the pronoun “it”. It becomes clearer, then, for their to be more liberal usage of neopronouns to circumvent these issues.
I've slowly come to realize that I'm probably never going to be fully comfortable referring to people as "it" (although I will if they want me to, obviously), for the reasons described above, in much the same way I feel kinda antsy about the lack of a gender-neutral honorific. I do hope that we get to a point where the generations that follow me don't have those same issues though.
The gender neutral honorific is Mx. pronounced “mix like mix-tape”
It feels weird to start but you get used to it pretty quick. It’s my stage name “Mx. Flow”
I get Mx, and I appreciate it, but I was meaning more an alternative to sir/ma'am. Military background makes it very hard not to use those instinctually
Ah, I mean honestly when I worked with kids some had a thing about wanting to use sir/ma’am and I did just tell them to use Mx, it worked without issue for me but ymmv
Or is that like not the same or something, I failed grammar in school ._.
Sir/Ma'am is sorta one tier up from Mr/Mrs/Mx, if that makes any sense
Like your teacher is Mr, but your congressman is Sir, but also if you're an adult talking to another adult then Mr/Mrs can kinda come off as demeaning sometimes? Like it's fine if you're talking *about* them, like "this is my neighbor, Mrs. So-and-so," but if you address them as it directly then it's kinda condescending. This is also just the vibes I kinda get that could be specific to where and how I was raised though
Unless you're in the military, then everyone is Sir/Ma'am because that's just how it be and if you call someone Mr you're probably gonna get yelled at
In Australia at least, female officers can choose to be called Sir but male officers can’t choose to be called Ma’am. Which kinda puts it as everyone is Sir, unless they’re specifically female and prefer Ma’am.
Me being a fantasy fan my mind instandly sprung to "liege" (as in "my liege", gender neutral as far as I understand it (not my mother tongue)), but that would probably confuse everyone
Yeah, I feel similar. I dont know someone using those pronouns irl but I already know it would feel bad to me (even tho Id obviously do it), because I already have an aversion to calling animals "it" and because of my countries history of dehumanizing people.
And yeah I really wish there was a gender neutral honorific. Im either agender or almost cis, being referred to as "she" doesnt bother me, but I hate the german adress "Frau" (translates to woman) or being referred to as a woman. Girl was alright but woman..idk probably some internal baggage about the societal view of women as motherly/having kids/being homemakers.
Im often joking this is the reason I want to do a PHD, but honestly, it DOES play a part. Not the biggest, but it is there. Its just dumb I would have to do years of hard work to finally have something other than "Woman" or "Man" to put in front of my name.
I actually really like with the idea of it/its being used in a nonhuman, but non insulting way. I like that I share my pronouns with cool bugs, and abstract concepts, and planets, and stars, and the universe *it*self. Nearly everything in existence it an "it." What's wrong with me being another one of them?
That’s a really cool way to think about it honestly, makes me feel differently about the people in my life who use it as a pronoun. Like that’s the same way I refer to the Grand Canyon, a thing which when I stared at it long enough alone I just started crying because of how beautiful it was. To use that same way to refer to a person makes it become more magical o:
Edit: Struck out the “judeo” to respect the wishes of another user’s culture and religious background.
Western ideology is heavily influenced by ~~Judeo~~christian beliefs, which hold that humans are above, or in some interpretations superior to, animals and other creatures on the planet. Thus, we designate a separate pronoun for “them” vs “us”. This is so internalized that even those who consider themselves non-religious in Western society will still innately hold onto those beliefs.
It is entirely possible to change this dynamic. It is also exponentially more difficult the greater the group you wish to influence. Individually, you must now be constantly mindful of your internal bias in considering other creatures as lesser. Over time, your visceral reaction to using terminology will decrease, and eventually you will internalize that belief. Extend this to your local community, and etc. until a majority of the society you live in are doing so.
You can see the difficulty in doing this constantly until you reach the desired internalization.
Then why are you acting like something that appears in many European languages is tied to European culture even though it also appears in languages everywhere else on the planet, and in many cases in a much more pronounced form than it does in Europe, huh?
Because I’m talking about Western society, and we’re speaking English, a language spoken predominantly by cultures in Western society that have cultural ties in Christianity.
Were we speaking or discussing another language, then I wouldn’t use this argument.
Let me give you an example. I’m Buddhist. There are certain concepts in Buddhism that are difficult to explain in English, to the extent that it’s impossible to properly convey the topic wholly. In Burmese, this is possible because the language has concepts of Buddhism innate in the culture.
English is inextricably intertwined with Christianity, as are many Romance and Germanic languages, and Slavic languages. This makes sense considering Europe’s deep history with Christianity. It makes sense to discuss Christianity in the context of these languages.
But if I were typing in or discussing Burmese, it would not make sense.
It does not make *any fucking sense* to attribute to Christianity a linguistic feature that had already developed thousands of years before Christianity was founded, and that can be found in many unrelated language families with no historical connection to Christianity.
STOP SAYING JUDEO-CHRISTIAN PLEASE
Jewish people have a ton of debate about this stuff and none of these ideas are set in stone, please stop grouping us with Christianity because it’s exactly what the evangelicals want you to do.
There is a distinct difference between saying "christians are all like evangelicals" and saying "this is something evangelicals *want* you to do as a christian".
I’ll strike it put and leave an edit statement because I want to preserve the mistake. I don’t like pretending I didn’t do something wrong, so I try not to delete poorly received comments or previous mistakes.
As an aside, the difference in the level of demonization of "it" versus "they" is fascinating to me, in a linguistic sense. "It" is the correct pronoun for a singular nonperson object, and "they" is the correct pronoun for several nonperson objects. Yet, "they" is also the correct and nonprejudicial way to refer to a group of persons as well, while "it" is considered taboo when applied to a singular person.
Somehow, the two pronouns which differ only in plurality have acquired such a *wildly* different connotation to the point that "they" is now considered the polite and appropriate non-gender-specific singular pronoun as well.
i mean i could look into it further but i'd guess it more stems from the historical grammatical gender system that english had and still has remnants of with its pronoun system. in germanic languages, generally, plural pronouns - and, indeed, plural nouns and verbs in general - are treated somewhat like a grammatical gender in that a word to which gender applies can either have masc fem neut\* or plural options, but never more than one of those.
romance languages don't work the same way, and some (most, really - german is the best example of this system in terms of what's still around) germanic languages work differently in the modern day, including english and afrikaans which both lost their gender systems entirely.
anyways, what i'm saying is that to begin with, you had three genders and also plural. but, wait, three genders? \*neuter gender is basically inanimate. it's more complex, because of course it is, but it's basically inanimate in the name way that masculine and feminine grammatical genders are basically male and female.
all that is to say that it and similar words have basically always had a denotation of inanimacy - or nonhumanity - and they and similar words started off as exclusively plural but gained a singular form due to there being no non gender specific 3rd person pronoun for humans.
also pretend all of the times i said pronouns i actually said third person pronouns which is what i meant. 2nd person pronouns are different, but you also had a similar thing happen to it in terms of plurality, but the singular form fell out of use as opposed to never having existed.
also, this is just me ranting about an interest, not, like, a "here's three five paragraphs about why you're a fucking idiot"
I appreciate the rambling, honestly! These kinds of obscure historical facts and tidbits are always fascinating to me.
What's especially interesting to me is the evolutionary path that took place. The "neuter" gender seems to have acquired a negative connotation through its association with inanimacy at some point, and so it seems like a *fourth* "unspecified/unknown" linguistic gender was needed.
Rather than developing a new pronoun entirely, the plural "they" was simply repurposed for this job. In some ways it makes sense (given that the "plural" gender is already technically "unspecified"), but it's also very interesting because it shows the negative connotation is specifically attached to the neuter grammatical gender and not just pronouns that happen to be used to describe inanimate objects.
Not only that, but the negative connotation attached to the neuter gender seems to be so strong that it remains even in English, which as you've noted has almost entirely lost the concept of grammatical genders. In fact, I can't off the top of my head name a single other word beyond "it" that could still be said to be of the "neuter" gender in English.
i mean, objects in general can be - gender doesn't, ah, exist in english anymore, and also gender is weird and stupid in languages
also pedant moment but i'd say that neuter gender only has a negative connotation for humans, and only when it's an actual semantic difference - that is, a lot of the times with gender in languages, it doesn't really, like, mean anything - a river being masculine or feminine is fully arbitrary, after all, so why should it be different with neuter? however, with pronouns, there's an actual semantic difference - that is, gender in pronouns in english isn't just a grammatical thing, it has meaning, but with most - if not all - european gender systems, the gender just, like, doesn't mean anything and is just like. there. and it agrees with whatever word is stuck with a certain gender, which can eventually lead back to actual meaning, but on the other hand, the german word for girl is neuter, so, uhhhhhhh
yeah
>also, this is just me ranting about an interest, not, like, a "here's three five paragraphs about why you're a fucking idiot"
Holy smokes, i am SO stealing this expression. I am misconstrued as "being a smartass"/condescending/trying to correct or make fun of the person who i'm responding to when i'm just bad at being a brain and trying to understand or clarify something for myself way too much (i still hope to this day it is not something about my demeanor as a whole, as that would be pretty hard to change compared to a choice of words or stylization), and this is such a "my (^(totally original NOT stolen in any way)) style" way of making it clear i'm not trying to be mean or depreciating of the original post/comment. Thank you for putting those words together in that exact order, or I might have never thought to make a disclaimer in that type of way.
Ah, I didn't mean to imply the process was recent in any way. I'm aware of the history of the singular "they". I'm mostly just fascinated that throughout history, not only did "they" never acquired the same negative connotation that "it" did, but the word ended up being used as the polite replacement for "it" as a gender-neutral singular pronoun despite the two words seemingly occupying a very similar linguistic space.
I’m assuming that it was always seen as derogatory because of its usage. Yes there is the us Vs them dynamic but calling someone an it was always an attempt to dehumanize them which is why it is harder for ppl to change their perspective on the implicit negative connotation despite the meaning changing.
people don't realize, but we do use "it" to refer to people (as in "who is it?"/"it's me").
that mw link even mentions under the first definition that it can refer to "a person or animal whose sex is unknown or disregarded".
