Women's IssuesWhat is with she/they and he/they pronouns?

submitted by strawberrysun from self.LGBDropTheT

Is this a trans thing?

I had never seen this until maybe a year or so ago, and now I’ve noticed it seems common among younger people. The only “she/they” close to my age I can think of is Halsey. Even in my ultra-woke city, I don’t have any 25+ peers going by she/they or he/they or whatever. But I am familiar with the younger crowd because I have a teenage sister (who unironically believes that cuffing your jeans is what makes you bisexual) and I’m a prominent content creator within a fandom mostly populated by the college age group.

On “Lesbian Visibility Day” I saw SO MANY posts and selfies from teenage girls and women in their early 20s claiming to be “she/they lesbians” and I don’t get it. Even more confusing, most of them were ultra feminine or even just average-looking girls. As an average-looking woman with a female name, I cannot imagine expecting anyone to call me anything other than she unless I was being referred to as part of a group. But that doesn’t seem to be what these people mean. I’ve heard that you are supposed to constantly switch between she and the singular they, and that just seems… dumb. Why would anyone expect that?

I genuinely cannot understand what the point is supposed to be.

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[–]ArthnoldManacatsaman🇬🇧🌳🟦 36 insightful - 16 fun36 insightful - 15 fun37 insightful - 16 fun -  (2 children)

Look at meeeeee I'm not like the other girls I'm so quirky and queeeeeer mmm delicious attention

[–]Dromedary 15 insightful - 3 fun15 insightful - 2 fun16 insightful - 3 fun -  (1 child)

Haha. Reminds me of blogger Sady Doyle, who now goes by Jude, and recently declared strenuously that s/he was a man and trans and nonbinary and a he and a they. And a spokesperson for LGBTQIA++ people everywhere, lol.

She's always been an anger artist, and also a wife and mom with husband (breadwinner) and kids in the suburbs, but now she demands to be known as queer champion numero uno man. And, I don't agree with Glenn Greenwald a lot, but on a podcast with lesbian Katie Herzog last month, he discussed how galling the presumption is. That someone in a heterosexual marriage, someone whose heterosexuality has been 100 percent approved and encouraged by society, can just waltz in and claim the mantle of oppression for herself. Whereas gay people like Glenn (and me) grew up with feelings of pain, shame, loneliness, secrecy, bullying. Where gay people were denounced by the Pope and the President, when society just scorned and hated gay men to a ferocious degree even as a generation of them were being wiped out by AIDS. And that was your future as a gay teen as you saw it: societal condemnation and death. And now, people like Doyle just march in and they want it all. Every hard-won victory that gays and lesbians earned over decades, they want it all and they want it now. All while dismissing and pushing lesbians and gay men out of the spaces and orgs they created. It's breathtaking. And by the way, FUCK your pronouns, you preening frauds!

(Edit to add: sorry for going long, I just got more annoyed as I typed, ha. )

[–]TiredTrendersSuper-gay 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

That someone in a heterosexual marriage, someone whose heterosexuality has been 100 percent approved and encouraged by society, can just waltz in and claim the mantle of oppression for herself. Whereas gay people like Glenn (and me) grew up with feelings of pain, shame, loneliness, secrecy, bullying. Where gay people were denounced by the Pope and the President, when society just scorned and hated gay men to a ferocious degree even as a generation of them were being wiped out by AIDS. And that was your future as a gay teen as you saw it: societal condemnation and death. And now, people like Doyle just march in and they want it all.

I don't like sounding like the woke crowd, but thats 💯% entirely heterosexual privilege and homophobia in a nutshell through and through.

[–][deleted] 28 insightful - 1 fun28 insightful - 0 fun29 insightful - 1 fun -  (5 children)

so I went by "she/they" while I was in college.

A lot of it is social pressure if you're involved in queer communities/clubs, all my friends i made in my lgbtqa+ center had some form of "they" pronoun. and a lot of it is an indication of being either inwardly or outwardly "gnc" or "not like the other girls". At least that's what it was in my case.

