If DeSantis wins
- Thread starter CastletonSnob
- Start date
I am, however, capable of having an identity without feeling it threatened by someone else sharing it or differing from it.
Sex does not require someone to have 100% of the associated characteristics, and it never did.
So you're not using sex or gender then, you're just going on surface-level stereotypes.
Firstly, you obviously are trying to sway people to Stance 2, since you've been insisting ad nauseum that it's "the definition".
Secondly, you yourself don't hold either of those stances. You just said you base it on stereotypes of appearance even if the sex differs.
Thirdly, you've made a leap in saying that if one believes pronouns are determined by sex, then therefore you can't change them. Because I (and many legal systems, doctors, and biologists) believe sex can effectively be changed. So even if I believed sex determined pronouns, I could still believe them changeable.
How do you think people have used pronouns for the entire history of language? You think they are checking a person's genitals or running thorough biology tests? It's not about 100% accuracy and never was. Just like birth at sex is highly highly highly highly accurate, people identifying someone's sex is also highly highly highly highly accurate.
Can you understand why someone would use pronouns other than the way you do? It's like Mysterious all over again. I'll have to evoke Judge Judy again; Yes or No?
So you're saying that the way people use pronouns is not based on what's in their pants but what gender they present as? What gender they are perceived as?
Ah, now that depends on the culture and point in history, doesn't it? Numerous cultures haven't connected them inherently with biological sex, or have recognised third genders or some other intermediate/separate form. Some cultures simply haven't used gendered pronouns. And for the last 700 years, "they" has been a perfectly acceptable and correct non-gendered pronoun in English.
Still that circular logic. "It's correct almost every time, thus we can ignore it when someone says it's not correct ---> because we don't count it when they say its not correct, it's therefore almost always correct".
Of course I can. I can't understand why that someone would be insistent on pushing their own definition onto others, as you seem to want.
Curious, so that means that in my 20's when I was skinny li'l twink of a guy during my (let's call it) Noel Fielding phase all the guys who used to grab my ass in nightclubs were right, I was a woman because I presented at least feminine enough to confuse some people who I'm sure would insist they can always tell. And this is how I find out?! I have, do and presumably always will identify as male but to others I presented at least feminine enough that they would shoot their shot so maybe I am a woman?
Those people sound like a-holes no matter your gender, treating you as a hunk of meat. And I am sorry for your experience, but in that moment those a-holes evidently thought you a woman and were in the wrong. Which is more or less what I said earlier: people use pronouns based on the perceived gender; likewise I assume these people would not have treated you this way if they had perceived you as a man.
You are what gender you feel you are.
Nah. I don't think that's right. According to phoenixmgs I didn't try hard enough to present as male so it's only good and correct to use feminine pronouns to identify me. Surely his ideology isn't just a hodgepodge of incoherent nonsense only designed after the fact to reinforce the beliefs he already held?
He has claimed that pronouns are based on sex, not gender. (Something I disagree with, but that's beside the point.)
But he also said he would refer to a trans woman as "she" but only if she puts in what he considers an appropriate amount of effort to present as feminine. Because his entire worldview has been formed by his youtube algorithm and he doesn't actually quite grasp all the things he believes.
An odd statement, considering you want to be able to control the identity of others.
You're projecting. You want people to be able to control their identities. I am telling you they cannot. You do not get to determine the things that distinguish you from others, other than the most shallow characteristics, and even then, something like dying your hair blue ceases to accomplish that if everyone starts doing it.
Anything you can control, so can everyone else. Anything you can't control, neither can anyone else. There is no situation where you can have sole control over how you are the same or different from others.
Partly yes and partly no. There's several physical characteristics that identify sex besides genitals and you really have to go out of your way to change those or cover them up. Something somewhat minor for example is skin, male and female skin is different and you unconsciously notice that just spending a rather small amount of time with a person. On the other side of things, if a guy is doing a Mrs. Doubtfire, then he'll be referred to as a she. Pronouns are a 2-way street and not one person is really the sole determining factor; thus, you don't own your pronouns like you own your name. And people prescribe pronouns based on what sex they determine the other person to be because if it was just what you're acting/behaving as tomboys would then be called boys but people still call them girls and she/hers (perceived sex is the determining factor not perceived gender).
Also, I just watched The Muppets (2011) last night and the following scene with Miss Piggy and Miss Poogy happened and notice how Piggy is giving Poogy a once over to determine if Poogy is a "sister" or not. That's how people determine pronouns.
Nope, like I said above, pronouns are a 2-way street, you are not the sole proprietor of your pronouns. If a normal looking guy/girl are wanting to be called pronouns other than what is normal, 90+% of the population is not going to do that. Just like 90+% of the population is not gonna use they/them as pronouns for a person either (or the hundreds of other new made up pronouns).
Finally, the answer I've waited for for pages now. Why can't you stop telling people how to use pronouns then? That doesn't mean you can't have an opinion on it, but you are not the arbiter of how to use pronouns either.
How is my following post here me being insistent on pushing my own definition onto others?
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Well over 90% use pronouns like I do without issue, but it's just an incoherent hodgepodge of nonsense when like everyone understands it perfectly fine?
Also, you've never been wrong or seen someone else mistaken by the back of someone's appearance and went up to them and said "sir" or "ma'am" and been wrong? Not saying grabbing people is ever right (in your specific scenario) but at bars with people drunk and on other things possibly, that kinda stuff happens.
I am not suggesting anyone has 'control' over their own gender identity, in the sense that they can just switch it on a mere whim. What I'm doing is acknowledging that A) it can be fluid; and B) The best person to judge it is the individual person. That's not the same thing.
The only things I'm suggesting someone can actively change are most physical characteristics associated with sex. Which is true: genitalia, body morphology, hormones etc.
Most people will make snap assumptions, usually based on stereotypes or a surface-level judgement on body morphology. That's unavoidable. Only the monumentally arrogant, prejudiced or rude would insist on their own image-based pronoun for someone else if they were then corrected.
I was clear about my position from the start. And yes, in insisting that a pronoun of your choosing must apply to someone else, based on how you think they look, is imposition. Because you're no longer just talking about your own identity; you're imposing your rigid, appearance-based understanding of identity onto others.
It's a 2-way street, neither party is the sole arbiter of the pronoun to be used. Your pronouns are not your name. Hell, even your nickname (if you have one) is more of a group decision than solely your own; a nickname you try to make happen for yourself usually is something doesn't end up happening.
Life Rule #1073: You Can't Choose Your Own Nickname. - Melisa Wells
As J got settled in at school, he began talking more and more about the new friends he was making. He gets along very well with both of his roommates--what a
www.melisawells.com
You're trying to be the sole arbiter not only of your own pronouns, but those of other people. Your position involves far more imposition than mine.
Riiiight.. except that the whole issue in that comic is that the stated name is really long and hard to get a handle on. Whereas "he" and "she" are the same complexity, and both extremely simple.
To be more accurate: person B tells person A their name is Pedro (just that), and person A insists on calling them Stephen because they think they look more like a Stephen.