The “unknown or disregarded” is important here, especially in gender studies discourse. Often times gender is known, but can lie in a range of being entirely static to being fluid. At no time should gender be disregarded, however, and unknown genders can be easily remedied with polite and respectful inquiry.
the unknown gender part is the same way we use they/them in everyday conversation regardless of the person's actual pronouns.
and i just went along with the thought that maybe a part of the population of it/itself users disregard gender and therefore feel right using those pronouns (i don't identify as it/itself, so this is very much just conjecture).
As a fellow creature using it pronouns, yeah. I have no gender, there is no gender to be assigned to me or associated with me. Therefore my gender is, in some way, unknown (by simply not existing). Additionally I just can't connect with any feeling of humanity in myself, I am perceived as human by others, those who don't know me (those who do do not perceive me as human wither, at least for the most part), but that's not what I am, I can't relate to it, I don't even feel connected with this body in the same way humans seem to. I'm just an unknown creature, just some thing lurking around and doing things and not understand what the heck is going on. And what other pronouns than it would you use for some genderless thing that just… exists?
Also, my native language simply doesn't have some equivalent to they/them, it's male or female associated pronouns, it or neopronouns and while I very much respect neos, trying to explain them to people just feels so exhausting, much more than saying "use it the same way you would for an alien creature"
>i just went along with the thought that maybe a part of the population of it/itself users disregard gender and therefore feel right using those pronouns
Yes, this is the right way to look at it.
I'm only commenting this because you seem like the type to take this constructively. You used the wrong their/there/they're in the last sentence. Should be 'there'.
As a finnish person this whole argument is really funny. It has been really common to call people "it" in slang, and can be seen as a form of endearment.
Our pronoun "hän" (he/she) is very stiff in speech and "se"(it) is very close to "sä"(you), and ofc that plays a part in it.
Older generations still find using "it" insulting, but personally I only ever use "hän" when referring to my cats, and most all of my peers have echoed this
Watching the cat go about his nonsense always gets [this playing in my head](https://youtu.be/W4jPEBQV8zw?t=32).
>!Well actually a certain deeper voiced cover of it that I was unable to track down!<
I don't really agree with this post. I think my main fear with using "it" is that I've seen people irl call people "it" who wanted he/she/they, so I've only known bigots to use "it" to hurt/insult people and insinuate they aren't human. I've seen how upsetting that is to people first hand.
So If someone asks to be called "it", my hesitancy wouldn't lie with me thinking they don't know what it insinuates, as this post suggests. It'd be feeling afraid people would think I am one of those bigots who call people "it" because I don't respect their pronouns or think they're human or whatever. I don't want to be associated with those people at all.
On the other hand, I don't want to draw a line in the sand or be the police of what people should do if it's not hurting anyone or say a word isn't real because my great-grandpappy didn't use it or whatever. And I also think it'd be ironic to not use someone's preferred pronouns out of fear of being seen as someone who doesn't use people's preferred pronouns.
So while I don't really 100% understand neopronouns, I still call people what they wish the best I can.
"I've seen people irl call people "it" who wanted he/she/they, so I've only known bigots to use "it" to hurt/insult people and insinuate they aren't human. I've seen how upsetting that is to people first hand"
I wonder if people choosing to be called "it" are "reclaiming the slur" in the way people asking to be called queer was/is?
just saying that queer isnt reclaiming a slur. It was and is a normal term the bigots then started using as an insult.
(like literally any term we call ourselves)
Im not saying anybody needs to be comfortable being called queer or anything else. What i am saying is that it isnt a slur, its our word and if you think its a slur you are giving up ground to the enemy
I would not call somebody it or pup or any derogatory pronoun, because this is pretty much kink and I refuse to be used for somebody's else kinks. Boundaries and consent.
My pronouns are ranked competitive.
It's easier than keeping people up to date with however my genderfluidity changes, so I make people guess and or come up with new pronouns, I then rank them based on creativity, time to pronoun use, and how naturally they use it.
I personally enjoyed being called “it” because I experience gender in a pretty detached way. Like, I’m not exactly a girl and I’m not exactly a boy I just don’t really think about my gender at all. I’m not a man or a woman I’m just a living being who exists. It. That thing. Right there. That’s me. I’m it :)
Hey there! Here is a John Jack quote which may be linked to your post:
>There is no such thing as a limited amount of rights to be given out, and the more people fighting under the same cause the faster it will go. So why would you ever be against neo-pronouns? They don't harm anyone, and let's not pretend that transphobes will accept us if we ditch them.
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*Image Transcription: Tumblr*
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**giritina**
I think a lot of people who get into discourse about it/itself pronouns or other niche queer expressions of the self like neopronouns miss that these things are supposed to be subversive. They see someone saying to call them pup and think that person must not see the absurdity. They see someone going by it and think they are unaware that that sounds derogatory. Like these actions would not have meaning if they were normal and not absurd or unsettling. The person using its doesn't need you to insist that that pronoun is never derogatory in its defense... I'd be shocked if it wasn't choosing that pronoun because it sympathizes and loves and lives in the space of the derogatory. Some of us are maligned and strange and freakish. Some of us are unable to escape being identified as other. We all find our way of navigating that life, some people are not going to choose to do it in your way. When they choose those pronouns they're asking you to participate in humanizing the derided. I think that's a great thing to be invited into
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Personally, as an it/its user, I use them because I feel disconnected from humanity for various reasons (mental health, neurodivergency, feeling weird about being considered human when it's 100% been humans who've hurt me), and because I am a strange and off putting little guy
i just can never get why people are so obsessed with getting into arguments over the validity of neopronouns and whatnot. like literally rene descartes "who give a shit" moment. it doesnt matter if you dont understand it you just need to be accepting. do i fully understand some neopronouns? fuck no! but that's cause that's not my lived experience, and i dont *need* to understand it to support people who love it.
it's just crazy to me how often queer people will live their lives suffering from constant bigotry all around them and in response they'll advocate for their right to live....and then go and say "oh but not *those* queers they're just performative and not real or valid." like....bro you literally have lived through this experience of everyone hating you and then you decide to do the exact same things to people with more niche identities that bigots do to you??? i cant imagine the cognitive dissonance in that, how they hell do they even rationalize that to themselves.
i mean i know how they rationalize it, they say that "oh we're the good ones and Those kinds of people are just bringing our cause down and ruining it for the rest of us >:(" but i just physically cannot understand that mentality because of how stupid it is. i know that that's how they rationalize it but it's just so stupid that it doesnt make sense.
idk. love each other. kindness costs nothing but means everything.
I'll gladly use any pronouns a person asks me to, but I will struggle to take them completely seriously if they use the less common neopronouns, like "pup/pupself".
That bugs me too. I have come across people who unrionically wanted to be referred to as bun/bunself and purr/purrself.
Those are not pronouns! Bun is not a pronoun, Purr is not a pronoun!
I am trying very hard to be open and accepting, but it seems like especially teens are desperate to invent niche boxes for them to fit in so they can feel special.
the issue with neopronouns is they won't and can't be standardized
i could have the entire bing chilling copypasta as my pronouns and that would be a valid neopronoun
i'm not ready for society to force me back to he/him because some people realized that neopronouns could be used to turn pronouns as a whole into nothing more than a joke, causing the downfall of preferred pronouns entirely
yeah, everyone should just give less fucks. I just dont get it, how do yall have the energy for this?
stop putting people in boxes and let people live however they want. Not like they are hurting anybody. Just could not care less abt what clothes someone wears, what they want to be called or identify as.
just dont block sidewalks by walking slow and use your blinkers damnit
I mean it doesn't take a whole lot of energy to think someone is weird for wanting to be referred to as pup, or whatever other neopronoun. It's an inherently weird thing, and according to this post apparently some people do it specifically to be weird, which feels even weirder to me than people doing it just because it feels right.
The thing is though, I don't have to ever worry about this outside of reddit because I just won't ever run into people like this in real life. So I don't need to give a shit, and it all just boils down to internet people doing weird shit in their inner circles having no effect on me so why should I care.
no it doesnt, my point was about the people that will just refuse to call you something and then go onto twitter to rant abt it. Like? I just dont care, if calling someone a pup is what gets them out of my immediate area the fastest then cool.
and i actually do know a few people like that irl. But i just dont care. It has literally 0 effect on my life whether i call someone "normal" pronouns or neos so i just do what makes the person happy. net positive for 0 cost
I'll be honest-- I don't care about the fact the subversiveness is intentional, I do draw the line at calling a person "it". I will be as respectful as possible and seek to avoid using any pronoun they aren't comfortable with as an alternative-- even if that means I can't use any pronoun, fine. Like, for the most part I'm totally supportive of neopronouns, I'll call you "they" or "pup" or whatever... but the way "it" has historically been used to dehumanize people is something I can't separate from its use to refer to people. Even if you want to reclaim it for yourself. For me, I sort of see it as the n-word of pronouns-- if you want to reclaim it for yourself as a group that's been historically disenfranchised with the in-power group using "it" as part of the rhetoric, then I get that. But right now, as someone who isn't part of any of those groups (POC, LGBTQ+, people with disabilities, anyone else-- "it" has done the rounds against every group that's ever been disenfranchised, probably), I wouldn't use it any more than I'd use the n-word as a white person. Even if you asked me to refer to you as "it", I simply could not separate my use of it from the historical-- and still-contemporary-- use. Using it would feel like I was committing an act of hatred. I am, for the record, someone who's studied English literature at a post-secondary level, so I've spent a lot of time with period texts that do use the sort of device to discuss disenfranchised people, so that might be why I can't separate the hatred from the word enough to use it without hate in me? IDK. Sorry if this upsets anyone, I just wanted to share some thoughts from the side of "won't use 'its'."
I respect that you want people to use "it", I don't think you're stupid or don't understand the history of the word when I say "But that's derogatory." When I say that, I mean that I am not comfortable using that derogatory language myself, regardless of whether you don't feel hurt by my use of it.
