Wikipedia talk:Editors' pronouns

Mistergendering

I'm guessing the most common form of misgendering is (ironically enough) what might be called mistergendering i.e. assuming the person is male. Perhaps that can be recognized in the essay somehow. EEng 01:16, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I do mention that, at the end of the second paragraph, and allude to it again at the start of § Why does it matter? Perhaps I'll make the second reference explicit rather than implicit, as one point I am trying to hit home here is that trans people didn't invent the concept of wanting to be called a specific pronoun. -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 01:58, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Right, but you don't use the term mistergendering™ which I invented and demand you work in somehow. EEng 03:42, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Missing advice

This essay also needs advice for those who request/demand that others use a specific pronoun to refer to them. Namely:

• Not everyone will notice that you want to be referred to by a specific pronoun.
• You have a choice about what you want to be offended about, and you need to decide if it's worth being offended about a pronoun, even if well intentioned. We are here to build an encyclopedia. One's personal identity should not be a factor.
• In a medium of written communication which lacks visual cues from body language, it is easy to misinterpret the intent of others. A thicker skin is required to interact smoothly with others.

As it stands now, the essay is pretty one sided. Not only to cisgender people need to know how to interact with transgender people, but transgender people should also assume good faith and not be quick to take offense. I find this to be an unnecessary distraction from the goals of this project. ~Anachronist (talk) 01:54, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I say at least twice in this that transgender people should assume good faith. I'll go into a bit more detail on never assuming that someone noticed your pronouns, though.

I have to say, though, Anachronist, it saddens me to see you take this attitude of "We have better things to do." As I said at Guy's talk, I'm not sure what's more important to the encyclopedia than making sure people feel comfortable editing it. -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 02:07, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I've added a section on the topic. -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 02:38, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Thank you. I like what you added.

You have every right to feel saddened, just like I have every right to feel that my own personal attributes are my own private business and have no place in this project. Speaking for myself, I am extremely uncomfortable, and I feel unwelcome, among users who make a point of broadcasting their religion, sexual preferences, and so on. It strikes me as a form of exhibitionism. There is perhaps an appropriate venue for exhibitionists, but I believe Wikipedia isn't that venue. And I am offended when someone distracts from the goals of this project to make an issue out of it. Yes, we do indeed have better things to do. That does not mean we have a license to be insensitive, but it does mean that those who are easily offended should perhaps take the advice you have already given in this essay about whether to be editing Wikipedia. ~Anachronist (talk) 02:44, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

(Came out a bit ramble-ier than intended. Sorry.)

You'd be surprised how much I agree with you on the general point there. I make a point of saying very little on my userpage about non-Wikipedia things. And that's not because I'm a particularly private person, but because I don't think a userpage is the place for that. I try to approach Wikipedia with roughly the same demeanor as with which I'd approach an office job (in an office that has lots of pornographic images and often has to repel invaders, I guess).

But I don't think saying, "Please refer to me as 'they'" is an instance of any of oversharing or of off-topic discussion. Contrariwise, it's a basic aspect of communication in English. That's why I lead with it on my userpage, so people know how to refer to me. And I don't think that being upset when people go against that is excessive think-skinnedness. While I'm trying to keep this comment mostly logic-bound, here I must get a little personal: There's a common misconception that the worst thing you can call a trans woman is "tranny." That's not true. The worst thing you can call a trans woman is "sir".

So, if someone were to deliberately misgender me (which thankfully has not happened to date on Wikipedia, although one troll did call my pronouns "disruptive"), that is from my perspective as much a personal attack as a slur is. I think you'll find basically all transgender and nonbinary people feel that way. And if that's too thin-skinned, then you'll have to write an encyclopedia without any trans or nonbinary people... or without a good number of cis women, I imagine, per EEng's point about above about assumed male-ness.