[–]strawberrysun[S] 19 insightful - 1 fun19 insightful - 0 fun20 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

So basically they do it because other people are doing it? That makes sense based on what I've seen.

[–][deleted] 14 insightful - 1 fun14 insightful - 0 fun15 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

social pressure is a big factor yes, especially when you're involved in queer groups where everyone is encouraged to "interrogate" their gender, and gender identity is the focal point of most discussions. it feels weird to be like "yeah i've been interrogating my relationship to gender for a while now!" and then say "i've come to the conclusion i'm just a woman with she/her", especially since i had interests outside of the female gender role, like hating makeup and liking men's sports and not "feeling" like a woman. if it sounds stereotypical reinforcement of gender roles and a social clique, that's because it is.

[–]INeedSomeTimeAsexual Ally 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

This is why I just see my gender as just something biological. I hate the demand it should be also expanding to my mind. No, it doesn't. To me both being transgender and cisgender sound like mental illnesses which make you obsess over non-existent gender identity. Agender is a natural state of a healthy human being.

[–]INeedSomeTimeAsexual Ally 8 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 0 fun9 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I am not surprised even. If you aren't in college then online in certain spaces you are (for me it's fandoms) every second person you see following you or liking your content has pronouns in the bio. If you aren't strong willed or you don't know what's behind all of these pronouns then you'd succumb and follow this trend too. What always protected me was me being in truscum/transmed spaces so I always saw these people as transtrenders not worthy serious consideration. And what protects me now is still the same thing - that it's a trend + ironically being the "boring cis" is actually being unique and strongwilled in the ocean of she/theys and some transmasc weirdos.

[–]wafflegaffWoman. SuperBi. 7 insightful - 1 fun7 insightful - 0 fun8 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

That sounds pretty rampant and weird to experience, thank you for cluing us in. Wish they had the guts to be what they are biologically and who they are as people at the same time.

[–]usehername 17 insightful - 3 fun17 insightful - 2 fun18 insightful - 3 fun -  (0 children)

most of them were ultra feminine or even just average-looking girls

Yeah... sigh

As for what they want? People have different opinions on this. For some, the pronoun they list first is their favorite, but they will accept being called the second. Others do want you to switch between both. I'd say the majority of she/they and he/theys would prefer to be called "they", but know deep down it's ridiculous and don't want to make a huge fuss about people who won't play along.

[–]Three_oneFourWanted for thought crimes in countless ideologies 16 insightful - 1 fun16 insightful - 0 fun17 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

It's like going to the mall for the day with an unlimited budget, you want to try on everything and mix and match different styles to see what crazy and fun combinations you can make. They're literally treating sex and sexualtiy like a game and are just throwing whatever combos feel fun at the moment together. They're not only an insult to everything LGB, but should be an even greater insult to those who actually suffer from gender dysphoria

[–]wafflegaffWoman. SuperBi. 13 insightful - 1 fun13 insightful - 0 fun14 insightful - 1 fun -  (7 children)

Sadly this is a new one on me. I could cynically take a wild guess that "they/them" has suddenly become passé so they're (literally) mixing it up a little (more, again). Striving to be unique is a never-ending fixation.

(who unironically believes that cuffing your jeans is what makes you bisexual)

Well...we aren't kidding when we say that they want to go back to the 1950s.

[–]strawberrysun[S] 11 insightful - 1 fun11 insightful - 0 fun12 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Well...we aren't kidding when we say that they want to go back to the 1950s.

Right!? I feel like stereotyping etc. has gotten much stronger in the past few years.

[–]wafflegaffWoman. SuperBi. 7 insightful - 1 fun7 insightful - 0 fun8 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Given that we've tried to obliterate those, if you are casting about for a way to be unique and special now that you have the freedom to be whatever without worrying about gender role conformity, you'd have to have a way to "other" everyone else again. That means promoting stereotypes. All over again.

Deeply ironic that they elevate themselves, their youth, their supposed wisdom and hipness by going backwards. But that is what they're doing: Dusting off the bullshit from the past to beat people with it again.

