Trans woman here. Your pronouns are he/him unless you’d rather be addressed with other ones. There’s multiple ways to handle exchanging them but one of the popular strategies is look at how a person is presenting, how gendered their name is, etc and if it seems pretty strongly leaning one way you can guess otherwise give your pronouns and they give theirs in return. At least that’s what I do.
this post was submitted on 18 Sep 2023
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answering your questions as best I can (I'm a straight male too) in order:
- if he/him seems right to you, then your pronouns are he/him. if other pronouns seem right to you, then your pronouns are those pronouns. pronouns don't have to match up with your gender or presentation, go with whatever you vibe with
- when meeting new people, I give my name and pronouns. "hi, my name is salarua and my pronouns are he/him." of course, it's nice to give your pronouns when asked, but other than that it's up to you
- just including your pronouns in your profile is good. some people put them in their nicks, some in their bio or about me. if you have a Mastodon, Akkoma, Misskey, or Firefish account you can put your pronouns in your custom fields
- you can try and figure out other people's pronouns from how other people refer to them. many people will also give their pronouns if you introduce yourself with your pronouns. it's not a faux pas to not know someone's pronouns beforehand, although I admit I don't know a non-awkward way to ask someone their pronouns
- a good bet is to refer to people whose pronouns you don't know as they/them. if you mispronoun someone by mistake, quietly correct yourself and continue with whatever you're saying. "so after arriving at the office, he- sorry, they went to go see their supervisor about the presentation..." as long as it's not done out of malice, people don't mind being mispronouned if you acknowledge the slip-up and move on
- I haven't met anyone irl with neopronouns either. presumably people with neopronouns would go by them if they were among people they felt safe with. unfortunately most of the world isn't safe :(
First off, thanks for asking and wanting to be more inclusive! :)
For your pronouns, you decide. If you typically go by "he/him" you can keep doing that, it's up to you.
Depending on the setting, people around you might all introduce themselves with their prefered pronouns, you can introduce yourself with your pronouns if you wish to whenever though.
Similar to how you might tell people a different name you prefer to go by. So if your given name was Nicholas but you prefere to go by "Nick," you might introduce yourself like, "Nice to meet you, I'm Nicholas, but just call me Nick." likewise, you can say something like, "Nice to meet you, I'm Nick, He/Him"
Online, it's fairly common now to have your pronouns in your profile or bio. Again, it's up to you if you want to put them in your bio or not. Some sites have actual places in the sign up screen or profile page to place your pronouns, it depends on the site/software.
It's rare for people to get offended IRL if you unintentionally mis-gender them. Most people will correct you politely in the same way they might if you called them by an incorrect name. So if you said, "Hey Nicholas, how are your classes going this semester?" they might say, "Oh, you can just call me Nick. Classes are going well so far, how about yours?"
Often people that know them will correct you politely too if you don't know and used the wrong pronouns. I've had it happen a few times over the years and everybody has always been very polite about it. I just quickly say, "oh sorry, my bad." and then just make sure to remember their pronouns going forward.
I personally have some family and friends that use they/them vs she/her or he/him. It's a thing for sure, we all support them and their pronouns. It's not very tough to get used to, and as long as you correct yourself if you make a mistake, nobody will be hurt. It's fundamentally about loving them and being inclusive and supportive.
Thank you for the comment I added he/him to my bio. Not sure if it's in the right place.
No prob, cool deal!
Your pronouns are the ones you want to be referred to as, its that simple. So yeah, he/him if thats what you want people to use.
As for gender neutral pronouns, I just use them by default for everyone, especially on the internet when you have no idea who you are talking to as it is all anonymous (unless they have specified their pronouns in their bio/profile of course)
But overall you just get in the habit of using "they/them" unless explicitly you know their gender.
Once you get in the habit of it, it becomes more natural and you stop thinking about it.