I understand having an issue with assuming intentionality without good cause. If you find someone doing that, call them out. Ping me and I'll come call them out (genuinely). A while ago I was in a discussion where a fairly well-respected editor made a comment that confused me. The most literal reading of it would have boiled down to "We should warn readers that non-binary identities aren't real". But assuming good faith means going beyond your first gloss. So I asked that user what they meant and... Well, actually, never got an answer. So who knows, maybe they did mean that, but I'll continue to assume they didn't. If someone approaches things otherwise, it's entirely fair to call them out. -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 03:20, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't disagree with any of that except for the position that politely requesting "please refer to me as 'they'" isn't oversharing. For me, that edges over the line into oversharing. It's harmless but distracting. I'll try to comply if I am asked, though. I'm fully aware of the flaws of human communication and I have no desire to throw sand into machinery that doesn't work too well in the first place. ~Anachronist (talk) 03:44, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

@Anachronist: On the one hand, I think we're decently-situated here to agree to disagree, so I understand if you don't see a need to reply to this, but, I have to ask, what about stating one's pronouns, compared to any other description of oneself, makes it oversharing? For comparison, you describe your line of work on your userpage. That has less relevance to the average conversation than someone's pronouns do, since it doesn't change how I'm going to address you or refer to you. (English doesn't mark for line of work, after all.) And many/most people would consider their gender a more important thing to know about them than their line of work. So why are pronouns oversharing and distracting? -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 16:21, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

I don't mind answering. Whatever personal information I divulge on my user page (which I wrote 17 years ago and I haven't bothered changing it since then), I did so to indicate content areas I was expecting to be editing (or possible conflicts of interest). So in that sense, what I share is (or was) relevant to this project. Once you put something on the internet, it's there forever, so I never bothered changing it.

Most important, nobody needs to know any of it to interact with me. I deliberately don't share the fact that I am an administrator because that's irrelevant for editor-to-editor interactions (a user page is a poor place to check for admin status anyway). The same is true for my gender, spiritual views, and sexual preferences — all irrelevant.

On the other hand, stating that I prefer to be referred to by a particular pronoun is something else entirely, tantamount to placing a burden on others to interact with me in a specific way. That crosses a line for me. In that sense, it's oversharing. One of my user boxes says I'm a "precisionist". As such, I extend the usual content-based definition to behavioral policies and guidelines also, in that I believe our policies and guidelines alone should be sufficient to govern how we interact with one another. If they aren't sufficient then they should be corrected. Nobody should be burdened by conflicting demands from individuals about how we should interact. If it were up to me, I'd want our guidelines to recommend dropping all pronouns entirely, and we just make third-person references to editors by their user names, which is ironically the very thing that got Guy blocked. ~Anachronist (talk) 19:28, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Why is the (minimal) burden on you to use the correct pronouns considered intolerable, but the burden on people who get misgendered considered something they should just get over? The ability to consider your identity "irrelevant" to any interactions you have is a function of social privilege that not everyone shares. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 20:15, 30 June 2021 (UTC)

Anachronist, if you are a cisgender male, you probably have little experience with being regularly misgendered on Wikipedia or more generally online. I cannot tell you how many times someone from a culture where the username "valereee" isn't a clear indicator of gender refers to me as he or even "sir" -- clearly trying to be ultra-respectful and polite in the customs of their own culture. They just assume everyone on wikipedia, and especially anyone who is an admin, is male. I usually try to let it go, but it does get a bit old even for me. I don't have the experience to be able to know what it would feel like if it were happening intentionally, but people who do have that experience tell me it is often deeply upsetting, and not just because it's rude but also because IRL it can signal actual physical danger. When someone reasonable who has more experience than I have in a situation tells me something about that situation, my default setting is to believe them. —valereee (talk) 17:48, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

So you're tired of being mistergendered. EEng 19:41, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

You are just determined to get that word into this essay. —valereee (talk) 19:48, 1 July 2021 (UTC)

You have to admit it's delish. How often do the gods of humor offer up such an opportunity? EEng 22:34, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

In case you need to do any more stipulating.

-EEng

Stipulated. —valereee (talk) 23:11, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

@Valereee: Until more recently when I included more of my name on my user page, and also under my previous username Amatulic, I was misgendered fairly regularly by well-meaning editors who weren't sure how to refer to me. Sure, that's probably "little experience" as you say. But I didn't care. It isn't upsetting to me.

Real names aren't a problem; in my day job we contend with that every day with remote contract employees around the world. When in doubt, say for Chinese or Indian names, a Google image search for the name often resolves the uncertainty quickly.

Made-up usernames, or gender-neutral real names, are different. When a username clearly indicates a gender, I'll use that gender I glean from it and expect to be politely corrected if I got it wrong. Your name, however, is ambiguous to me. I know that Valere is typically a male name, Valerie is typically a female name, but Valereee seems phonetically close to Valerie.... but it could also be Valere-ee (electrical engineer Valere?) so I wouldn't presume to use a pronoun when referring to you in the third person, I would just refer to your username. If unavoidable I'd use "they" although as a former copy-editor that rankles me grammatically.

