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Latest Zoom Update Improves iPad Calls, Adds Custom Video Filters, Gender Pronouns, and More
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That’s just so silly.
I have a given name. I don’t use it. I use my nickname. My wife calls me by my nickname. My friends and coworkers do too. My parents exclusively call me by that nickname and have for the entirety of my life. The only people who use my given name are people who don’t know me.
If someone calls me by my given name and I correct them to use my nickname, is that poison? Is that me forcing something on someone? Is that completely unacceptable?
Or is that just me asking someone to be thoughtful enough to refer to me the way I’d like?
Pronouns are no different. Seriously. I even put my nickname in parentheses in professional bio statements, just like (he/him), because I publish under my given name for professional contractual reasons.
I don’t post my pronouns because I get a sort of giggle when people assume my gender (or worse, my professional position) based on my nickname, which is at best ambiguous and frequently feminine. But I also don’t care if other people share theirs. It’s the same as me sharing the name I’d like to be called.
Nah, your name would be “your majesty” and following historic tradition your pronouns would be (them/their) or if you were speaking in the first person (we/our).
posting mostly as a joke; I’ve always loved the hubris of the royal we
Lol to your second quote.
Could I just quickly interrupt our discussion and make it all about gender, please, as I don't believe gender should define me
You’ve done yourself astray by listing those examples which so clearly prove my point that both the idea of gender and the people who are designated to be beyond the natural gender binary are indeed a societal projection rather then a demonstrably new type of human being.
The wiki page for Bugis people itself says that the projection of said gender spectrum existed in a pre-Islamic Bugis society as part of rituals referenced as ‘Animism’ to which evaporated largely with the adoption of Islam.
Which begs the question that if their society no longer recognises these 5 genders you mentioned (since converting en-masse to Islam), where have they gone? Why don’t they exist anymore? Is there any evidence that these additionally recognised genders were in any way biologically different from what we consider Male & Female today?
The page for ‘Two-Spirit’ you linked says in it’s opening sentence that it is a “modern term” used to explain the projection of non-binary genders used in ceremonial & social roles.
And so the theme that you yourself are arguing here is that any genders beyond Male & Female are indeed a socially-agreed upon narrative projection of roles onto humans, and that their existence relies solely upon the belief of the peoples to which they are a part of.
Essentially, you are inadvertently agreeing with the notion that trans-people don’t exist unless we believe they exist, as unlike a Male or Female which exists regardless of belief (based on scientifically observable chromosome expression and evident in anatomy), any alternative genders from any given culture you can quote are simply social projections that have been agreed upon by said culture but don’t actually exist outside the minds of those who agreed on the projection.
And so are trans-phobic people actually denying the existence of something real and concrete? Or simply refusing to play along in the socially constructed LARP-projection game you are playing with words and fooling people into supporting with blind consent.
Thank you, Professor iRock1, but I don't consider YouTube to be an authority on much of anything.
Now post the pre-1980’s definition of this exact word. If that website had a time-travel feature the way Google street view lets you see previous pictures from the same location, you would see the definition of that and many other words change before your eyes (some very recently) from one thing to another, as the social reconstructionists began entering positions of influence within these companies and literally changing the definition of the words we have used for generations.
In fact there is a collection of screenshots exactly like what you posted which I cannot find at this moment but show how the definition of many terms have been changed over the past decade to support the post-modernist lexicon. Literally re-writing the definitions of the words that underpin our language and communication.
This has got nothing to do with anything. The definitions of words change regularly and new words come in to existence all of the time. In the 1500’s the Great English Vowel shift occurred to make the language ‘sound less french’. American English (or Australian, South African, Canadian, etc) has altered and morphed from British English, purely to fit into the lives, ways and country of the people whom bought the language with them.
Language necessarily changes and evolves due to social attitudes and pressures. It’s not a modern idea.
Finding some list that some person has plastered as a meme all over the internet as reasons for someone not to have the freedom to be described as they wish, is not going to alter my or even most people’s perception of the idea.