[–]LeaveAmsgAfterBeep 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (4 children)

I think its more of a one foot in one foot out fear, fitting in, etc phenomena

[–]wafflegaffWoman. SuperBi. 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

More people who need help, in their own way, "detransitioning."

[–]usehername 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

It's called desisting if they don't medically transition.

[–]wafflegaffWoman. SuperBi. 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Thanks for the reminder, yes. Yesterday I was riding the vaccine wave a bit and forgot.

[–]usehername 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Good for you. Can't wait for mine

[–]Lessom 10 insightful - 2 fun10 insightful - 1 fun11 insightful - 2 fun -  (5 children)

I think it’s ridiculous. I’ve recently seen it happening in the signatures of work emails. Something I used to dismiss and joke about but has become a reality. It’s happened at least twice this year. It was two woman identifying as she/hers and I just rolled my eyes. Well at least, it’s easier to identify annoying attention seekers so I can keep my interactions with them as minimal as possible.

From my understanding, their reasoning behind it so we don’t assume people’s genders because words have no meaning these days. Anyone can be a woman, man or nothing at all based on their feelings at that moment in time.

[–]Femaleisnthateful 9 insightful - 1 fun9 insightful - 0 fun10 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Pronouns in email signatures is becoming a big thing at my workplace. I feel like I'm living in "Invasion of the Body Snatchers". It just kills me every time I see someone I thought was intelligent and based adding pronouns to their signatures. None of these people are trans, of course, so this just serves to enforce 'cisheteronormativity' (spellcheck hates that word as much as I do). I know none of these people understand gender identity ideology. They're just doing it because they think Trans is Gay 2.0, or to tick a box on their performance review (because diversity and inclusion is a big thing now).

[–]Kai_Decadence 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I haven't noticed this at my job yet but I did notice that when I went to see my doctor back in July last year when I caught Covid. The fill out sheet had "Man", "Woman", "They" on it...

[–]wokuspokusWoman in a man’s world, TERF in whatever we call this madness 6 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 0 fun7 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Desperation to be special

[–]latuspodSuper Straight 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Is she/they meaning they would use she/her or they/them? Or specifically she and they in different circumsrances? Seems like that doesn't work in all contexts

[–]chandra 8 insightful - 3 fun8 insightful - 2 fun9 insightful - 3 fun -  (0 children)

If you search it on Twitter you'll see that you are expected to make a conscious effort to switch between them, ideally even within the same sentence. I've seen she/theys bemoaning people for using 'she' all the time because it shows they really think of the person as a woman, or using 'they' all the time because it shows they don't really accept that 'she/they' is a meaningful thing.

Dictating the way people refer to you is one thing when it's one set of pronouns, but expecting strangers to care enough to make the effort to switch it up for you is just crazy, it's pure narcissism.

[–]Taln_Reich 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

It's low effort woke points. Just tack "they" onto your regular pronouns and you can claim all the pro's from being non-binary in woke spaces (attention, being considered woke, everyone tip-toeing around you) without having to endure any difficulties in unwoke spaces (for example no negative reaction from being/being perceived as gender non-conforming, no pronoun problems in unwoke spaces, no discrimination in general in unwoke spaces). Essentially, winning the oppression olympics without having to experience any actual oppression.

[–]INeedSomeTimeAsexual Ally 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

"She/they" feels like that old trend of LARPING as bi while these girls only dated men. So it's the same with them claiming to be non-binary and "she/they" while looking like an average girly girl.

In the past I had so strong "not like the other girls" syndrome that if I looked in the future I'd feel kinda outplayed by these girls lmao. But on the other hand I think that seeing that being "she/they" and non-binary is so popular among girls my go to be like "not like the other girls" would be being just "boring cis" girl hahaha.

[–]TiredTrendersSuper-gay 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

Its they please. Theyyyyyyyyyy. Don't assume my identityyyyy. I'M specshul and I want attentionnnnnnn.

[–]batwoman 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

AKA the new "not like other girls."