My point earlier was that our policies and guidelines should cover this in a consistent way, without having to attend to numerous personal instructions about editor interactions. That is a burden, "minimal" as you may consider it to be. Having a consistent guideline to make third person references to a username when in doubt of the pronoun wouldn't please everybody but could be accepted by everybody. ~Anachronist (talk) 16:34, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

• I'm genuinely confused. All my life I've been told that we shouldn't worry about a person's gender, rather should look past it, judge people on their merits, be gender-blind where at all possible. So here we are on the goddam internet, where there's literally no way to even know someone's gender unless they go out of their way to tell you, and suddenly everything's gone 180 degrees and were supposed to be keeping track which of the 23 genders someone is, address them in special ways based on that, and so on. What in the world is gained by all this? Singular they. That's it. EEng 21:00, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

  That's what I use, pretty much any time the person doesn't have a preference enabled, and often even then. Ten years ago it felt very awkward and weird. Not so much any more. —valereee (talk) 23:33, 4 July 2021 (UTC)

  But you (and everyone else) are still not answering my question. Why am I supposed to spend my time checking someone's preference? Why am I being forced to acknowledge someone's gender? Why shouldn't I just ignore genders, they way I've been taught to do for decades? EEng 04:35, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

  @EEng: As the essay notes several times, consistently avoiding gendered pronouns with all editors is not misgendering, or at least, to my knowledge, has never been interpreted as such by the community. Personally, I default to they/them unless Popups or Userinfo tells me the person has selected he/him or she/her pronouns in their preferences, or unless I happen to know the person's pronouns from some past interaction. If I didn't use those scripts, I would probably just they/them everyone. -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 05:29, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

But why are editors going out of their way to advertise their gender, and why is special apparatus provided to communicate genders to other editors, when a shitload of trouble would be saved by just ignoring the issue? (This isn't directed at you personally, just a rhetorical cry in the dark.) And don't forget, we had a case in which it was claimed that they was offensive because (it was said) the subject wanted to be called by tree (he didn't actually, of course), and another in which the same claim was made because the subject had apparently said they the subject didn't want any pronoun at all used. So singular they isn't a safe harbor after all, apparently. EEng 11:34, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

@EEng: Well, I list my pronouns because many people do use something other than across-the-board they/them, and I want them to know what to use. If Wikipedia had a policy that everyone shall refer to everyone else with they/them pronouns, I wouldn't list them. But as long as some people are going to decide whether to call me he, she, they, or something else, I want them to call me the right thing, because the alternative is frustrating (if done innocently) or upsetting (if done intentionally). If you don't understand why it's upsetting, I can give you the whole schpiel of what it's like having society try to force you into a gender role that isn't yours.

It's worth noting that the WMF didn't add this feature just as part of the wave of sites supporting pronoun options. It's existed for over a decade because MediaWiki is internationalized to deal with languages with much stronger grammatical gender than English has, where "ignoring the issue" isn't really an option. I recently learned that you can actually set different gender flags on different sites, which is nice for me, since I go by a feminine grammatical gender in languages where one has to choose a binary option. So if you take a look at fr:Utilisatrice:Tamzin/Brouillon, you'll see that the software calls me a utilisatrice, not utilisateur like it does for you, and that the userbox there refers to me as an éditrice, not an éditeur like it would for you. Without that software feature, both the interface and that userbox, as well as anyone referring to me using a gender-based template, would imply not just that I'm of unspecified gender, but specifically that I'm male.

As to these edge cases, I would say use common sense. If someone really doesn't want to be referred to as any pronoun at all, they can communicate that politely, and you can do your best to remember it. Believe it or not, that's common enough in trans spaces. Some people will have a default they/them policy even face-to-face, and certain others will politely say, "Actually if you could please only ever call me he", and everyone carries happily along. I don't think pronouns are special in this regard. When people have requests about how to be referred to, it's courteous to honor those requests. I call myself a Jew, and by default call any other Jew a Jew, but if I call someone a Jew and they say, "Actually, I prefer only to be called a Jewish person", then fine, I call them a Jewish person. It's much the same with pronouns. -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 12:06, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

I wish I'd been born in 1890. EEng 13:14, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

I mean, I don't know that spanish flu was much better than coronavirus... Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 13:36, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

