D&D 5E Mearls' "Firing" tweet

Bacon Bits said:

I also think it's a little overzealous or excessive to be outraged or insulted that a stranger misgenders you. I totally get why people who have less accepted gender identities get upset due to the social problems they face and personal struggles they've had, but it seems to me to be not far removed from getting someone's nationality or race wrong.

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That's an awfully presumptuous stance to take. In case anyone was wondering, getting mis-gendered hurts. A lot. I cannot even begin to explain how much it sucks to have a sense of self that is still so commonly unaccepted and denied in the world. Until and unless you can experience that I would highly recommend avoiding making presumptions on how one ought to react to situations the impact of which you haven't the foggiest idea about.

You're right in that 99% of the time it's an innocent or honest mistake; people I know and respect still get it wrong from time to time. It happens. Of course, 99% of trans folx understand that that's part of the process and we're actually quite patient with people who mean well. It's also really really obvious to us when people misgender us on purpose, usually because they're making it obvious on purpose. Other times, however, people will extend the illusion of providing us common courtesy while also making it very very obvious that they'd really prefer if people like us just didn't exist.

That sucks a lot too.

epithet said:

but I'm unwilling to give politics and social anxiety the pride of place that you seem to afford them... I think it's likely that most English speakers don't really give a damn about the perceived cultural baggage associated with the use of the basic pronouns...

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Boy, that sure sounds nice.

epithet said:

It tends to depend on who the disregarded others are, actually.

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GEE, YOU THINK?

epithet said:

I probably don't use "thee" and "thou" because (if I had to guess) they fell out of use centuries before I took my first English class. Same reason you don't use them.

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I see.

Part of the point is that the singular "they" came about as part of the same language shift that took "thee" and "thou" out of the common lexicon.

But, whenever your classes were, you here recognize that language does change over time. It is then interesting that you do not seem to admit to anything *other* than what your classes told you - in the past, there was change, but between your classes and now? Apparently nope, not happening.

While you may say, "Well, just because they did it back in the day, doesn't make it correct," there's a paired, "Just because you had it in a class, doesn't mean it was 100% correct," to go along with it. My (and my wife's) biology classes in school taught "Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny", which is horse manure. Until the current generation, veterinarians were taught that animals could not feel pain. Schools a couple of decades ago taught that the C programming language was the most valuable thing a student could ever learn, and that "manifest destiny" was something more than just a way for people long ago to justify taking things from other people.

And, really, dismissing contemporary articles form the OED... not a good look for someone who may want to take a stance based on scholarship. True scholarship calls for continuous learning, not static stances, does it not?

On the matter of respect, "due regard" is a flexible standard.

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Yep. No claim otherwise was made. We don't need it to be objective - we merely ought to note that, in fact, unless we are sociopaths, we do assume some very basic levels of respect for our fellow human beings.

Still waiting for the APA and MLA references if you have the style guides at home [MENTION=6796566]epithet[/MENTION] . Wonder how Chicago does it differently than them.

epithet said:

Then politics happened.

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With respect (see what I did there? )...

I'm going to push back on that. Politics didn't happen. Some folks have figured out that we should give people enough respect to give them space to be who they are. Folks who think being respectful of others is "politics" ought to re-examine that position.

epithet said:

The words you use to describe me have no bearing on my humanity, and vice versa. If I call you a pencil, or a keyboard (first things that my eye fell upon,) that says more about me that it does about you.

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I would like to encourage you to google the term "dehumanizing language", then re-read this post and think about what it says about you.

epithet said:

No, I do not die on the hill of grammatical purity, even in "certain instances." This all began with me, thinking to participate in an ongoing conversation, saying (I'm paraphrasing) "You can be called whatever you want to, but 'they' is plural."

Then politics happened.

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The conversation about "they" being single vs. plural literally started as a post about using plural pronouns to respect people's gender identities. https://www.enworld.org/forum/showt...g-quot-tweet&p=7626962&viewfull=1#post7626962 Jumping into that to share your opinion then getting preachy at others being too "political" about it is like buying a house next to an airport and then complaining about all the planes.

DEFCON 1 said:

You forgot to mention the "BROOOOOOOOOOOOOOONS!"

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Says the Canucks fan:

I'm proud to say I've never yet put anyone on ignore in here, but much more of that kind of talk and my unblemished record might have to gather a stain*.












* - just kiddin'

Umbran said:

With respect (see what I did there? )...

I'm going to push back on that. Politics didn't happen. Some folks have figured out that we should give people enough respect to give them space to be who they are. Folks who think being respectful of others is "politics" ought to re-examine that position.

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Sometimes I wish I could go back into that magical world where talking about people's well being was just "politics". When I could have a "healthy debate" about the value of people, and how everything would be better if everyone just thought how I did.

Sorry epithet, language evolves. It's kind of "cool" how the use of words "evolve" to fit casual usage.

Since I don't see you writing in old or middle English, I think your opposition to singular "they" is about something other than language.

Back in college, I had a professor who ranted about my using they when when the subject was unknown, and that was before non-binary persons were more known. I just did it because "he or she" was linguistically clunky. At the time, I didn't know it was disrespectful to certain persons.

Add me to the growing list of trans or non-binary people telling you that you have no idea how we feel, and the best thing to do when marginalized people talk about their experiences is to listen and learn.

I can't believe this thread is still going.

Xeviat said:

I can't believe this thread is still going.

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Indeed. It was necro'd with a pun, which made me conflicted because I love a good pun as much as the next dad, but given the context of the thread I was worried.

BookBarbarian said:

Indeed. It was necro'd with a pun, which made me conflicted because I love a good pun as much as the next dad, but given the context of the thread I was worried.

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With a comment on a pun, actually.