It was bound to happen sometime. I was out with a friend-acquaintance-colleague I hadn't seen in a few years. She was ordering for both of us and--gesturing to me--told the server, "They'd like a cup of coffee." [Record player screeches to a halt.] I have always used "she," so it was weird to me that this friend would assume that I had switched to "they." It's not as if I look more masculine than I did a few years ago. I can only assume that for her, the context has changed--people who look like me (butch women) are now, at least as a default, "they." I corrected my friend, saying, "She, please," (after the server left), and my friend replied, "Oh, I just wanted to be safe." Safe? Wouldn't "safe" be assuming that I still use the pronouns I have always used, unless I tell her otherwise? My friend replied that most people who look like me use "they." I continued to boil quietly about this. Afterward, I kept wondering why it bothered me so much. I don't get angry when people accidentally call me "he"--in fact, I go out of my way to tell them not to worry about it. Gender mistakes happen. Who cares? Although, if someone who knew me suddenly started referring to me as "he," I would be surprised and possibly annoyed. But I still think "they" bothered me more than "he" would have. And it's not as if I'm the pronoun police. When I'm in a group and we have to go around and give our preferred pronouns, I now tell people that I don't care about pronouns. They always use "she," because (1) my name strongly signals "femaleness" and (2) I think(!?) I "look like a woman"--or rather, I look like some instantiation of woman with which they are somewhat familiar (the outside layer of a Rachel Maddow babushka doll). But I guess I do care about pronouns--at least a little. I didn't like my friend assuming that a gender nonconforming look is de facto incompatible with being a woman. I felt like I was being gender policed--as if she was telling me, "You're not doing 'woman' correctly anymore--people like you are a 'they.'" This chafes me. A "she" can look any way at all. And part of my stubborn refusal to use anything but she, despite my annoyance at the very existence of gendered pronouns, is an assertion that this is what a woman looks like. Grr. I don't know. It's weird. If I hate gendered pronouns, why don't I like "they?" I'm still wrapping my head around why I cared so much. It's at least partly because I don't love "they" as a singular pronoun. Maybe I should just adopt a random word or phrase, like "puppy" or "the silver robot" or "sulky capybara" as my pronoun. Then she would have had to say, "The silver robot would like a cup of coffee," so I'd at least get a chuckle out of it.
18 Comments
Tracy
8/23/2017 09:07:42 am
I get it. I'm in the same boat. I use she, present as very masculine and don't get flustered at the random he and sir. But when people assume "they" it annoys me.
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Dana
8/23/2017 09:18:25 am
I agree completely. I think the automatic "they", even when well-intentioned, ends up reinforcing gender norms by essentially telling women that they're weird for not adhering to traditional ideas of how women should dress and act. I know women who had a harder time coming to terms with themselves as nontraditional women, and especially as lesbians, because their friends and acquaintances kept treating them as if they were "supposed" to identify as something other than a woman, just because of their hair and clothing.
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T
8/23/2017 10:09:57 am
Completely agree. Someone should ask what pronouns you use before making an assumption. And no matter how masculine or androgynous a woman looks, if she identifies as female she is a she. Very rude to assume otherwise. I look completely female and have no interest in changing but identify as non-binary. They would be more appropriate to use for me but no one has ever assumed that they should.
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Amanda L Allee
12/13/2017 03:01:07 am
Actually as a masculine woman that passes as a male 80% of the time and live as a woman asking my pronouns everywhere I go would be like asking if I'm a boy or a girl everywhere and it's incredibly rude.
Ray
8/23/2017 10:20:45 am
I understand why you feel that way, especially if your friend knows your pronouns already. But I think for a lot of people, "they" is a way to not assume how someone identifies and can be a placeholder until you know their pronouns. I am nonbinary, I use they/them but I also know people can't be expected to know that. It comes down to respect and not assuming how someone identifies based solely on how you perceive them.
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T
8/23/2017 12:52:19 pm
Why not just ask what pronoun they use before using "they"?
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Ray
8/25/2017 05:45:20 pm
Because if you're in public or a situation where it may not be safe or appropriate to ask, it's a way to respect a non normative gender expression without putting them on the spot.
Whitney Lauren
8/23/2017 12:23:52 pm
I care very much when I'm they/themed and he/himed or any other pronouns are used for me besides she/her. I'm a woman no matter how masculine looking anyone thinks I am. Assuming I'm neutral or a man pisses me off. I do my best not to assume for other folks and ask or wait until ppl tell me what's up before using pronouns. If ppl use he/him or they/them, I 100% use those for those folks and think it's important to do so. My she/her pronouns are equally as important.
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Liberacion
8/24/2017 05:33:11 am
The story makes me sad, though I'm glad you shared it.
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dalex986
8/24/2017 07:08:43 am
Trans people exist and that's okay. It is no great patriarchal beguilement to recognize one's self as transgender and take measures to express yourself honestly. Someone else's experience with gender has no impact on my own except to potentially expand my understanding of myself or provide an example of a new way of self-expression. Further, the author of this piece never says, or makes any assertion, that woman-ness is an irrevocable, biologically-fixed imperative. Your TERF ideology superimposed that onto her text.
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@dalex986: Thanks.
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Liberacion
8/24/2017 08:34:57 am
Hi BW, thanks for responding. I appreciate where you're coming from and am sorry if it seemed I was ascribing an intention to your post that wasn't there; I was just very happy to read a post by a butch woman in my age range who wants to go by "she." This is something of great personal value to me.
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@Liberacion: of course you can keep commenting! Please do! Part of why I write this blog is to get dialogue and share different perspectives. Even if I don't agree with you, I want to hear your point of view (and this goes for everyone!). And I think that even if I disagree with you intellectually, I get where you're coming from emotionally, at least in some sense. I'm in my thirties, and it *does* seem like there's an assumption that I must be uncool, retro, or anti-trans if I identify as a woman. Nope, nope, and nope. Just doing my own thing. (Well, possibly uncool.)
amsilldn
8/24/2017 06:51:51 pm
I think what bothers me most about things like this (aside from my intense level of rigidity about they being a plural pronoun) is how it erases my identity. I can be a woman and look masculine. Just because I look masculine doesn't mean I'm gender non-conforming or I'm transitioning or interested in doing so. The assumptions about and ignorance towards/erasure of my identity because I look like a dude infuriate me more than I can express.
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T
8/24/2017 07:31:36 pm
This is why I sometimes wonder if people feel that they are trans instead of just gender nonconforming. I think they think masculine = male and feminine = female and feel they have to transition. Particularly for people from a very rigid conservative environment.
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amsilldn
8/27/2017 06:42:10 pm
I think this is why many masculine presenting women question whether or not they are trans, but I don't think it is why they transition. If you don't have body dysphoria as a woman, can you imagine what would happen if you became a man? No, I think after doing research and all that most would realize they're not trans. But I'm quite certain it leads to the question of "am I trans?" some masculine presenting women ask.
Les
8/26/2017 11:25:39 am
I am in my early 20s and living in Europe. I am glad you posted this!!
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Marty
9/11/2020 08:10:49 am
Me tooooo!!!!!! Its like so weird. Im like queer but too masculine for the women spaces to cis for the trans spaces and to lesbian for any other spaces.
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