I’ve been waiting until after Christmas day to make this post, but some of our communities recently have had a lot of noise and upset over someone that uses neopronouns that most people are unfamiliar with.
So I want to make this clear. A persons pronouns are to be respected. This is true when the user is using neopronouns that you’re unfamiliar with. It’s true even if you think someone is trolling. Pronouns are not rewards for good behaviour. They aren’t only to be respected when you like the person you’re interacting with, or if their pronouns “make sense” to you. Trolls, spammers, twitter users, it doesn’t matter who they are, your options are to respect their pronouns, or to not engage with them.
I really want to re-iterate the importance of this. Gender diverse folk are undermined, invalidated and questioned at every step of our lives. As a community, we need to be working to undo that, not creating more of it, and that means there is no space for treating pronouns (including neopronouns) as a reward for good behaviour.
This isn’t a free reign for trolls and spammers. The rules still apply. Trolling, spamming, etc will continue to be dealt with, but it’s not an excuse to act as if respecting someones pronouns is optional.
In most settings I would be inclined to agree, but in specific settings, like the community this was originally posted in, acceptance and comfort is the point.
You may have seen this from World, but it was posted on blahaj.
In this particular instance, it seems less like you were approached on the street and told to speak differently, and more like some people were having a meeting and you walked in and told them to stop making a scene.
Removed by mod
If xey really want a closed meeting, there’s an option to make a community local only.
Some of us are likely to wander into some other blahaj posts like we wandered into this one so it’s good to know.
Excellent analogy at the end there.