@EEng and Anachronist: I don't really see how any of these concerns are relevant. The core contention of this essay—which itself just reflects the status quo of what admins will and won't sanction users for, rather than being an attempt to make policy—is that it is incivil to intentionally misgender someone. That's it. How does this encumber any good-faith discussion? If you don't want to keep track of people's pronouns, don't use gendered pronouns. If you do want to use gendered pronouns, then make a good-faith effort to make sure you're using the right ones. How does that inconvenience anyone? And how is it any different than the norms that have existed in English for centuries about gendering people? -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 10:36, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

Your analysis ignores the fact that, right here on WP and with perfect seriousness, editors were harangued to tree as a pronoun in one case, or to studiedly use no pronoun at all in another, and were told that to use they in those cases was offensive and that somehow everyone's supposed to keep track of such stuff. EEng 12:03, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

I'm familiar with the first case, and find it's not a great test case because of the wrinkle that the subject wasn't serious about the pronoun. But I'm not familiar with the latter example. Could you link me to it? -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 12:26, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

I'm wondering this, too, as I've basically just gone to they/them unless the person has a preference selected. Or even if I'm just feeling too lazy to hover over their user name and see if they've got a preference selected. They/them seems like a great solution all around. —valereee (talk) 19:37, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

See Talk:Sophie_(musician)/Archive_1#Pronouns. (Best comment in that thread: Looking forward to the person who gets you all to scramble to never use any nouns or verbs or the letter 'e' when talking about them, or whatever the next thing will be.)

As a friend observes, depending on whose turn it is to browbeat you, not using tree might be forbidden, Xe and Xir might be forbidden, using no pronouns at all might be forbidden, or they might be forbidden. (For that last, see [1].) EEng 19:56, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

So we're going to use RGloucester to take the temperature of the average reasonable editor? If someone doesn't want me to use they, and won't tell me what pronoun is preferred, I'm assuming she. It's only fair. —valereee (talk) 21:16, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

Please, please do that. Ol' RG would really pop a gasket then. EEng 22:32, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

It does sound amusing. If I ever actually do it, I'm probably drunk. —valereee (talk) 23:19, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

Huh. I'm a Utilisateur on fr.wiki and a Usario on es.wiki, and I can't seem to make it change, although I've just set "she edits" in my global preferences. It's making me feel mildly uncomfortable lol...maybe it needs a bot to go by. —valereee (talk) 13:45, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

@EEng:​ I don't see anyone browbeating anyone in that thread. The only hostility in the thread seems to come from people objecting to the consensus against using pronouns, for instance you referring to Sophie's lack of pronouns as "absurd" and "stupid". Despite that, I don't see a single person there saying, "How dare you say that, EEng?" The most snippety back-and-forth there is about sourcing and the wording of GENDERID, not about anyone calling anyone else a bigot.

Since you're someone known to speak frankly, EEng, I'll speak frankly to you: I think you're so caught up in this "treegate" persecution complex that you've lost touch with the reality of how society interacts around trans/nonbinary people's pronouns. There are no raving mobs of trans-PC-police trying to ban anyone for accidentally slipping up and saying "he", or for not magically guessing that the user with no gender flag set takes xe/xem pronouns rather than they/them. You continue to make jokes about this whole tree thing—despite that being a pronoun that some people, albeit not the original subject of the dispute, do take—without issue. That would seem to go against your narrative of sensitive snowflakes lying in wait to cancel you.

There are, however, literal raving mobs who target the kinds of people who take these pronouns. Misgendering is a serious concern for a significant percentage of our editorship, one rooted in an association with real-world violence. I don't know if you realize how much you're trivializing that with this parade of horribles. You are saying that the theoretical censure you face from some hypothetical hyper-sensitive trans person is more important than trans and nobinary editors' right (and, for that matter, the right of any cis people who are particularly sensitive to misgendering) to edit here without deliberate harassment.

Finally, if RGloucester dares to "give the what for" to someone for taking the software's word for it as to his pronouns, without politely correcting them first, ping me and I'll come give him a piece of my mind. Same goes for anyone who fails to assume good faith about a first-offense misgendering. /gen -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 20:36, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

Or mistergendering, I assume. I should have made it clear that RG gets his bowels in an uproar about just about everything that's happened since the 18th century, so the fact that he's upset about singular they really means nothing; I just thought I'd use him to round out the circular firing squad of conflicting pronoun demands.