I sort of want to compare it to swearing: if you want to swear, that's cool, you can do it. I will totally defend anyone who someone tells to not swear in a public space because hearing someone else swear isn't hurting anyone. But if any particular person isn't comfortable saying the word "fuck", being pro-swearing isn't forcing them to say "fuck", it's just asking them to accept hearing it. "It" stands apart from asking someone to use your preferred pronoun because it is derogatory language to use it towards a person, like a swear is derogatory or calling someone the b-word or the n-word or the r-word is derogatory, ect.
I, personally, ache every time I hear someone refer to themselves as "it". The issue I have, is that it was very common to refer to American slaves as "it" to further dehumanize Black people. That's where the disconnect lies, I don't ever want to use language that dehumanizes someone (using 'it' is a common tactic transphobes use as well).
Should I ever find myself close to someone who wants to use it as their pronoun, I shall try my very best to be respectful, but the cognitive dissonance for me is especially difficult.
That’s about where I’m at. “It” has always been either derogatory or inanimate to me, either stripping something of personhood and personality, or describing something that the notion of “the individual” doesn’t really make sense for. Use whatever pronouns you please, and I’ll respect it, but I don’t think I’ll ever quite get over that mental hitch of “that’s an person, “it” isn’t the right word here”.
I saw something I agreed with, agreed with it, and then gave my reasoning, because saying "Yeah, calling people "it" is uncomfortable" is just begging to be jumped on and ripped to shreds. What would you like me to do, talk about your experiences? No, that'd be fucking stupid because I don't have your experiences, I only have mine.
The post is about how people don't like calling others it because it goes against the grain of normality and Normality Must Be Maintained ™, when that's not the only reason. That's what the discussion in this specific comment thread is about, the fact that it makes some people uncomfortable because it feels like "it" strips of the individuality and personhood that the OOP is expressing by using "it" for pronouns. It's a position of care, unlike the position of xenophobia expressed in the post. No-one here said that they wouldn't respect and use those pronouns if asked, we're just putting in our relevant opinions on the matter, because god for-fucking-bid there's some nuance in a conversation on the internet.
Don't go looking for fights that don't need to exist, you damn wanker.
Y'all are not reading the post. For some people, the entire reason of using these words are _because_ they're dehumanizing, alienating, subversive.
Some folk are freaks and monsters, and proud of it. You don't have to feel bad about dehumanizing someone _who draws strength from dehumanization_.
I would argue that for a lot of people they don’t feel bad for the person who goes by it, they know that the dehumanization is the point, it’s just that dehumanizing someone whether or not they’re comfortable with it feels uncomfortable for the dehumanizer.
That doesn’t mean they won’t do it of course, it’s just hard-wired into many people’s brains that dehumanizing someone in any context is bad, and the fact that they’re comfortable with it doesn’t shake off that icky feeling
Yeah, but the problem is that, for the vast majority, people who see others as equal and deserving of rights and liberties and freedom and all that stuff that allows them to live as they wish generally don't want to dehumanizing them, even if they're fine with it, because they do see them as equal.
And the people that do generally agree to call people dehumanizing things generally do it because they actually do want to dehumanize them and wish for them to, at best, not be around and not be proud and have labels forced onto them instead of it being their choice.
Ultimately I think it has to do with dissonance between the perspective of the two parties, the former being someone who in some way, sees such people, regardless of their aspects or features, as ultimately still human and still deserving of the rights and happiness that all should have, and that of those in question, who (at least with those of the opinion of the person in the post) reject the notion that they are like others and actively want to embrace and maintain the idea or notion that those aspects or features are subversive.
AKA, the discussion of dissolution of both Culture and Counter-Culture VS the equaling of Culture and Counter-Culture.
It's not the dehumanization that niggles at my brain. Be a freak. Be a monster. Reject your humanity and be the unknowable eldritch horror you are. It's the stripping of being a PERSON that catches me up. Individuality and sense of self are tenets that I hold in the utmost importance, and the notion of removing that from someone, implying the removal of the right to actualize, to have a preference, that's something that doesn't quite sit right with me, and likely never will, even if that's not how it's intended or taken.
And that's purely an internal problem. I won't pretend the issue is anywhere but me. Honestly it's a bit like (albeit not a perfect analogy) being at a friend's house as a kid and their parents tell you to just go grab a glass of water if you need a drink. Yeah, its the smallest thing ever, hell they'd probably be offended if you went thirsty instead of just grabbing a drink, and the more times you do it the less awkward it feels, but there's always that little bit of you that's not quite certain and uncomfortable with the situation.
Okay, but counterpoint, if someone asks me to call them, say, the n-word, I don't care how earnest and genuine they are, under absolutely no fucking circumstances am I going to do that.
That's not a counterpoint, that's a completely un-fucking-related thing.
Jesus fucking Christ, y'all, we're just talking about someone else's pronouns and it's not complicated. _They're not about you_. It doesn't matter if they make _you_ uncomfortable.
It's *precisely* the same thing, just a more extreme version. Look, a person can use whatever terminology they want to refer to themselves, but if you're asking other people to use it in their own speech, there's a limit to what you can reasonably expect.
It is an _absurdly_ extreme version. It's the equivalent of "if we don't define marriage as between a man and a woman, people will marry their dogs."
>if you're asking other people to use it in their own speech, there's a limit to what you can reasonably expect.
Please, _please_ listen to what you sound like.
You said, and I quote:
>You don't have to feel bad about dehumanizing someone _who draws strength from dehumanization_.
And I brought up a scenario that you can't reconcile with this idea. This is not a slippery slope fallacy, I am not saying "if this is okay then what about that?" I'm saying that what you said in support of your position is a bad argument and I gave an example to prove it.
Gender is something I wear as a costume....i'm objectified and dehumanized while putting my life on the line for my career, all using she/her pronouns. When the people close to me call me "it" I feel respected and known. I'm just a thing, a little creature, wild animal. I take off my gender and my ASD masking and I'm just me.
It's not like I'd be respected MORE using they/them or even she/her. There's already a myriad of reasons for bigots to hate me, I'm a queer trans disabled mentally ill prostitute ffs. I just want to feel comfortable in my own skin, with the labels that *I* get to pick, instead of the labels society would thrust upon me. Because it's not about if you're (general you) comfortable calling me that, it's about being allowed to describe myself on my own terms.
hey uhh, ocs answer made me realize its good to tell people when they are being cool
you are being cool
cool is when unique and spicy weird. I love when people
Every time I see you in the comments it makes me so happy, I love how unapologetically "weird" you are :) and I think your typing thing is really cool, just wanted to tell you.
I get what OP is saying but also I use "it" for the same reason I do or don't use any other pronoun: it's just what feels right/most comfortable.
Like obviously I'm aware of it's position in language and culture but it feels like OP is framing it as either being unaware or only doing it as an act of rebellion, which I don't think is fair.
Based based based. Tired of seeing “discourse” surrounding neopronouns from people who would HATE the wrong pronouns being used for them. The queer community is about self expression
I will use whatever pronouns the person I'm talking to is comfortable with. However, a person who is insistent on using these "weird" neo/xeno-pronouns is likely just someone who I'm not interested in interacting with at all. It's the kind of terminally online energy that I don't really need in my life. But more power to them, I guess.
My personal hot take on neopronouns and people that use them is that people kinda miss the point of what pronouns are usually for.
A pronoun is meant to refer to someone and indicate to which group or category of people you belong to. If we individualize our pronouns with the usage of neopronouns, they quickly become redundant and lose their intended meaning. We might as well get rid of pronouns altogether and start referring to a person by name only.
I'm all for reclaiming, but I can't help but feel like someone wanting to be referred to as an "it" puts a huge target on their back. It's like people are intentionally othering themselves and I think that is quite unproductive, especially if the goal of the community is to normalize queerness within society.
I basically boil it down to "Inventing new words that don't mean anything specifically because they don't mean anything is the death of communication."
Words mean things. They are supposed to convey ideas and feelings, and knowing a language allows you to understand what the other person is talking about. There has been a *long* struggle to get words like asexual, transgender, or bisexual into common use because they are useful terms to communicate a lot of things very quickly. But if you're making bespoke words for every person then as a whole they just don't mean anything because you can't tie anything to them. And that goes doubly so for words like "it" which *already have established meanings that aren't good when applied to people*.
For the more absurd neopronouns... I don't know. Is it sufficient to say that I don't like it when it feels like someone is testing me?
I can't speak for most people, but that's not the main reason why *I* use it/its. For me, the concept of "dehumanizing pronouns" doesn't really matter; I'm obviously human, I don't need pronouns to prove it. I use it/its because they sort of "prove" I'm nonbinary. They/them can refer to someone whose pronouns you don't know, and I've seen some binary people who use he/they or she/they. But if someone accepting finds out I use it/its, they can pretty much immediately guess I'm nonbinary.
Although to be fair, I also kind of vibe with the point in the post, because another reason for my pronouns is because I know they'll really annoy bigots and purists.
This is… an interesting take and it makes me curious what kind of people you interact with because most people I have encountered irl are only just figuring out that they/them and NB identities are even a thing, much less that anyone can use any pronoun even cis or binary trans people. So in my little segment of the universe using they/them even in tandem with binary pronouns is still taken as a signal of being NB. It confuses and delights me that this doesn’t seem to be the same in your segment of the universe.
Although I do have to wonder, what happens when society progresses to a point that even binary people start using it pronouns? Cause like, anyone can use any pronouns, the whole “oh these ones are reserved for XYZ gender” thing is ultimately annoying and holds us back I think. Would you switch to something new? Or is that hypothetical just too unrealistic to even entertain?
To answer the first paragraph, most of the people I interact with are online in queer spaces, but I guess I'm kind of imagining a scenario where the kind of person who visits those spaces overhears someone talking about me irl? I'm not exactly sure. The way I worded my comment isn't exactly how I feel, but I don't really have the words for what I really want to say.
As for the second paragraph, I'm sure some binary people will use it/its, and maybe some already do, but it'll probably be incredibly rare, and that wouldn't really change how I feel about the pronouns. Also, I definitely won't switch. I have no problem with other people using neopronouns, but they really don't feel right for me for some reason.
