Transgender trends and politics in the US

Over 1,000 people were at a trans history exists protest today at Stonewall.

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In the CAS website they started making you pick something for pronouns, but one of the choices is ā€œprefer to not provideā€ or something like that, don’t remember exactly.

I’m curious how many male vs female people pick that option.

So far, both male coworkers have picked he/him. A former female coworker has not provided. I didn’t feel comfortable either and am female. Wondering if that’s a trend or just random data. I am comfortable being referred to as a woman, (but would prefer there are no gender stereotypes in the world at all, and no differentiation in how society treats us). But I would rather my pronouns aren’t a huge part of my identity. Having them on my profile makes it feel like it is, because that’s one of the few things aside from my name there.

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My company added pronouns to the standard corporate email signature, and has ā€œstrongly encouragedā€ us to use them on internal emails.

While that’s something I wouldn’t have initially chosen to add to my signature, the rationale given makes quite a bit of sense to me – by having pronouns be standard in our communications, it doesn’t uncomfortably spotlight those of our colleagues who might wish to use them to avoid misgendering.

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Forms that ask for your gender when it is irrelevant irritate me. And socially, there are many situations where no harm would be done by using gender neutral language and I suspect that over time, society will do so.

Re: pronouns, for most trans people, it is obvious what pronouns they prefer. Of those who fall under the trans umbrella, including pronouns is most helpful for people who are non-binary. But it isn’t just non-binary individuals who are helped by this. Cis people with names that are not clearly gendered or are culturally unfamiliar benefit as well.

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This is like so many things in life. We put something in for the purpose of helping group A and it ends up helping far more people than originally intended.

Tons of inventions for the disabled (ramps, elevators, closed captioning, audiobooks, bendy straws, ā€œsmartā€ home devices) are terribly useful for non-disabled. The ā€œcouchesā€ invented by NASA to keep astronauts comfortable while experiencing multiple Gs also make ordinary drivers in regular cars far more comfortable. The list is endless.

The Education Department is investigating whether five Northern Virginia school districts violated Title IX and one of President Trump’s recent executive orders by allowing transgender students to use their chosen name and pronouns at school and access restrooms and locker rooms that match their gender identity.

https://thehill.com/homenews/lgbtq/5149578-education-department-northern-virginia-schools-transgender-students-trump-executive-order/

Same, and i ended up adding ā€œany pronounsā€, because i feel like @An_actuary , and really don’t want to yell ā€œI’m female!ā€ at the world. But given the politics in the actuarial world around pronouns, i wanted something in my email to indicate that i support people who want to share their pronouns.

And in fact, I’m regularly ā€œsirredā€ over the phone, and have been in person in the winter, when i was bundled up. And I’ve been referred to as ā€œtheyā€ and as ā€œzeā€. And I’m okay with all of those. Really, anything you use in good faith is okay.

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Land of the free!

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Ironically I am watching a Ken Burns on the Statue Of Liberty

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An example of why people think that the NYT sucks:

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Huntington Beach approves a MAGA plaque celebrating the 50th anniversary of their library

Local resident Chris Kluwe expresses his disapproval, and specifically stands up for trans rights. While the video doesn’t say so, I’m pretty sure this is former Vikings punter Kluwe

book burners get a library plaque - how nice

In Ohio - there’s a big uproar at our kids’ local middle school, I guess a teacher (who our son had last year and is very vocally religious, although our experience with her was limited and she was never bigoted towards us or our gender fluid child) misgendered a child. The child’s preferred pronouns are ā€œtheyā€ and the teacher kept telling them they were a ā€œheā€ because they were born a male, and so far the school has…not been handling it great.

I’m hearing all of this third hand, but I guess the teachers had a talk with all the sixth graders (our kid is a seventh grader, so we didn’t get this info from him, rather from another parent) and basically threw the misgendered student under the bus and blamed them for the conflict, rather than the teacher. Our friend’s son, who was in the classroom when it happened, said the student was not being aggressive at all, just asked to be called they, and the teacher referenced some law or bill to support why she was referring to this student with male pronouns.

We are in a suuuuuper liberal area, I can’t see this going well, but I also doubt the law will land on our side, which is so frustrating.

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Law is probably on the teacher’s side here. While they are permitted to use a student’s preferred pronouns (for now, but give Trump time) they cannot be required to do so.

Last month an Ohio teacher was awarded $450,000 following a more or less forced resignation over the issue of the teacher refusing to use the student’s pronouns. The teacher claimed the First Amendment gave her the right to use the pronouns corresponding to the students sex at birth rather than gender identity.

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So, apparently Trump and Maine Governor Mills had words over trans athletes in school sports.

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There’s already an EO that says that they cannot support social transition or use preferred pronouns. Federal law seems to disagree, so some school districts are saying that they will ignore it, and others are quietly doing so.

Hunter Schafer just got her new passport back, it says she’s a dude.

DOJ lawyers have filed a complaint with the chief judge of the DC circuit b/c Judge Reyes embarrassed their attorney for being clueless in court.

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