I appreciate your speaking frankly, but you misunderstand me. I'm not in the slightest upset about being blocked, and I don't feel persecuted. I don't know what parade of horribles you think I've, um, paraded, but I will not hesitate to vigorously object to the trivialization, on WP, of a real and serious social issue by wokescolds demanding we employ "pronouns" such as tree and bunny. People are neither objects nor animals, treeness and bunniness are not genders, and tree and bunny are not pronouns (not even in reference to trees and bunnies, for that matter). EEng 03:53, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

You do understand, though, that there are regular run-of-the-mill nonbinary people—not "wokescolds"—who take "nounself" pronouns, right? I know a few. -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 05:49, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

Yes, but in general they're not here at WP demanding articles employ them. EEng 10:48, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

At this point I think we're rather far removed from this essay's topic: the civil way to refer to fellow editors. -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 12:38, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

But it's been a fun and enlightening ride. EEng 17:07, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

Wow, nounself pronouns is a new one on me. I had to go look it up, and we don't even have a redirect for it. Honestly if someone who uses nounself pronouns -- or any pronouns which can change over time and/or have conjugations to learn -- gives someone a hard time for calling them they, they're just being difficult. :D It sounds like most folks are using them basically for their own amusement and that of other nonbinary people, though? Also otherkin is an interesting concept. —valereee (talk) 11:58, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

I'd stop short of saying it's just for amusement, but the level of seriousness definitely varies. I don't know anyone who in their most outward-facing persona exclusively takes nounself pronouns. In fact, despite having dozens of nonbinary friends, I think I only know one person who in hir day-to-day life is not okay with one of the "big three" sets of pronouns. Nounself pronouns, much like otherkin-ness, are much more common in explicitly neurodivergent circles than elsewhere—often as an expression of "This world makes no sense to me, so I see no need to make sense to it"—and that doesn't jibe very well with Wikipedia's dynamic (despite the large neurodivergent presence here).

I'm active in communities that would look completely alien to most Wikipedians, communities where people trigger-warning things you likely wouldn't consider even mildly upsetting, communities where calling someone a "person" can be taken as presumptuous. And I know from various off-wiki conversations that I'm not the only Wikipedian with that sort of background. We all just code-switch as needed. I affect a radically different persona on-wiki than I do in private, because that's what fits in here, and because throwing a bunch of alien cultural norms at people wouldn't be conducive to building an encyclopedia. Instead I draw a line around the bare minimum I need recognized, the one thing that it would feel like lying, rather than code-switching, to omit: my gender. Or, actually, a very simplified form of it. I could write a few thousand words on my userpage about when I feel like a she versus a they versus occasionally a xe versus, on very rare occasions, a—gasp!—he... But people don't really need to understand all that (although anyone's free to inquire by e-mail if they're curious). People just need to know the two sets of pronouns I'm uniformly okay with. -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 12:38, 9 July 2021 (UTC)

It's more than my job's worth

Right now the essay says

For a much milder example, but of a similar nature, imagine getting a promotion at work, but then someone insisting on referring to you by your previous title—except that in this alternate reality, your job is a deeply important part of your identity that you've worked your whole life to assert, and people who are perceived as having the wrong job are often targeted for violent crimes.

However, as it turns out the UCoC lists [2] "career field" along with "caste, social class, language fluency, sexual orientation, gender identity, sex", and so on. So shame on you for trivializing career field–based oppression. EEng 11:23, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

As editors, we should be blind to all of those things. They don't matter for our work on Wikipedia. I cannot be expected to look at the user page of everyone I interact with. I should not have to keep track of who prefers which of a dozen or so pronouns, or who is female or male, or who is a grade-school kid or an adult (and I've encountered childish adults and mature middle schoolers here). I fail to understand why some editors feel they need to make a point about deeply personal aspects of themselves that are irrelevant to the Wikipedia project. My gender, career choices, sexual orientation, religion, and whatnot are attributes I can choose to share if I want to, but I would never try to make a point of it or burden anyone with an expectation that they treat me a certain way because of any attribute of myself that I choose to disclose. They don't matter. ~Anachronist (talk) 17:23, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

I have little doubt you knew I was joking. I think your comment might have more impact at the end of the section just one up from here, where you'll see I totally agree with you. EEng 22:36, 7 July 2021 (UTC)