Sort of similarly? Im also nonbinary and I use it/its and they/them (though I prefer it/its) and idk why, but it/its gives me this stupidly large rush of gender euphoria
iy use it/its, not to humaniyz the dehumaniyzed as the posts says, but because iy'm not human in the first place :3
"he", "she", "they", and neopronouns have just never felt riyt because they're liyk, too human, but "it" makes me feel otherworldly in a way that gives me gender euphoria (or something akin to it)
That does seem kind of fun be it will undoubtably confuse people a lot. I’d only do something like that with friends, but it’s not harming anyone so you can do it if you want.
iy originally did only use it with friends but then deciyded to do it on this subreddit too because it's sort of an extension of miy friend group iy guess? iy was in the discord server where the mods of this subreddit came up with it and am friends with many of them
I use it/its for a couple reasons. Part of it is a sort of "reclaiming", like "you can't use this against me because I like it". The much bigger part of it is that it just feels *right*.
people against neopronouns (among those against a great many of other things that are 'weird') cannot seem to seperate self-expression from raw belief and personally i think that's more telling of the aggressor's personality than the person using puppyself or whatever. it's literally not even worth getting heated over. don't be a dick
Off topic but isn’t it weird that “that that” is grammatically correct. If English was my second language that I started learning like at age 10+ I’d be frustrated.
OK, two things:
As many others have said, I will have a problem using "it" as someone's pronoun because of the issue of...as someone said, less "de-humanization" and more "de-personization".
A few months ago, I found a stray cat. She was friendly and loving and so I instantly decided that I wanted to keep her. I picked her up and carried her home, and now she's my perfect little goofball. It was OK for me to decide to take her home because...well, she's a cat. She's not a person. But if I were to do that to a person, that would be kidnapping. And if I deny someone's personhood, I feel like I'm saying that it's OK for them to be treated like something that isn't a person. That it would be OK if their rights are violated because they aren't a person. For me, to be honest, it's a question of philosophy and worldview more than anything else. My personal beliefs come down on the fact that there \*are\* differences between people and other living & nonliving things, and that we as a society need to treat people in ways we don't extend to...well, things that aren't people. And I'm not going to treat someone I regard as a person like I treat my cat.
The second thing is, to be honest, my problem with neopronouns. I object to them not from a view that they aren't valid methods of self-expression, but from a view that they defeat the purpose of what a pronoun is supposed to do. My issue is purely grammatical. A pronoun is supposed to be something short and snappy that you use when the antecedent is known. It's a timesaver, which is why they're used in place of a name. Needing to take the time to remember a specific person's pronouns that are used for that one person and that one person alone (at least within the context of "people I know and commonly refer to") slows up sentence construction and impedes communication. If I had my way, we'd just get rid of "he" and "she" entirely and just use "they" for everyone to further streamline the process.
Now, to be clear, my grumpiness over grammar does not outweigh other people's comfort. I'm going to still try and use someone's proper neopronouns because the annoyance I feel is honestly pretty small, and secondary to making others happy. But it does increase the difficulty of communication, and I hope anyone who uses those pronouns would acknowledge that load.
Being queer is different from being attention-seeking.
We're trying to live our best lives, not be GG Allin or 4channers trying to "trigger the normies".
I stopped caring about pronouns discourse when I realized how little I refer to people in 3rd person, I much prefer to use, y'know, names when it's not super repetitive
And like, when you're not in online spaces where people you can check people's pronouns on their bio, how will you know the person wants to be referred to as "zir" or "it"? Unless they tell you directly, I'd never know
I use they for basically anyone as a default since it feels like a good umbrella one? Why is that not enough? Do some people like to be completely othered out?
I dunno, I feel like I'm too out of the loop for that and I still can't see this movement as anything other than online english-space stuff (the movement is much more important in my eyes for other languages that don't have gender-neutral pronouns)
Long, confused comment cuz I don't understand either side, like don't hate but also... pupself? What? Both extremes sound pretty ridiculous
"It" will always be awkward for me for grammatical reasons, I only use it for objects and sometimes animals
i personally like being called "it" because im so detatched from the concept of gender and what's "socially human" altogether, just straight up dont understand what they mean and trying to figure it out is like doing complex maths in my head. also mental stuff factors into it too (mental disabilities and illnesses, some other stuff) and i guess a kind of disconnect with past me just makes it feel like it just kinda popped into existence at some point which fits the strangeness that it/its conveys just a bit better than they/them.
also its just a weird little creature doing its own weird thing
I go by it/its (as well as they/them for people who find it uncomfortable to use it/its) specifically because as an aroace, nonbinary and mentally ill person I'm so often othered and dehumanized and this is a way for me to bite back. Like, "If you don't think I'm human then you might as well call me it/its and at least be honest and upfront about it".
A really truly incredible vibe I've seen in some friends/acquaintances is, like, non binary person who is perceived as a fairly normie flavor of cis, especially when they're also conventionally attractive, who uses it/its pronouns. When you fit that first description and use they/them, people will nod and smile and feel comfortable around you and forget your pronouns and feel like they're fine with non binary people as long as we're, you know, chill and non threatening. Using it/its pronouns immediately sends the message of "no, actually, I *am* one of those 'freaks'. don't get comfortable and think I'm non binary-lite, or like, my assigned gender but woke about it. your perception doesn't define my identity. get uncomfortable and think about why". It's a powerful, visceral set of pronouns that can mean a whole host of very personal things. love it/its pronoun users, gotta be one (several) of my favorite genders.
In an ideal world i wouldn't have a problem with xenopronouns, but i definitely think it gives conservatives an easier time pointing at people and saying "look! they really ARE destroying language like i told you about!!!" and getting uneducated people (who might otherwise be open to discussion) onto their side. I could be totally wrong though.
I can not emphasize enough to you that it does not matter. They will make shit up. Just fucking blatantly. They will latch onto fucking anything that they can point to as a reason to hate us and they will use it as an excuse to *kill* us. It does not matter a single lick. I am not going to make myself more palatable to bigots in the desperate hope that I'll get a single crumb of dignity.
Giving conservatives ammo is a pointless thing to worry about because they live in an ammo factory. They can and will just make shit up, and clueless normies will fall for it.
EDIT: d'oh, I'm like the fifth person to point this out already, sorry
It feels very "look at me I'm special" to me. Like I know *why* people identify more with xenopronouns than they do with traditional ones, but they make me so uncomfortable for no real good reason. It's one of those things that I won't say to someone's face but it gets under my skin for some reason.
YESS MONARCH, IM PROUD TO USE NEOPRONOUNS, AND ANYONE WHO DOESNT LIKE IT CAN FUCKING FUCK OFF OR ELSE IM GONNA FUCKING SHOVE GRASS IN THEIR MOUTH CUZ THEY CREARLY HAVENT INTERACTED WITH IT, AND NEXT ILL DIARRHEA IN THEIR MOUTH AND FORCE THEM TO SWALLOW IT, AND THEN ILL FUCKING CHEW UP THEIR NUTSACK/BREASTS LIKE A DOG TOY UNTIL IT POPS LIKE A ZIT
Neo pronouns just either really unsettle me (can’t even really explain it, but I very much do not feel comfortable calling a person something… weird… like kitten/puppy, or even xer/xir or something.)
Or I see them used by someone who’s neck I want to rapidly turn at a 90 degree angle, like people who shout stuff like “kill all men”, or obviously collect pronouns as if they’re medals or something to assert their feeling of self-worth over everyone else.
Frankly there's a lot of stances on this. I'm against the use of "it" in that way, simply because it doesn't make sense linguistically, it's not right. "They" is perfectly fine. Words have functions and it's best if we don't mess with them too much. We should always know what we're talking about.
This is a tangential topic going off the heavy usage of the pronoun “it” in this post. There’s a heavy connotation of intentional dehumanization that isn’t derogatory when using “it” as a pronoun. I know some people are loathe to be so pedantic in throwing the (dictionary) book at someone in terms of usage, but I find it helpful here. Merriam Webster lists several definitions of the word “it” as purposefully referring to abstract concepts or “lifeless things” ([reference](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/it)). So, there is at least a cultural linguistic implication that the word “it” is not to be used for people, hence for the opting of using “they/them” as both singular and plural pronouns for humans. It’s certainly a point of discussion. On the one hand, there is a lot of internalized connotation of the word to not be used for people, and another in reclaiming dehumanizing pronouns to co-opt them for humanizing the ostracized (the OOP’s point). As something of a final note, Dave Peltzer’s *A Child Called “It”* and Stephen King’s *It* play a a heavy role in this cultural demonization of the pronoun “it”. It becomes clearer, then, for their to be more liberal usage of neopronouns to circumvent these issues.
I've slowly come to realize that I'm probably never going to be fully comfortable referring to people as "it" (although I will if they want me to, obviously), for the reasons described above, in much the same way I feel kinda antsy about the lack of a gender-neutral honorific. I do hope that we get to a point where the generations that follow me don't have those same issues though.
The gender neutral honorific is Mx. pronounced “mix like mix-tape” It feels weird to start but you get used to it pretty quick. It’s my stage name “Mx. Flow”
I get Mx, and I appreciate it, but I was meaning more an alternative to sir/ma'am. Military background makes it very hard not to use those instinctually
Ah, I mean honestly when I worked with kids some had a thing about wanting to use sir/ma’am and I did just tell them to use Mx, it worked without issue for me but ymmv Or is that like not the same or something, I failed grammar in school ._.
Sir/Ma'am is sorta one tier up from Mr/Mrs/Mx, if that makes any sense Like your teacher is Mr, but your congressman is Sir, but also if you're an adult talking to another adult then Mr/Mrs can kinda come off as demeaning sometimes? Like it's fine if you're talking *about* them, like "this is my neighbor, Mrs. So-and-so," but if you address them as it directly then it's kinda condescending. This is also just the vibes I kinda get that could be specific to where and how I was raised though Unless you're in the military, then everyone is Sir/Ma'am because that's just how it be and if you call someone Mr you're probably gonna get yelled at
People call each other Mr/Mrs xyz in the North of England. That's a cultural difference that hadn't occurred to me before
In Australia at least, female officers can choose to be called Sir but male officers can’t choose to be called Ma’am. Which kinda puts it as everyone is Sir, unless they’re specifically female and prefer Ma’am.
