So there’s a discussion over at Claire’s about this guy who wants to be called a woman, and he’s not Bradley Manning. And I – sarcastically, I admit – stuck my oar in, and now I’m a “hater.”
This is not an issue I’ve ever had to deal with. Until recently I wasn’t aware it was an issue at all. You got your men, your women, your gay men, your lesbian women, and some poor sick mutilated f*cks I’ve successfully avoided meeting in public washrooms, and that’s about it. Seemed complicated enough. But now it seems I have to request clarification before I can even refer to someone who’s self-evidently a guy as “him” or “her.”
This is messing with poor old Uncle Joel’s head, so it seems we need a stated policy. And here it is: If I meet you or even see a picture of you and you’re clearly a guy, you’re a guy. The third-person pronouns that will be assigned to you are “he” and “him.” Even if you’re confused, I’m not. This is not an attempt to be offensive, I’m just struggling for clarity. That is all.
I understand. I read that yesterday and all evening I was trying to wrap my head around it.
Oh, well, to each his own. Another reason to be a hermit, heh? 😉
What got me was lola’s “in your face” attitude. I can work with anyone who claims to have a problem or serious issue. But once he who was asking for tolerance immediately became intolerant and started threatening to sic his big bad blogging friends on anyone who had a problem…… well I lost sympathy.
When I saw Claire post about it, I had a feeling that whole thing was gonna go sideways….
As a lesbian, I confess I’ve always had a problem w/a man who wants to play 50’s housewife dress-up & insist on my using the feminine pronouns for him, but who trashed lesbians, & dumped the ‘womanly wiles’ on Monday to go to work. It more struck me as mockery of women than anything.
For me, you want to be called ‘she’…cut it off. THEN I’ll call you she.
Otherwise, you’re just a drag queen.
And yes, this is another reason to be a hermit.
Folks who go onto a public blog and reveal their innermost hangups have no jusrification for getting all butthurt when not just everyone sympathizes with them. When ya post stuff, ya have to expect responses and ya can’t reasonably expect universal sympathy . . . particularly when you come out as, um, very confused in one manner or another.
JMHO
Damn you, Joel. [grin] I wasn’t going to go back to that post until I saw your bit about it here.
Hey, you’re only a hater. I’m apparently the Anti-Christ or something equally nasty, and I’m the one who didn’t care about her gender identity. They’ll probably be pounding on my door to burn me at the stake after my last post over there.
Erin’s always come across as kind of neurotic and overly sensitive to me, so her reacting badly to anything even slightly negative is no great surprise. She and Bonnie (Squeaky) both like to tear into a discussion where they feel slighted with vigor. Eh – don’t sweat it or her issues. Let her live her life and you go on with yours. Buy yourself some nice shoes *g*.
had a friend once that was transgender. He was not an attractive woman. He/she did not get offended if someone got pronouns wrong. Lot of fun to hang around with, she could cause ore trouble just walking into a room than I ever dreamed of.
There’s something disturbingly flame like about that post and comment thread over at claire’s and the temptation for people with beards (like me) to go too near to it.
got to say, the only surprise about Erin coming out, was the beard,
so the class of “Bearded Hermits” is now known to extend to at least one who wishes to be referred to as “she”.
I find it ironic when people who claim to be defying some sexual convention or other act hysterical and irrational, just like a stereotypical irrational woman from a sitcom.
Don’t worry about being branded a “hater”. There seems to be a pattern with that. Erin called me the same thing a few weeks ago.
I wrote a funny post about My Little Pony. (Hereafter referred to as “MLP” or “Aaaauuugh”.) Apparently there are MLP fans other than the expected six year old girls. Who knew? I got the vapors, portrayed myself as the butt of several jokes, and finally strung together the phrase “an orangutan broke through the window and did a puppet show with live cats”.
Erin mis-interpreted one of my commenters as an unhinged monster intent of mayhem and painted me with the same broad brush. I was figuratively burned at the stake as a “hater”. (Which is a whole lot better than literally!)
Everyone likes to be the hero of their own story. Some stories require a “hater” to be “heroic”. Maybe that’s why Erin sees a whole lot of violent haters in a world that hasn’t been shocked by variation in sexuality since Dustin Hoffman played “Tootsie”.
Also nobody liked my orangutan joke. That makes me sad.