Let’s speak the honest truth here, you don’t believe some people should have the freedom and the right to call or describe themselves what they wish.
That’s what this is, trying to dress it up with some pseudo sociology doesn’t change it.
I think the issue is the interplay between the freedom of A to call themselves C and the expectation that B calls them C, with the freedom of B to call A as they see fit. Or I hope it is...
See my comment earlier about my mother and the Miss Mrs Ms situation.
Every single person who has said this is some sort of issue, would have the respect to obey my mother’s wishes, because that’s ‘different’.
But it’s not different. It’s a word she chose and wished people to use to describe her.
There is a stark difference between the natural evolution of language over time and the forced coercive deliberate manipulation of our language. The term G’day spoken by Aussies in place of “good day” formed naturally in Australia over decades. The gender-neutral sheen being given to all our masculine & feminine words are a deliberate collaborative effort by post-modernist intellectuals working for the likes of Merriam-Webster, Oxford Dictionary, And other academic institutions, that can on a whim and with no external regulation or warning change the definition of words ever so slightly to push the agenda they desire.
Correct. I believe people should be described & adressed as they are, not as they wish.
Completely agree, its the same as saying depression is just in someones head. Nobody knows what someone else is thinking or going through. The childrens view in the OP's comment is completely irrelevnt, I have an 18 month old daughter, at this stage everything suggests she's female but if that changes later in life so be it, she could mark herself down as a gay fax machine for all I care so long as she's happy.
Perhaps the following will help your understanding of the issue and why others might disagree with you.
You are - factually - wrong and it is different. The word she chose was a title (like Princess, Doctor, Sir, Lady, the Right Reverend). The discussion at hand is about pronouns, which are a different part of the language. Had your comment been relevant, you'd have written it as follows:
"My mom refers to Ms, wishers others to refer to Ms as such and has the right to be referred to, as Ms."
But you didn't... because it's a different thing.
What if she began to insist you communicate with your partner by writing notes and (literally) feeding them to her? And then did the same with her friends at school, or the Principal? She's identifying as a communication device, after all.
Please don't misunderstand - I do also believe people should be able to identify however they like. It's just you're agreeing with someone who is positioning that as the opposite argument to "I don't believe I should have to call another person whatever THEY like, if it isn't supported by the facts". They're not the same argument. As you said, nobody knows what someone else is thinking, and that makes expecting others to follow our own truths (and that of any other person they meet) is, well, a big ask. In some cases, it isn't made obvious at the outset.
On the other hand... this is something that addresses that. Perhaps it'll kill the "did you just assume X's gender?" question, because it gives people the ability share their preferred pronouns...
Unless someone has a fetish for consistent date formatting, then this is pretty much the reason for the existence of this article in the first place. It's not like there's much else to discuss... the word "notable" is used quite liberally in the article.
It’s not though, it’s the exact same concept. Pronouns are just a different facet of the same subject. And it’s nothing similar to doctor or reverend or anything else you have mentioned. You can’t choose to use them, you inherit them or you earn them.
Wishing to be known as Ms rather than the standard Mrs is a choice made, and it’s political and it rubs people up the wrong way. Not now, perhaps but you look back at the time when it was invented as a thing.
The views regarding that are the same views being espoused here.
Just as an aside, this isn’t a question asked by anyone other than the people who are against other peoples free decisions, trying to prove a point about the subject.
People who become doctor's can't choose to use it? Who forced them to become a doctor in the first place? Senior doctors in some countries (including the UK) revert to "Mr" rather than "Dr". It very much is a choice to use any title other than the default Mr or Mrs (and now, Ms), since it can be given up and the defaults reverted to. The irony of someone who supports choice or title - or pronoun - saying something like this is kind of hurting my brain.
It probably is similar in terms of why it is controversial... but I really don't think the similarities extend as far as the differences. Titles are something of record, where pronouns rarely are. For example, I would sign a letter as Prof User and expect a reply to Prof User, but I wouldn't include my pronouns as convention. My name badge at work would list my title, but not my pronouns... the list goes on.