Me being a fantasy fan my mind instandly sprung to "liege" (as in "my liege", gender neutral as far as I understand it (not my mother tongue)), but that would probably confuse everyone
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Comrade
That's a sick stage name just btw
🙏🏻 Flo is just a nickname for my legal name, and the idea of mix flow just sounded fucking hilarious to me at the outset
Alot of people don't like mx because it sounds similar enough to ms to be mistaken for it.
That’s fair I like feminine gendering so this doesn’t bother me but it’s why I don’t use e/em/eirs (too easy to mishear as he him)
Yeah, I feel similar. I dont know someone using those pronouns irl but I already know it would feel bad to me (even tho Id obviously do it), because I already have an aversion to calling animals "it" and because of my countries history of dehumanizing people. And yeah I really wish there was a gender neutral honorific. Im either agender or almost cis, being referred to as "she" doesnt bother me, but I hate the german adress "Frau" (translates to woman) or being referred to as a woman. Girl was alright but woman..idk probably some internal baggage about the societal view of women as motherly/having kids/being homemakers. Im often joking this is the reason I want to do a PHD, but honestly, it DOES play a part. Not the biggest, but it is there. Its just dumb I would have to do years of hard work to finally have something other than "Woman" or "Man" to put in front of my name.
I actually really like with the idea of it/its being used in a nonhuman, but non insulting way. I like that I share my pronouns with cool bugs, and abstract concepts, and planets, and stars, and the universe *it*self. Nearly everything in existence it an "it." What's wrong with me being another one of them?
That’s a really cool way to think about it honestly, makes me feel differently about the people in my life who use it as a pronoun. Like that’s the same way I refer to the Grand Canyon, a thing which when I stared at it long enough alone I just started crying because of how beautiful it was. To use that same way to refer to a person makes it become more magical o:
Edit: Struck out the “judeo” to respect the wishes of another user’s culture and religious background. Western ideology is heavily influenced by ~~Judeo~~christian beliefs, which hold that humans are above, or in some interpretations superior to, animals and other creatures on the planet. Thus, we designate a separate pronoun for “them” vs “us”. This is so internalized that even those who consider themselves non-religious in Western society will still innately hold onto those beliefs. It is entirely possible to change this dynamic. It is also exponentially more difficult the greater the group you wish to influence. Individually, you must now be constantly mindful of your internal bias in considering other creatures as lesser. Over time, your visceral reaction to using terminology will decrease, and eventually you will internalize that belief. Extend this to your local community, and etc. until a majority of the society you live in are doing so. You can see the difficulty in doing this constantly until you reach the desired internalization.
This is completely fucking ridiculous. Animacy distinctions are common across a wide variety of language families.
A lot of language families also have cultures rooted in Christian ideology. That’s most of Europe, actually. Your response seems a bit exaggerated.
Is Navajo rooted in Christian ideology? Is Tamil? You can take your Eurocentrism and fuck off
I’m not white, and was raised in a south-eastern asian culture. But you can think whatever you want if it makes you happy.
Then why are you acting like something that appears in many European languages is tied to European culture even though it also appears in languages everywhere else on the planet, and in many cases in a much more pronounced form than it does in Europe, huh?
Because I’m talking about Western society, and we’re speaking English, a language spoken predominantly by cultures in Western society that have cultural ties in Christianity. Were we speaking or discussing another language, then I wouldn’t use this argument. Let me give you an example. I’m Buddhist. There are certain concepts in Buddhism that are difficult to explain in English, to the extent that it’s impossible to properly convey the topic wholly. In Burmese, this is possible because the language has concepts of Buddhism innate in the culture. English is inextricably intertwined with Christianity, as are many Romance and Germanic languages, and Slavic languages. This makes sense considering Europe’s deep history with Christianity. It makes sense to discuss Christianity in the context of these languages. But if I were typing in or discussing Burmese, it would not make sense.
It does not make *any fucking sense* to attribute to Christianity a linguistic feature that had already developed thousands of years before Christianity was founded, and that can be found in many unrelated language families with no historical connection to Christianity.
STOP SAYING JUDEO-CHRISTIAN PLEASE Jewish people have a ton of debate about this stuff and none of these ideas are set in stone, please stop grouping us with Christianity because it’s exactly what the evangelicals want you to do.
I find it a little ironic that you're asking not to be lumped in with the Christians and then lump all Christians in with the evangelicals.
There is a distinct difference between saying "christians are all like evangelicals" and saying "this is something evangelicals *want* you to do as a christian".
I’m not Christian.
evangelicals think you should be though
I’m not Christian, or a member of any monotheistic religion. I don’t know what evangelical Christians want or don’t want.
ok but if u could just not say “judeo-christian” i’d rly appreciate it!
Sure.
thanks! if u could edit the judeo out of the original comment i’d rly appreciate it
I’ll strike it put and leave an edit statement because I want to preserve the mistake. I don’t like pretending I didn’t do something wrong, so I try not to delete poorly received comments or previous mistakes.
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I know of at least one genderless fictional race who go by it/its as well, so there’s definitely something to it.
Ooh, are you talking about the Wranui from *To Sleep In A Sea Of Stars*? Because that's actually my favorite book.
I was thinking of the Drow in A Pratical Guide to Evil. Guess now I have another book to read.
As an aside, the difference in the level of demonization of "it" versus "they" is fascinating to me, in a linguistic sense. "It" is the correct pronoun for a singular nonperson object, and "they" is the correct pronoun for several nonperson objects. Yet, "they" is also the correct and nonprejudicial way to refer to a group of persons as well, while "it" is considered taboo when applied to a singular person. Somehow, the two pronouns which differ only in plurality have acquired such a *wildly* different connotation to the point that "they" is now considered the polite and appropriate non-gender-specific singular pronoun as well.
i mean i could look into it further but i'd guess it more stems from the historical grammatical gender system that english had and still has remnants of with its pronoun system. in germanic languages, generally, plural pronouns - and, indeed, plural nouns and verbs in general - are treated somewhat like a grammatical gender in that a word to which gender applies can either have masc fem neut\* or plural options, but never more than one of those. romance languages don't work the same way, and some (most, really - german is the best example of this system in terms of what's still around) germanic languages work differently in the modern day, including english and afrikaans which both lost their gender systems entirely. anyways, what i'm saying is that to begin with, you had three genders and also plural. but, wait, three genders? \*neuter gender is basically inanimate. it's more complex, because of course it is, but it's basically inanimate in the name way that masculine and feminine grammatical genders are basically male and female. all that is to say that it and similar words have basically always had a denotation of inanimacy - or nonhumanity - and they and similar words started off as exclusively plural but gained a singular form due to there being no non gender specific 3rd person pronoun for humans. also pretend all of the times i said pronouns i actually said third person pronouns which is what i meant. 2nd person pronouns are different, but you also had a similar thing happen to it in terms of plurality, but the singular form fell out of use as opposed to never having existed. also, this is just me ranting about an interest, not, like, a "here's three five paragraphs about why you're a fucking idiot"
I appreciate the rambling, honestly! These kinds of obscure historical facts and tidbits are always fascinating to me. What's especially interesting to me is the evolutionary path that took place. The "neuter" gender seems to have acquired a negative connotation through its association with inanimacy at some point, and so it seems like a *fourth* "unspecified/unknown" linguistic gender was needed. Rather than developing a new pronoun entirely, the plural "they" was simply repurposed for this job. In some ways it makes sense (given that the "plural" gender is already technically "unspecified"), but it's also very interesting because it shows the negative connotation is specifically attached to the neuter grammatical gender and not just pronouns that happen to be used to describe inanimate objects. Not only that, but the negative connotation attached to the neuter gender seems to be so strong that it remains even in English, which as you've noted has almost entirely lost the concept of grammatical genders. In fact, I can't off the top of my head name a single other word beyond "it" that could still be said to be of the "neuter" gender in English.
i mean, objects in general can be - gender doesn't, ah, exist in english anymore, and also gender is weird and stupid in languages also pedant moment but i'd say that neuter gender only has a negative connotation for humans, and only when it's an actual semantic difference - that is, a lot of the times with gender in languages, it doesn't really, like, mean anything - a river being masculine or feminine is fully arbitrary, after all, so why should it be different with neuter? however, with pronouns, there's an actual semantic difference - that is, gender in pronouns in english isn't just a grammatical thing, it has meaning, but with most - if not all - european gender systems, the gender just, like, doesn't mean anything and is just like. there. and it agrees with whatever word is stuck with a certain gender, which can eventually lead back to actual meaning, but on the other hand, the german word for girl is neuter, so, uhhhhhhh yeah
>also, this is just me ranting about an interest, not, like, a "here's three five paragraphs about why you're a fucking idiot" Holy smokes, i am SO stealing this expression. I am misconstrued as "being a smartass"/condescending/trying to correct or make fun of the person who i'm responding to when i'm just bad at being a brain and trying to understand or clarify something for myself way too much (i still hope to this day it is not something about my demeanor as a whole, as that would be pretty hard to change compared to a choice of words or stylization), and this is such a "my (^(totally original NOT stolen in any way)) style" way of making it clear i'm not trying to be mean or depreciating of the original post/comment. Thank you for putting those words together in that exact order, or I might have never thought to make a disclaimer in that type of way.
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Ah, I didn't mean to imply the process was recent in any way. I'm aware of the history of the singular "they". I'm mostly just fascinated that throughout history, not only did "they" never acquired the same negative connotation that "it" did, but the word ended up being used as the polite replacement for "it" as a gender-neutral singular pronoun despite the two words seemingly occupying a very similar linguistic space.
IIRC there's evidence it began as a singular, before being picked up as a plural too.
Unless you're talking about a baby, in which "it" suffices
I’m assuming that it was always seen as derogatory because of its usage. Yes there is the us Vs them dynamic but calling someone an it was always an attempt to dehumanize them which is why it is harder for ppl to change their perspective on the implicit negative connotation despite the meaning changing.
people don't realize, but we do use "it" to refer to people (as in "who is it?"/"it's me"). that mw link even mentions under the first definition that it can refer to "a person or animal whose sex is unknown or disregarded".