@Anachronist, I don't object to you being blind to such things. If you're blind to them, you'll just use they/them. Using he/him for everyone is not being blind to a person's gender. It's making assumptions about it. —valereee (talk) 19:40, 8 July 2021 (UTC)

No, I tend not to use they/them. I would use the username. Which is what Guy got blocked for. And which is what prompted the creation of this essay. ~Anachronist (talk) 18:57, 10 July 2021 (UTC)

@Anachronist, so you regularly and consistently just repeat the username of anyone you aren't absolutely sure goes by he/she when you refer to them? That sounds so bizarre. There are so many editors here that you haven't enabled user preferences to indicate gender. Don't you get comments on how bizarre you sound nearly daily? I am going to have to pay attention to how you interact with people and see how it looks lol... I really just can't imagine writing that awkwardly. Anachronist thinks people should just avoid pronouns, so Anachronist writes using usernames only, because Anachronist thinks Anachronist's gender is no one's business but Anachronist's. Hahahahaha...omg. I am cracking myself up. Is that actually how you write? —valereee (talk) 14:16, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

Generally I rarely need to refer to anyone in third-person, I talk to a person directly, as I am doing now with you (second person). In my previous comment I referred to Guy as a username, no need for a pronoun. If I didn't know Guy's gender and needed to use a pronoun I simply use Guy. Do I get comments about how bizarre it sounds? No, not until you just made such a comment. ~Anachronist (talk) 14:45, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

Also, to be clear: No, I tend not to use they/them. I would use the username. Which is what Guy got blocked for. No, that's not what he got blocked for. Guy was talking directly to Fae, and pointedly replaced second-person pronouns--not third-person pronouns like "they"--with Fae's username: Fæ, please explain in Fæ's own words your understanding as to why Fæ was blocked. (src). That was not a case of Guy accidentally forgetting someone's pronouns, not a case of Guy avoiding someone's choice of pronouns that he finds distasteful, and not a case of Guy not knowing what someone means when they ask to be referred to with the singular "they"--Guy knows exactly how the singular "they" works. If y'all want to extend AGF to Guy that he genuinely wanted to avoid offending Fae, that's your prerogative. But you cannot claim it as an example of someone getting blocked for not using singular "they", because that's not what happened. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 16:02, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

@Writ Keeper, as a one-off, given the (please don't make me go find the diff, I don't even remember where the discussion was) thank-you Guy gave to (Tamzin?) for explaining what the problem was because no one had explained it before, I do actually find it believable that he was trying to avoid rather than cause offense. Now that it's been explained, I wouldn't believe it again, but once? Yeah. —valereee (talk) 16:53, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

@Anachronist, if you needed to refer to someone in the third person -- no other choice, no way to recast the sentence -- and you didn't know their preferred pronouns, would you default to he? —valereee (talk) 17:00, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

No. I have used "s/he" on occasion (and also "he or she"), but usually I contrive a way to avoid it. The singular "they" is grammatically ugly and I don't write that way. ~Anachronist (talk) 22:20, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

Like I said, that's fine; I don't personally buy it, but I'm not contesting it. As I said in my original comment on Guy's block, if people like you and Rtiche say this was in good faith, I'll trust your judgment, even if I don't agree with it. The block is lifted and I'm not interested in getting it reinstated, the situation I am ultimately concerned with was dealt with neatly by an interaction ban, and I'm certainly not pressing for any other sanctions or anything like that.

But I think it should be absolutely clear that, even if Guy did it completely innocently and with the best of intentions, what he did was not just avoiding singular "they"; it went well beyond that. Using it as a basis for "using usernames instead of singular 'they' will get you blocked" is, at best, incorrect, because that's not what Guy actually did. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 17:03, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

nutshell

@Tamzin, to me it feels like the biggest takeaway for the average editor is: if you want to stay out of trouble and avoid conflict, just use they for everyone unless you're absolutely certain what pronouns they use. If that's actually inaccurate, let's fix it, but that's what a nutshell is supposed to be: for those who don't want to read the essay but want to benefit from its advice. What you've replaced the takeaway with is the reasoning behind it. A sort of mini-essay. It tells them what the essay is about, but it doesn't give them the takeaway. It makes them still read the essay if they want to find out how to put that reasoning into action.

Nutshells are for lazy people, the ones who are going to click here, look at the length, and think 'hell, no. TLDR. One sentence, please?' The ones who are curious to understand why the nutshell is true and the reasoning behind it will read the essay. With the nutshell we're trying to capture those who won't bother to read the essay.