Maybe people will look back in 30 years on this new convention and say this was the turning point. Who knows... until it is more widespread, though, there's a separation between the decency to use what's right in front of you and the ability to recall peoples' hidden preferences beyond your immediate friends/family.
I'm intrigued by your mother's use of Ms now. Did she insist upon it in social interaction, or was it moreso for things recorded or communicated in writing?
Yeah, what a twist of words here! Obviously it’s a choice, after you have become a rev or a doc or a princess. That’s not the original point you made though.
Perhaps but that’s just today’s convention.
No one is preventing that. Just that if you get it wrong and the person corrects you, then you know, right? And you can respect their wishes, right?
EDIT - the larger font is an accident due to typing on my phone which I cant seem to fix, not some sort of other point.
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The original point I made was that titles and pronouns are not the same thing. Perhaps your wording was clumsy, and you meant that you can't choose to use a title you haven't earned or aren't entitled to... which then leads to the question: if nouns and pronouns are the same concept, why do people have to choose from a specific set of nouns but they're free to make use of any invented pronoun set they like? It's a distinction between the two. They aren't the same idea.
Please note, I refer to them as invented because Wikipedia literally lists their inventors (some of whom are anonymous, but still cited) which cannot be said for he/she and more traditional pronouns.
In terms of writing titles but not pronouns being "just today's convention", it's also the convention going back hundreds and hundreds of years. It isn't like that started last week... we know that Ms was already used in the 17th Century for exactly that reason, that it was written down.
The issue I've described a few times now is the idea of being judged before the mistake... it isn't the same thing as respecting someones wishes, since they are unknown. In the absence of information, what should be assumed? Is they really a word to default to - because in the singular it applies only to people, while the subject could be an artificial intelligence or a fax machine? There's also the consideration that it is, essentially, demanding respect. Respect for others is a personal choice (one I would hope others made, and one I try to teach the importance of in my work, but a personal choice nonetheless and not something which can or should be imposed).
Here's an example of an explanatory footnote to discuss nonbinary pronouns:
“In this paper, I use the nonbinary gender pronouns [name them] because the people I am citing and/or to whom I am referring use these pronouns to refer to themselves. It is important to me that I respect their identities in my writing by using the appropriate gender pronouns.”
I'm behind that. I get it, I agree with it. What I'm trying to share is that I think some in this thread are missing it and making a spectrum of views ironically binary (in that you agree or you're wrong). To further the example, I'm going to shift the above footnote on its head, by changing the pronouns...
“You will use the nonbinary gender pronouns [name them] because the people to whom you are referring use these pronouns to refer to themselves. It is important to you that you respect their identities by using the appropriate gender pronouns.”
and here (underlined) lies the issue. People cannot be told what is important to themselves.
I’m not being clumsy and you’re massively over thinking things. The very, very simple fact of the matter is that some people would prefer to be described a certain way, sometimes this may fit into today’s convention, sometimes not. To some, some of these may be ‘out of the ordinary’, but frankly what has it got to do with them? It’s the convention that’s at the heart of the issue, coupled with people’s beliefs that certain groups or types of people should be denied the right to describe themselves as they please.
The rest, including most of what you have written, is just excuses and ‘reasons’ as to why some people shouldn’t be allowed to be how they would like to be. Not always but often made by ‘freedom’ loving people that would call to arms if they found themselves in such a situation, flabbergasted beyond belief that such a thing could even come about.
Conventions change, regularly. People do not change so easily.
Nor, it seems, do mindsets that this is a binary issue and that one 'out of the ordinary' person's expression of themselves is somehow more important than another person's freedom to be ignorant of that expression.
Once again: please stop confusing people's belief they shouldn't have to describe A as B with denying A the right to call themselves B. There's sometimes overlap, but it's not the same thing.
Down with Big Dictionary!
Actually, you do know that this is exactly backwards in how dictionaries work, right? They change the definitions to follow how people are using the words, not the other way around.
I agree it’s the piece of the article that would garner the attention. I’m just annoyed that it has to fall into the gatekept politics section. Culture wars everywhere…