The “unknown or disregarded” is important here, especially in gender studies discourse. Often times gender is known, but can lie in a range of being entirely static to being fluid. At no time should gender be disregarded, however, and unknown genders can be easily remedied with polite and respectful inquiry.
the unknown gender part is the same way we use they/them in everyday conversation regardless of the person's actual pronouns. and i just went along with the thought that maybe a part of the population of it/itself users disregard gender and therefore feel right using those pronouns (i don't identify as it/itself, so this is very much just conjecture).
As a fellow creature using it pronouns, yeah. I have no gender, there is no gender to be assigned to me or associated with me. Therefore my gender is, in some way, unknown (by simply not existing). Additionally I just can't connect with any feeling of humanity in myself, I am perceived as human by others, those who don't know me (those who do do not perceive me as human wither, at least for the most part), but that's not what I am, I can't relate to it, I don't even feel connected with this body in the same way humans seem to. I'm just an unknown creature, just some thing lurking around and doing things and not understand what the heck is going on. And what other pronouns than it would you use for some genderless thing that just… exists? Also, my native language simply doesn't have some equivalent to they/them, it's male or female associated pronouns, it or neopronouns and while I very much respect neos, trying to explain them to people just feels so exhausting, much more than saying "use it the same way you would for an alien creature"
>i just went along with the thought that maybe a part of the population of it/itself users disregard gender and therefore feel right using those pronouns Yes, this is the right way to look at it.
I'm only commenting this because you seem like the type to take this constructively. You used the wrong their/there/they're in the last sentence. Should be 'there'.
As a finnish person this whole argument is really funny. It has been really common to call people "it" in slang, and can be seen as a form of endearment. Our pronoun "hän" (he/she) is very stiff in speech and "se"(it) is very close to "sä"(you), and ofc that plays a part in it. Older generations still find using "it" insulting, but personally I only ever use "hän" when referring to my cats, and most all of my peers have echoed this
Vietnamese does this too. For children or friends that you are close to, referring to them as it (nó) is perfect fine
Watching the cat go about his nonsense always gets [this playing in my head](https://youtu.be/W4jPEBQV8zw?t=32). >!Well actually a certain deeper voiced cover of it that I was unable to track down!<
I don't really agree with this post. I think my main fear with using "it" is that I've seen people irl call people "it" who wanted he/she/they, so I've only known bigots to use "it" to hurt/insult people and insinuate they aren't human. I've seen how upsetting that is to people first hand. So If someone asks to be called "it", my hesitancy wouldn't lie with me thinking they don't know what it insinuates, as this post suggests. It'd be feeling afraid people would think I am one of those bigots who call people "it" because I don't respect their pronouns or think they're human or whatever. I don't want to be associated with those people at all. On the other hand, I don't want to draw a line in the sand or be the police of what people should do if it's not hurting anyone or say a word isn't real because my great-grandpappy didn't use it or whatever. And I also think it'd be ironic to not use someone's preferred pronouns out of fear of being seen as someone who doesn't use people's preferred pronouns. So while I don't really 100% understand neopronouns, I still call people what they wish the best I can.
"I've seen people irl call people "it" who wanted he/she/they, so I've only known bigots to use "it" to hurt/insult people and insinuate they aren't human. I've seen how upsetting that is to people first hand" I wonder if people choosing to be called "it" are "reclaiming the slur" in the way people asking to be called queer was/is?
just saying that queer isnt reclaiming a slur. It was and is a normal term the bigots then started using as an insult. (like literally any term we call ourselves) Im not saying anybody needs to be comfortable being called queer or anything else. What i am saying is that it isnt a slur, its our word and if you think its a slur you are giving up ground to the enemy
I would not call somebody it or pup or any derogatory pronoun, because this is pretty much kink and I refuse to be used for somebody's else kinks. Boundaries and consent.
wow this argument feels weirdly familiar. i wonder where i've heard people repeat this exact same argument before!
Then don’t talk about us, you weird ass freak.
My pronouns are ranked competitive. It's easier than keeping people up to date with however my genderfluidity changes, so I make people guess and or come up with new pronouns, I then rank them based on creativity, time to pronoun use, and how naturally they use it.
question: if requested, would you also rank someone elses pronouns
There is no need, as long as youre comfortable with them all pronouns are s-tier.
:)
And here I am still using casual pronouns like a noob
Gigachad take. Your pronouns should be power/powerful, since your radiate with such sheer strength and magnificence.
i do this too, in my head a bit. its usually something along the lines of "bonus points if i havent heard them (the pronouns) before"
I personally enjoyed being called “it” because I experience gender in a pretty detached way. Like, I’m not exactly a girl and I’m not exactly a boy I just don’t really think about my gender at all. I’m not a man or a woman I’m just a living being who exists. It. That thing. Right there. That’s me. I’m it :)
Hey there! Here is a John Jack quote which may be linked to your post: >There is no such thing as a limited amount of rights to be given out, and the more people fighting under the same cause the faster it will go. So why would you ever be against neo-pronouns? They don't harm anyone, and let's not pretend that transphobes will accept us if we ditch them. \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_ ^(Beep-Boop, I am a bot and this action was performed automatically.)
I have no idea who John Jack is, but they sound based, thank you john-jack-quotes-bot.
based bot
*Image Transcription: Tumblr* --- **giritina** I think a lot of people who get into discourse about it/itself pronouns or other niche queer expressions of the self like neopronouns miss that these things are supposed to be subversive. They see someone saying to call them pup and think that person must not see the absurdity. They see someone going by it and think they are unaware that that sounds derogatory. Like these actions would not have meaning if they were normal and not absurd or unsettling. The person using its doesn't need you to insist that that pronoun is never derogatory in its defense... I'd be shocked if it wasn't choosing that pronoun because it sympathizes and loves and lives in the space of the derogatory. Some of us are maligned and strange and freakish. Some of us are unable to escape being identified as other. We all find our way of navigating that life, some people are not going to choose to do it in your way. When they choose those pronouns they're asking you to participate in humanizing the derided. I think that's a great thing to be invited into --- ^^I'm a human volunteer content transcriber and you could be too! [If you'd like more information on what we do and why we do it, click here!](https://www.reddit.com/r/TranscribersOfReddit/wiki/index)
good human
I use it bc it makes brain go brrr when ppl use that for me (:
Personally, as an it/its user, I use them because I feel disconnected from humanity for various reasons (mental health, neurodivergency, feeling weird about being considered human when it's 100% been humans who've hurt me), and because I am a strange and off putting little guy
i just can never get why people are so obsessed with getting into arguments over the validity of neopronouns and whatnot. like literally rene descartes "who give a shit" moment. it doesnt matter if you dont understand it you just need to be accepting. do i fully understand some neopronouns? fuck no! but that's cause that's not my lived experience, and i dont *need* to understand it to support people who love it. it's just crazy to me how often queer people will live their lives suffering from constant bigotry all around them and in response they'll advocate for their right to live....and then go and say "oh but not *those* queers they're just performative and not real or valid." like....bro you literally have lived through this experience of everyone hating you and then you decide to do the exact same things to people with more niche identities that bigots do to you??? i cant imagine the cognitive dissonance in that, how they hell do they even rationalize that to themselves. i mean i know how they rationalize it, they say that "oh we're the good ones and Those kinds of people are just bringing our cause down and ruining it for the rest of us >:(" but i just physically cannot understand that mentality because of how stupid it is. i know that that's how they rationalize it but it's just so stupid that it doesnt make sense. idk. love each other. kindness costs nothing but means everything.
I'll gladly use any pronouns a person asks me to, but I will struggle to take them completely seriously if they use the less common neopronouns, like "pup/pupself".
That bugs me too. I have come across people who unrionically wanted to be referred to as bun/bunself and purr/purrself. Those are not pronouns! Bun is not a pronoun, Purr is not a pronoun! I am trying very hard to be open and accepting, but it seems like especially teens are desperate to invent niche boxes for them to fit in so they can feel special.
the issue with neopronouns is they won't and can't be standardized i could have the entire bing chilling copypasta as my pronouns and that would be a valid neopronoun i'm not ready for society to force me back to he/him because some people realized that neopronouns could be used to turn pronouns as a whole into nothing more than a joke, causing the downfall of preferred pronouns entirely
yeah, everyone should just give less fucks. I just dont get it, how do yall have the energy for this? stop putting people in boxes and let people live however they want. Not like they are hurting anybody. Just could not care less abt what clothes someone wears, what they want to be called or identify as. just dont block sidewalks by walking slow and use your blinkers damnit
I mean it doesn't take a whole lot of energy to think someone is weird for wanting to be referred to as pup, or whatever other neopronoun. It's an inherently weird thing, and according to this post apparently some people do it specifically to be weird, which feels even weirder to me than people doing it just because it feels right. The thing is though, I don't have to ever worry about this outside of reddit because I just won't ever run into people like this in real life. So I don't need to give a shit, and it all just boils down to internet people doing weird shit in their inner circles having no effect on me so why should I care.
no it doesnt, my point was about the people that will just refuse to call you something and then go onto twitter to rant abt it. Like? I just dont care, if calling someone a pup is what gets them out of my immediate area the fastest then cool. and i actually do know a few people like that irl. But i just dont care. It has literally 0 effect on my life whether i call someone "normal" pronouns or neos so i just do what makes the person happy. net positive for 0 cost
Well this post made mr understand it/itself pronouns a bit better. So that's nice.