I apologize that what I'm saying is probably somewhere between depressing and infuriating. —valereee (talk) 14:09, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

@Valereee: Better? I just want to avoid the implication that the essay's primary point is "just say they", when it isn't. There may be an essay to write on that topic, but this essay's primary point is to get people's pronouns right, with "Or you can just always say they" being an alternative option. -- Tamzin (she/they) | o toki tawa mi. 23:13, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

@Valereee and Tamzin: I quite liked the previous one, actually. It was short, to the point, and covered the important points of the essay: (a) respect other people's pronouns; (b) when in doubt use non-gendered pronouns ("they"); and (c) both sides should always assume good faith. The shorter a TLDR is the better, but sometimes it might be best to elongate it a bit, to cover all the important parts. Isabelle ^🔔 23:30, 11 July 2021 (UTC)

I think the current version works just fine. I'm sorry that I'm arguing for the primary point is just say they. I do actually understand that it isn't, even though that's what I argued before. I understand there's much more, and that you understand this much better than I. —valereee (talk) 01:15, 12 July 2021 (UTC)

"They" as misgendering

Speaking as a cis person almost never misgendered himself, I've seen commentary that "they" can be misgendering too, usually when someone is polite enough to refrain from using outright incorrect pronouns for trans people but still unwilling to use the right ones. Maybe this is less of a concern here, but still may be worth noting in the essay, especially to avoid the idea that this is "just call everyone 'they'". (I saw that concern above; I didn't get that impression myself reading it.) --BDD (talk) 14:06, 3 August 2021 (UTC)

My own view is that I rather someone refer to me as my username, or as an actual gender even if it's wrong (she-he or s/he would be OK), and not refer to me as "they". I really dislike that recommendation in this essay. Everyone has peeves. Using a plural pronoun in a singular context is one of mine. My objection has nothing to do with gender, it's all about proper grammar. ~Anachronist (talk) 15:36, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

The goal of this essay was to describe existing practice more than to establish any new one. "They" is, at this point, the most common gender-neutral singular pronoun in English. It also happens to be a plural pronoun. If some other pronoun had become the most common gender-neutral singular pronoun—personally I was rooting for xe/xem or e/em—the essay would recommend that instead. (And, while it's not in the nutshell, the body of the essay does make an allowance for the minority of editors who use some other gender-neutral pronoun by default.) Regardless, the essay further says that if someone specifically requests something that goes contrary to someone's across-the-board approach, one should respect that. For instance, I default to they/them for anyone who doesn't have a gender marked in their preferences, but I'll make a note in the future to refer to you as he or she, based on your above comment. If I forget, well, all I'll ask is the same AGF I recommend in this essay. :) -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she/they) 15:50, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

@BDD: If you want to add something along the lines of ... can I use she/her for cis people and they/them for trans people? to § But..., I have no objection. Personally I'm trying to keep this from getting too long, but there's always ways to cut down if that happens. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she/they) 15:50, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

For now, I think what's in the best practices section covers this (i.e., "if someone does (politely!) request that you make an exception from your policy and always refer to them by a specific pronoun, you should still make a good-faith effort to do so."). --BDD (talk) 17:28, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

Regarding my edits

CC @Tamzin and @Anachronist

The main goal of my edits was to:

1. Make the essay more general, as not only trans people can use different pronouns as detailed in the essay
2. Make the essay more clear and less
3. Show the effects misgendering can have and make it less threatening (i.e. misgendering is not in and of itself a "blockable offence")

I would make a detailed discussion, but I don't think this is needed here, so I'd prefer to bullet point each change

• Assuming that predominately cisgender people wouldn't care about pronouns is a very narrow point of view, some people, and I even know a few, might just prefer any pronouns or just not care in general, whether they are cis or not.
• I agree with this diff and admit I could've worded this better, but I didn't want to modify the essay too much.
• "almost all cisgender people request a pronoun, or expect to be called by what they see as the correct ones" - I could've worded this better. I meant as in how many cis people default to accepting their pronouns are "he/him" or "she/her" without thinking much about it or specifically requesting/specifying them
• "such as calling someone a he the person had specifically requested to be called a she" - changed this to "the person" as I saw it as more readable and less confusing. That could be just me though.
• why does this matter section - it felt very "you're a cis man and that's bad and I'm not surprised you don't understand" which can feel a bit patronising, and we can't assume in general that cis people haven't been misgendered. Yes, it's unlikely, but I don't think its worth saying. If you care, you care, if you don't, you don't, cis or not.
• And most importantly, pronouns do not always equal gender. Parts of this need to be reworded to reflect that, and is the reason why I expanded part to say "Some people don't feel strong attachments to their gender or pronouns."