Thats pretty much all there is to it, its quite simple and people who moan and complain about gender stuff are either:
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Lazy, and dont want to put in the 1% of effort it requires to not be shitty
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Really just bigoted but cant admit it out loud, so they complain about such things as a dog whistle to other bigots
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Are extremely misinformed about what is expected of them. They seriously think the real world is out to get them, and that if they misgender someone they'll get attacked for it (in reality maybe 1 person coughs uncomfortably and they get informed as an aside awkwardly). Non zero chance these folks also think vaccines cause autism and 5G causes cancer.
Or... hear me out... this is insanity being given a voice and should be pushed back against, like so many other unhealthy things.
Yep, that does in fact sum it up
No idea wtf you are talking about, but you sound like someone in section 2 or 3.
But Ill just quote you, yourself, from something you wrote 6 days ago:
People are rather ignorant as a whole. Many of us here probably use our brains for genuine thought, but I find that to be the exception.
Look at the shit people focus on as important and how they mimic what they see and parrot what they hear and it becomes clear how they can’t even get simple sayings right.
While you were referring to people using common phrases entirely wrong, I think it applies to what you have written here.
There is nothing unhealthy about being grammatically correct. There is nothing new about this either. The pronouns They/Them are ancient as hell and have been a part of the English lexicon for centuries. It is not conceptually a remotely novel idea to use gender neutral pronouns in a gender neutral way.
Full stop, its that simple. There is nothing political, social, or whatever about using they/them.
It is purely grammatically correct, and always has been.
Consider this
Completely subtract the whole trans thing away, all recent kerfuffle, and just consider this very simple scenario that is not anything new, and is grammatically an occurrence that would have happened even hundreds of years ago.
Imagine you have discovered in a public place a personal belonging of someone, it is clearly valuable and has initials on it. You dont know the person's name, and you don't know who they are. You definitely do not know the person's gender.
Now, answer me this simple question: Would or would not the following statement aloud, even hundreds of years ago, be grammatically correct English?
"Someone lost their belonging! We should get it back to them, they probably miss it!"
Note how in this case we are still using Gender Neutral Pronouns, because we do not know the person's gender
Even hundreds of years ago, this would have been absolutely normal to say and grammatically correct. Gender Neutral Pronouns were in use in even extremely old books you can still find and read today.
I already think you are off your rockers. Seeing that much text and the bits of glanced at confirmed it.
Write more essays to support clear unnecessary complexity in langauage. But know this: only people drinking the same Kool aid as you will read that much nonsense.
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Can we not dig up people's comment history to win arguments? That's kinda toxic.
If you dont like people using your own words against you, don't post it on the internet where the entire world can see it.
What, exactly, is toxic about holding someone to their own word?
What is toxic, precisely, about pointing out how a persons own statement mere days ago directly contradicts their current stance now?
If highlighting a persons inconsistencies and self contradictions is toxic, then so I shall be. I have zero issue with calling people out on their bullshit though.
Don't like it? Stop posting on the public of the internet on a forum where your words will be marked down for the rest of history (or at least, until Lemmy instances all suddenly stop being used, which likely won't be anytime soon)
There's a basic expectation, when you make an argument on a public forum, that it'll be judged on the content of the argument, not on who posted it. If you want to look through their history to see if they're a troll, and then just ignore them if they are, there's nothing wrong with that.
What you did was say "you're stupid and lazy," but for no good reason, you used that guy's own words to say it. That was entirely unnecessary. It didn't prove any inconsistency, it just proved that, like many people on Lemmy, the guy thinks a lot of people are dumb.
What is non-toxic about using someone's own words from past threads to insult them when you already have enough of a text wall to make your point?
What you did was say “you’re stupid and lazy,”
Extremely reductive and explains why you viewed it as toxic.
That is not what I said, at all. You have focused on the wrong parts of what I quoted, and ignored the context of my statements surrounding the quote.
If you read what I wrote, you should see that was not what I said at all.
So yeah, I guess if you quickly skim over what I wrote, not really reading it much, focus on the quote I called out, and assume there is some sort of insult buried in their to be dredged up and squint your eye's hard enough, you can draw such a conclusion.
But I'd recommend go back and read what I wrote instead.
Don't ask for other people to identify you, please.