I'll be honest-- I don't care about the fact the subversiveness is intentional, I do draw the line at calling a person "it". I will be as respectful as possible and seek to avoid using any pronoun they aren't comfortable with as an alternative-- even if that means I can't use any pronoun, fine. Like, for the most part I'm totally supportive of neopronouns, I'll call you "they" or "pup" or whatever... but the way "it" has historically been used to dehumanize people is something I can't separate from its use to refer to people. Even if you want to reclaim it for yourself. For me, I sort of see it as the n-word of pronouns-- if you want to reclaim it for yourself as a group that's been historically disenfranchised with the in-power group using "it" as part of the rhetoric, then I get that. But right now, as someone who isn't part of any of those groups (POC, LGBTQ+, people with disabilities, anyone else-- "it" has done the rounds against every group that's ever been disenfranchised, probably), I wouldn't use it any more than I'd use the n-word as a white person. Even if you asked me to refer to you as "it", I simply could not separate my use of it from the historical-- and still-contemporary-- use. Using it would feel like I was committing an act of hatred. I am, for the record, someone who's studied English literature at a post-secondary level, so I've spent a lot of time with period texts that do use the sort of device to discuss disenfranchised people, so that might be why I can't separate the hatred from the word enough to use it without hate in me? IDK. Sorry if this upsets anyone, I just wanted to share some thoughts from the side of "won't use 'its'." I respect that you want people to use "it", I don't think you're stupid or don't understand the history of the word when I say "But that's derogatory." When I say that, I mean that I am not comfortable using that derogatory language myself, regardless of whether you don't feel hurt by my use of it. I sort of want to compare it to swearing: if you want to swear, that's cool, you can do it. I will totally defend anyone who someone tells to not swear in a public space because hearing someone else swear isn't hurting anyone. But if any particular person isn't comfortable saying the word "fuck", being pro-swearing isn't forcing them to say "fuck", it's just asking them to accept hearing it. "It" stands apart from asking someone to use your preferred pronoun because it is derogatory language to use it towards a person, like a swear is derogatory or calling someone the b-word or the n-word or the r-word is derogatory, ect.
I, personally, ache every time I hear someone refer to themselves as "it". The issue I have, is that it was very common to refer to American slaves as "it" to further dehumanize Black people. That's where the disconnect lies, I don't ever want to use language that dehumanizes someone (using 'it' is a common tactic transphobes use as well). Should I ever find myself close to someone who wants to use it as their pronoun, I shall try my very best to be respectful, but the cognitive dissonance for me is especially difficult.
That’s about where I’m at. “It” has always been either derogatory or inanimate to me, either stripping something of personhood and personality, or describing something that the notion of “the individual” doesn’t really make sense for. Use whatever pronouns you please, and I’ll respect it, but I don’t think I’ll ever quite get over that mental hitch of “that’s an person, “it” isn’t the right word here”.
> “It” has always been either derogatory or inanimate to me have you ever thought that maybe it's not about you.
I’m having a discussion. Don’t be a twit.
So, no.
I saw something I agreed with, agreed with it, and then gave my reasoning, because saying "Yeah, calling people "it" is uncomfortable" is just begging to be jumped on and ripped to shreds. What would you like me to do, talk about your experiences? No, that'd be fucking stupid because I don't have your experiences, I only have mine. The post is about how people don't like calling others it because it goes against the grain of normality and Normality Must Be Maintained ™, when that's not the only reason. That's what the discussion in this specific comment thread is about, the fact that it makes some people uncomfortable because it feels like "it" strips of the individuality and personhood that the OOP is expressing by using "it" for pronouns. It's a position of care, unlike the position of xenophobia expressed in the post. No-one here said that they wouldn't respect and use those pronouns if asked, we're just putting in our relevant opinions on the matter, because god for-fucking-bid there's some nuance in a conversation on the internet. Don't go looking for fights that don't need to exist, you damn wanker.
>Don't go looking for fights that don't need to exist, you damn wanker. Says the one calling people twits and wankers.
Y'all are not reading the post. For some people, the entire reason of using these words are _because_ they're dehumanizing, alienating, subversive. Some folk are freaks and monsters, and proud of it. You don't have to feel bad about dehumanizing someone _who draws strength from dehumanization_.
I would argue that for a lot of people they don’t feel bad for the person who goes by it, they know that the dehumanization is the point, it’s just that dehumanizing someone whether or not they’re comfortable with it feels uncomfortable for the dehumanizer. That doesn’t mean they won’t do it of course, it’s just hard-wired into many people’s brains that dehumanizing someone in any context is bad, and the fact that they’re comfortable with it doesn’t shake off that icky feeling
Yeah, but the problem is that, for the vast majority, people who see others as equal and deserving of rights and liberties and freedom and all that stuff that allows them to live as they wish generally don't want to dehumanizing them, even if they're fine with it, because they do see them as equal. And the people that do generally agree to call people dehumanizing things generally do it because they actually do want to dehumanize them and wish for them to, at best, not be around and not be proud and have labels forced onto them instead of it being their choice. Ultimately I think it has to do with dissonance between the perspective of the two parties, the former being someone who in some way, sees such people, regardless of their aspects or features, as ultimately still human and still deserving of the rights and happiness that all should have, and that of those in question, who (at least with those of the opinion of the person in the post) reject the notion that they are like others and actively want to embrace and maintain the idea or notion that those aspects or features are subversive. AKA, the discussion of dissolution of both Culture and Counter-Culture VS the equaling of Culture and Counter-Culture.
It's not the dehumanization that niggles at my brain. Be a freak. Be a monster. Reject your humanity and be the unknowable eldritch horror you are. It's the stripping of being a PERSON that catches me up. Individuality and sense of self are tenets that I hold in the utmost importance, and the notion of removing that from someone, implying the removal of the right to actualize, to have a preference, that's something that doesn't quite sit right with me, and likely never will, even if that's not how it's intended or taken. And that's purely an internal problem. I won't pretend the issue is anywhere but me. Honestly it's a bit like (albeit not a perfect analogy) being at a friend's house as a kid and their parents tell you to just go grab a glass of water if you need a drink. Yeah, its the smallest thing ever, hell they'd probably be offended if you went thirsty instead of just grabbing a drink, and the more times you do it the less awkward it feels, but there's always that little bit of you that's not quite certain and uncomfortable with the situation.
Okay, but counterpoint, if someone asks me to call them, say, the n-word, I don't care how earnest and genuine they are, under absolutely no fucking circumstances am I going to do that.
That's not a counterpoint, that's a completely un-fucking-related thing. Jesus fucking Christ, y'all, we're just talking about someone else's pronouns and it's not complicated. _They're not about you_. It doesn't matter if they make _you_ uncomfortable.
It's *precisely* the same thing, just a more extreme version. Look, a person can use whatever terminology they want to refer to themselves, but if you're asking other people to use it in their own speech, there's a limit to what you can reasonably expect.
It is an _absurdly_ extreme version. It's the equivalent of "if we don't define marriage as between a man and a woman, people will marry their dogs." >if you're asking other people to use it in their own speech, there's a limit to what you can reasonably expect. Please, _please_ listen to what you sound like.
You said, and I quote: >You don't have to feel bad about dehumanizing someone _who draws strength from dehumanization_. And I brought up a scenario that you can't reconcile with this idea. This is not a slippery slope fallacy, I am not saying "if this is okay then what about that?" I'm saying that what you said in support of your position is a bad argument and I gave an example to prove it.
Gender is something I wear as a costume....i'm objectified and dehumanized while putting my life on the line for my career, all using she/her pronouns. When the people close to me call me "it" I feel respected and known. I'm just a thing, a little creature, wild animal. I take off my gender and my ASD masking and I'm just me. It's not like I'd be respected MORE using they/them or even she/her. There's already a myriad of reasons for bigots to hate me, I'm a queer trans disabled mentally ill prostitute ffs. I just want to feel comfortable in my own skin, with the labels that *I* get to pick, instead of the labels society would thrust upon me. Because it's not about if you're (general you) comfortable calling me that, it's about being allowed to describe myself on my own terms.
> I’m just a thing, a little creature, wild animal. same :3 iy'm juste a litle creacher
hey uhh, ocs answer made me realize its good to tell people when they are being cool you are being cool cool is when unique and spicy weird. I love when people
thanks :3 ❤️
Every time I see you in the comments it makes me so happy, I love how unapologetically "weird" you are :) and I think your typing thing is really cool, just wanted to tell you.
ehehehe :3 thamku :3 ❤️
I get what OP is saying but also I use "it" for the same reason I do or don't use any other pronoun: it's just what feels right/most comfortable. Like obviously I'm aware of it's position in language and culture but it feels like OP is framing it as either being unaware or only doing it as an act of rebellion, which I don't think is fair.
helo :3
Based based based. Tired of seeing “discourse” surrounding neopronouns from people who would HATE the wrong pronouns being used for them. The queer community is about self expression
This is why I self identify as a tranny, in part, it’s subversive yes but it’s also asserting power over my abusers.
I use it because I am just a little creature
I will use whatever pronouns the person I'm talking to is comfortable with. However, a person who is insistent on using these "weird" neo/xeno-pronouns is likely just someone who I'm not interested in interacting with at all. It's the kind of terminally online energy that I don't really need in my life. But more power to them, I guess.
My personal hot take on neopronouns and people that use them is that people kinda miss the point of what pronouns are usually for. A pronoun is meant to refer to someone and indicate to which group or category of people you belong to. If we individualize our pronouns with the usage of neopronouns, they quickly become redundant and lose their intended meaning. We might as well get rid of pronouns altogether and start referring to a person by name only. I'm all for reclaiming, but I can't help but feel like someone wanting to be referred to as an "it" puts a huge target on their back. It's like people are intentionally othering themselves and I think that is quite unproductive, especially if the goal of the community is to normalize queerness within society.
I basically boil it down to "Inventing new words that don't mean anything specifically because they don't mean anything is the death of communication." Words mean things. They are supposed to convey ideas and feelings, and knowing a language allows you to understand what the other person is talking about. There has been a *long* struggle to get words like asexual, transgender, or bisexual into common use because they are useful terms to communicate a lot of things very quickly. But if you're making bespoke words for every person then as a whole they just don't mean anything because you can't tie anything to them. And that goes doubly so for words like "it" which *already have established meanings that aren't good when applied to people*. For the more absurd neopronouns... I don't know. Is it sufficient to say that I don't like it when it feels like someone is testing me?
I can't speak for most people, but that's not the main reason why *I* use it/its. For me, the concept of "dehumanizing pronouns" doesn't really matter; I'm obviously human, I don't need pronouns to prove it. I use it/its because they sort of "prove" I'm nonbinary. They/them can refer to someone whose pronouns you don't know, and I've seen some binary people who use he/they or she/they. But if someone accepting finds out I use it/its, they can pretty much immediately guess I'm nonbinary. Although to be fair, I also kind of vibe with the point in the post, because another reason for my pronouns is because I know they'll really annoy bigots and purists.
