this stems from another conversation on this site.

a commenter used the pronoun "they" because they didn't know the gender. Commenter could have looked at an inactives users profile to see the pronouns were she/her, but they didn't.

So the question is: is it wrong to use pronoun "they" when you simply don't know or needed to know the gender? I was told that "liberals" use it aggressively/offensively to trans people, but most liberals i know aren't smart enough to know about pronouns and how to use them properly.

I've been using "they" to admit gender ignorance all the fuckin time so im just trying to see if im wrong or not. Because ive never heard of this before. and i thought this site had told me everything by now lol

edit: thank you all for the comments. ill certainly try to remember to check pronouns of inactive accounts before i talk about them, but we need to be able to debate from a reasonable position and jumping to "HOW DARE YOU SAY THEY YOU LIB" isn't going to do shit. Lenin created schools to educate workers, Hexbear is our school. and i fucking love this school.

  • ajorge [he/him]
    ·
    10 months ago

    libs definitely use the They pronoun as a minimum of performative solidarity instead of seeking to understand someone's gender identity or having it be low on their Priority List

    imo: when talking in the abstract about someone or something, it's fine.

    When a person is in the conversation, use their pronouns. In the scenario who is the object of a conversation has a name like TransComrade, you should do the diligence of seeing if you can find their pronouns. In that sort of scenario, it's clear that the person's pronouns matter (they're identifying themselves as trans! their gender identity is clearly a very important thing and should be respected!)

    • TankieCatgirl [she/her, comrade/them]
      ·
      10 months ago

      this

      If you can't be bothered to do the bare minimum of due diligence to check a hexbear user's pronouns before discussing them, I don't know what to tell you. In cases where you have no easy way of finding out someone's pronouns, sure, use they/them, but refusing to put in the bare modicum of effort when our pronouns are right on our profile is lib shit.

      • Cummunism [they/them, he/him]
        ·
        10 months ago

        i dont even know if they saw the link to the profile or not, but if admitting ignorance or trying to be as neutral as possible is lib shit, then we're just an echo chamber that won't accomplish anything. Confronting everyone from the most left position possible isn't going to do shit.

        • TankieCatgirl [she/her, comrade/them]
          ·
          10 months ago

          The correct response in that case would be "my bad, let me fix it" and then fixing it, not going on the defensive because people who are sensitive to that kind of thing are justifiably upset.