I'll take your word for it since I wasn't there but how do you know they weren't transitioning? Did you check their hormone levels? Or did you just make an assumption?
If it's debatable then it's definitley not objective. Yes it's harsh but not accepting a group of people becasue you refuse to recognize who they are I would call it bias.
Objectively, he or she describes someone who is biologically male or female. As I said, I will cater politely to the wish of someone who wants to be addressed differently from what they objectively are.
That would mean then that you accept that this is about culture. To expand on a previous point you are free to not recognize trans people. You are free to not want to deal with them and while I've been arguing for calling people by the pronouns of choice I too would argue against legal measures to force people to do so under free speech. To reiterate again this comes back to treating people as you would like to be treated. If someone didn't acknowledge my identity and refused to address me as I would prefer to address me I would consider that rude and disrespectful. If I got the feeling that most of society was treating me like that I frankly would probably feel suicidal too.
I don't see any reason not to deal with trans people. I will treat them just as politely as anyone else. I would also not ask anyone to address me as anything I am not.
Funny... I thought anyone who thinks that social conditioning can change someone's sexual preference and gender identify would be bi. I can't see myself socially conditioning myself to not want a penis or **** a dude's *******. If you see yourself having the ability to make these decisions from being "brainwashed" that implies you are bisexual as you believe you can chose.
then we're agreed: your first sentence is not objective. you seem to be working overtime to label some very reasonable people in this thread as bigots. one wonders why.
The way I understand it, a transgender person doesn't believe they are doing that. A transgender woman, for instance, believes their womanhood is an innate characteristic that is grounded in reality -- an aspect of their brain chemistry. A boy whose sexual anatomy is somehow hidden from them and is raised as a girl will still very likely feel like they are male and there's some mismatch with their body. I believe there was a case of something like this happening, illustrating that gender or sex identity is a feature of the human brain that is not simply a consequence of observing one's own body. A person is transgender when this mismatch between gender identity and their physical body happens naturally. When such a person asks to be treated according to their gender identity, they are not asking you to contradict objectivity reality. They are asking you to be willing to accept that their sense of their own non-conforming gender identity may be real, perhaps due to a fluke in their prenatal development, even if you can't see it or measure it for yourself. They are asking to be able to live a life that aligns well with their gender identity. This includes, for transgender women, other people not insisting on treating them like they are male in normal social interactions even after being made aware of their female self-identification. I really don't think it's too much to ask. I feel like a lot of the push back is a reaction to not wanting to be forced to address people in a particular way. When people feel like they'll be ostracized if they don't follow a particular social convention that has been politicized, they will purposely refuse to follow the convention -- even if it's just being a decent fellow human being -- to make a point that they shouldn't have to do it. This is why I don't believe in ostracizing or punishing people who refuse to be basically decent to others. I don't think it helps in the end.
Good conversation in here. To me, this is the issue: how we identify. Why are we so obsessed with being acknowledged, affirmed, seen, validated, and needing a rainbow when we're sitting on a pot of gold? If our perception is our reality, and we can decide how we perceive something, are we not God (the creator of reality)? Most people identify as humans having a spiritual experience, and therefore with their meat sacks (black/white, gay/straight, man/woman), beliefs (which preclude them from occupying any other idea), and the "validity" of their feelings. What if we're spirits having a human experience? What if we choose to identify not with our feelings, but our awareness of them? If the story of what we are, after all, is the only choice we have, then is seeking happiness and external validation/affirmation not pointless compared to the practice of self-awareness?
You don't have to cater to another person in order to be decent to them. And people can choose to NOT be offended. Being offended is a choice. Never forget that.
To bring it around to this topic: My meat sack has a penis that likes being inside and around vaginas, but I don't identify with that at all - I am simply occupying it. However, I've been told by lots of folks that I'm "queer as ****", whatever that means (I can be what people call "feminine"). Often times those very people get upset because I DON'T insist on pronouns. Who gives a ****? Edit: for the record, I absolutely refer to people by their preferred whatever. Just because I think something someone is doing is irrational doesn't mean I want to hurt them.
i know a couple transgendered people and its not difficult at all to refer to them as their preferred pronouns. i dont see what the big deal is. i find the focus on pronouns like "they/them" thing to be more odd, honestly. and im seeing more and more people putting "he/his" or "she/her" on their social media profile or even their business card or business emails. people who are obviously the gender that they appear as, but still feel the need to specify that theyre a he or a she. i know one person who is a "they/them" and will correct any and everyone who calls them a "he/him". i try to call them what they prefer, but its actually hard to remember sometimes and if you accidentally say "he" then they correct you.
rocketsjudoka used the word “bias”. You are saying he is labeling people as “bigots”. I don’t know what dictionary you use, but those two things are not the same. This often happens when people cannot respond to the actual assertion (bias), so they twist the assertion into something it is not (bigots), and then claim moral outrage or victory. You have neither.
This is crucial!! Don't let someone you perceive as an oppressor have the keys to your car. You drive.
If by “cater” you mean go out of your way to accommodate a frivolous request, yes I agree. Insisting on referring to someone in a way they makes them feel bad, simply to make some silly political point, is not what I’d describe as “not catering to them”.
They're not mutually exclusive, right? I go out of my way to accommodate what I think is a frivolous request (I don't let them know I think that unless they ask), but when I make a mistake, it isn't for the intention of making a silly point or making them feel bad.
I don’t think gender identity is frivolous for most of us, and I wouldn't assume it be so for a person I am interacting with (particularly one who has gender dysphoria). How we identify gender-wise is pretty fundamental to who we are. I think people should make some effort to respect another person's gender identity, particularly if they make it clear that it is important to them. Asking someone who is a peer to refer to you by some honorific in a casual setting would be frivolous. That would be a case where I don't think someone is being a jerk for just refusing to play along.