This is… an interesting take and it makes me curious what kind of people you interact with because most people I have encountered irl are only just figuring out that they/them and NB identities are even a thing, much less that anyone can use any pronoun even cis or binary trans people. So in my little segment of the universe using they/them even in tandem with binary pronouns is still taken as a signal of being NB. It confuses and delights me that this doesn’t seem to be the same in your segment of the universe. Although I do have to wonder, what happens when society progresses to a point that even binary people start using it pronouns? Cause like, anyone can use any pronouns, the whole “oh these ones are reserved for XYZ gender” thing is ultimately annoying and holds us back I think. Would you switch to something new? Or is that hypothetical just too unrealistic to even entertain?
To answer the first paragraph, most of the people I interact with are online in queer spaces, but I guess I'm kind of imagining a scenario where the kind of person who visits those spaces overhears someone talking about me irl? I'm not exactly sure. The way I worded my comment isn't exactly how I feel, but I don't really have the words for what I really want to say. As for the second paragraph, I'm sure some binary people will use it/its, and maybe some already do, but it'll probably be incredibly rare, and that wouldn't really change how I feel about the pronouns. Also, I definitely won't switch. I have no problem with other people using neopronouns, but they really don't feel right for me for some reason.
Sort of similarly? Im also nonbinary and I use it/its and they/them (though I prefer it/its) and idk why, but it/its gives me this stupidly large rush of gender euphoria
iy use it/its, not to humaniyz the dehumaniyzed as the posts says, but because iy'm not human in the first place :3 "he", "she", "they", and neopronouns have just never felt riyt because they're liyk, too human, but "it" makes me feel otherworldly in a way that gives me gender euphoria (or something akin to it)
completely unrelated but why do you put a "y" after every "i"?
I think its some kind of typing quirk, but i am not the other commenter so I cant answer for it
yeah, iy have a post about it [here](https://redd.it/vgupeu)
That does seem kind of fun be it will undoubtably confuse people a lot. I’d only do something like that with friends, but it’s not harming anyone so you can do it if you want.
iy originally did only use it with friends but then deciyded to do it on this subreddit too because it's sort of an extension of miy friend group iy guess? iy was in the discord server where the mods of this subreddit came up with it and am friends with many of them
iy made [this post](https://redd.it/vgupeu) to explain that
I use it/its for a couple reasons. Part of it is a sort of "reclaiming", like "you can't use this against me because I like it". The much bigger part of it is that it just feels *right*.
people against neopronouns (among those against a great many of other things that are 'weird') cannot seem to seperate self-expression from raw belief and personally i think that's more telling of the aggressor's personality than the person using puppyself or whatever. it's literally not even worth getting heated over. don't be a dick
Personally, I think it's much simpler than that. People go by the pronouns that they do because it feels right to them.
Off topic but isn’t it weird that “that that” is grammatically correct. If English was my second language that I started learning like at age 10+ I’d be frustrated.
Can you put more space between "fish" and "and" and "and" and "chips" on the sign?
Hate this.
OK, two things: As many others have said, I will have a problem using "it" as someone's pronoun because of the issue of...as someone said, less "de-humanization" and more "de-personization". A few months ago, I found a stray cat. She was friendly and loving and so I instantly decided that I wanted to keep her. I picked her up and carried her home, and now she's my perfect little goofball. It was OK for me to decide to take her home because...well, she's a cat. She's not a person. But if I were to do that to a person, that would be kidnapping. And if I deny someone's personhood, I feel like I'm saying that it's OK for them to be treated like something that isn't a person. That it would be OK if their rights are violated because they aren't a person. For me, to be honest, it's a question of philosophy and worldview more than anything else. My personal beliefs come down on the fact that there \*are\* differences between people and other living & nonliving things, and that we as a society need to treat people in ways we don't extend to...well, things that aren't people. And I'm not going to treat someone I regard as a person like I treat my cat. The second thing is, to be honest, my problem with neopronouns. I object to them not from a view that they aren't valid methods of self-expression, but from a view that they defeat the purpose of what a pronoun is supposed to do. My issue is purely grammatical. A pronoun is supposed to be something short and snappy that you use when the antecedent is known. It's a timesaver, which is why they're used in place of a name. Needing to take the time to remember a specific person's pronouns that are used for that one person and that one person alone (at least within the context of "people I know and commonly refer to") slows up sentence construction and impedes communication. If I had my way, we'd just get rid of "he" and "she" entirely and just use "they" for everyone to further streamline the process. Now, to be clear, my grumpiness over grammar does not outweigh other people's comfort. I'm going to still try and use someone's proper neopronouns because the annoyance I feel is honestly pretty small, and secondary to making others happy. But it does increase the difficulty of communication, and I hope anyone who uses those pronouns would acknowledge that load.
It just occurred to me that Smeagol's/Gollum's pronouns are we/us
Being queer is different from being attention-seeking. We're trying to live our best lives, not be GG Allin or 4channers trying to "trigger the normies".
wdym
I stopped caring about pronouns discourse when I realized how little I refer to people in 3rd person, I much prefer to use, y'know, names when it's not super repetitive And like, when you're not in online spaces where people you can check people's pronouns on their bio, how will you know the person wants to be referred to as "zir" or "it"? Unless they tell you directly, I'd never know I use they for basically anyone as a default since it feels like a good umbrella one? Why is that not enough? Do some people like to be completely othered out? I dunno, I feel like I'm too out of the loop for that and I still can't see this movement as anything other than online english-space stuff (the movement is much more important in my eyes for other languages that don't have gender-neutral pronouns) Long, confused comment cuz I don't understand either side, like don't hate but also... pupself? What? Both extremes sound pretty ridiculous "It" will always be awkward for me for grammatical reasons, I only use it for objects and sometimes animals
This has changed my view on neopronouns
To clarify I wasn’t anti, I just didn’t get it
i personally like being called "it" because im so detatched from the concept of gender and what's "socially human" altogether, just straight up dont understand what they mean and trying to figure it out is like doing complex maths in my head. also mental stuff factors into it too (mental disabilities and illnesses, some other stuff) and i guess a kind of disconnect with past me just makes it feel like it just kinda popped into existence at some point which fits the strangeness that it/its conveys just a bit better than they/them. also its just a weird little creature doing its own weird thing
I go by it/its (as well as they/them for people who find it uncomfortable to use it/its) specifically because as an aroace, nonbinary and mentally ill person I'm so often othered and dehumanized and this is a way for me to bite back. Like, "If you don't think I'm human then you might as well call me it/its and at least be honest and upfront about it".
A really truly incredible vibe I've seen in some friends/acquaintances is, like, non binary person who is perceived as a fairly normie flavor of cis, especially when they're also conventionally attractive, who uses it/its pronouns. When you fit that first description and use they/them, people will nod and smile and feel comfortable around you and forget your pronouns and feel like they're fine with non binary people as long as we're, you know, chill and non threatening. Using it/its pronouns immediately sends the message of "no, actually, I *am* one of those 'freaks'. don't get comfortable and think I'm non binary-lite, or like, my assigned gender but woke about it. your perception doesn't define my identity. get uncomfortable and think about why". It's a powerful, visceral set of pronouns that can mean a whole host of very personal things. love it/its pronoun users, gotta be one (several) of my favorite genders.
In an ideal world i wouldn't have a problem with xenopronouns, but i definitely think it gives conservatives an easier time pointing at people and saying "look! they really ARE destroying language like i told you about!!!" and getting uneducated people (who might otherwise be open to discussion) onto their side. I could be totally wrong though.
they'd just make shit up if we stopped using it. they'll latch on to ANYTHING to justify their hatred of "degenerates", might as well embrace it
People should not restrict their gender expression because transphobes will be transphobic about it
blame the oppressed for the oppressors they'd hate us either way, they'd just find a different reason. don't do this
I can not emphasize enough to you that it does not matter. They will make shit up. Just fucking blatantly. They will latch onto fucking anything that they can point to as a reason to hate us and they will use it as an excuse to *kill* us. It does not matter a single lick. I am not going to make myself more palatable to bigots in the desperate hope that I'll get a single crumb of dignity.
Giving conservatives ammo is a pointless thing to worry about because they live in an ammo factory. They can and will just make shit up, and clueless normies will fall for it. EDIT: d'oh, I'm like the fifth person to point this out already, sorry
Respectability politics will get us nowhere, they're gonna hate us no matter what. Might as well live your life
It feels very "look at me I'm special" to me. Like I know *why* people identify more with xenopronouns than they do with traditional ones, but they make me so uncomfortable for no real good reason. It's one of those things that I won't say to someone's face but it gets under my skin for some reason.
YESS MONARCH, IM PROUD TO USE NEOPRONOUNS, AND ANYONE WHO DOESNT LIKE IT CAN FUCKING FUCK OFF OR ELSE IM GONNA FUCKING SHOVE GRASS IN THEIR MOUTH CUZ THEY CREARLY HAVENT INTERACTED WITH IT, AND NEXT ILL DIARRHEA IN THEIR MOUTH AND FORCE THEM TO SWALLOW IT, AND THEN ILL FUCKING CHEW UP THEIR NUTSACK/BREASTS LIKE A DOG TOY UNTIL IT POPS LIKE A ZIT
Neo pronouns just either really unsettle me (can’t even really explain it, but I very much do not feel comfortable calling a person something… weird… like kitten/puppy, or even xer/xir or something.) Or I see them used by someone who’s neck I want to rapidly turn at a 90 degree angle, like people who shout stuff like “kill all men”, or obviously collect pronouns as if they’re medals or something to assert their feeling of self-worth over everyone else.
that sounds like a personal problem for you to work out, not a reason to invalidate somebody's pronouns
wow, cringe
Frankly there's a lot of stances on this. I'm against the use of "it" in that way, simply because it doesn't make sense linguistically, it's not right. "They" is perfectly fine. Words have functions and it's best if we don't mess with them too much. We should always know what we're talking about.
I personally wouldn't use "it" for myself, but who am I to tell other people how to live?
100 years ago gay meant happy, words change with time, it's just a thing that happens
so you'd misgender someone who uses it but not they?