I still think this essay needs improvements in quite a few regards, predominately focusing on making it less "don't misgender somebody, or else!" and more, "this is why misgendering is bad, how it can harm some editors, and why using the correct pronouns and not maliciously misgendering somebody is a crucial part of civility in Wikipedia's diverse community". This essay is missing a lot of evidence on how it can actually hurt somebody and be disrespectful, and why it is uncivil, and we should work together to iron out some of the creases. Honestly, I think this essay is extremely important in the role of explaining requested pronouns and why they are important to many people as more and more people use different pronouns, and as more and more people start editing Wikipedia the more and more prevalent this essay will become for many editors. ✨ Ed talk! ✨ 23:55, 7 September 2021 (UTC)

But... I simply forget and keep using the wrong pronoun

My sister's partner is a they, but I did just type boyfriend before I deleted it again to correct myself. Every time I talk about them I say he, and I just don't notice it, until I do. I happen to get lucky and almost never need to mention them in third person when they are around. But I still constantly use he instead of they >90% of the time when I do still need to speak in third person. My mind just can't get over it, I just always have he or him pop up when I am building the sentences in my head. It's hard to explain, it just happens automatically. I need to focus on it to simply not make mistakes, which make me think about their gender the whole time instead of whatever the conversation was actually about. It really does just makes it awkward for me to talk, even though I think they are a really fun person to talk to. I also find it incredibly hard to use they in a context where they could also be referring to multiple people, it even confuses me when I'm the one typing/speaking. To my grammatical brain they is kind of the opposite of me or us. I could describe it as "depersonalised", something you use when talking abou someone else. I very much do use it for singular use, but generally for the utmost unpersonal uses, this means I use singular they even in cases where I know the subject's gender. It just has a different grammatical meaning to me than he or her, despite also being a singular third person pronoun, and I can't get over it. It would be nice if we discuss this, and you add it to the but... section after we do. DiddyDante (talk) 01:29, 27 May 2022 (UTC)

What is mainspace here?

And I see sort-of citations in other parts of the article such as “ [3] It is possible to be cisgender but still not take the pronouns associated with your gender; it's just uncommon.”, I’m wondering if something like that can be included with further reasoning, maybe no source, on the bit my latest edit covered Justanotherguy54 (talk) 19:37, 22 February 2023 (UTC)

Rewrite

Pinging Tamzin, theleekycauldron, Roundish: I rewrote/heavily edited this essay.

User:Cessaune/LGBTQ+/EDPRONOUNS

I list my issues with the current version there. I genuinely believe my version is better than the current one. Can y'all take a took? Feedback would be greatly appreciated. Cessaune [talk] 04:10, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

Anachronist, sorry, I meant to ping you initially. Cessaune [talk] 04:12, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

It's fine. It doesn't address my concerns I elaborated above, but no revision would. ~Anachronist (talk) 06:29, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

I agree with #1, the essay still feels like it belongs in Tamzin's userspace.

#4, I do not agree. Unless someone is deliberately being transphobic/sexist and gets it wrong in a discussion despite being corrected in that very discussion, not a severe issue. A pattern of misgendering openly trans editors may be dealt with accordingly, but once a year is not a problem. Also, we can't force people to not use generic he.

I disagree with #5, and your prefered lede is rather short. Length isn't really an issue here, and everything else needs to be dealt with before squabbling about bytes. The essay could be trimmed a little, but not a main focus.

Yes to #6 and #9. I would like to bring up Tamzin's edit summary here:

The essay makes a deliberate effort to be *painfully* detailed about all nuances of pronouns.

I don't see the point of adding every exception (i.e. It is possible to be cisgender but still not take the pronouns associated with your gender) in an essay primarily about good conduct, and regardless of the history of the essay explaining to an editor about prefered pronouns shouldn't require such a thorough dive into something that is entirely unrelated to Wikipedia.

I agree with #10 and the essay should be more neutral in regards to this. Could possibly be tied into #6 and #9 issues? This is pretty much what I want for much of the essay. (Roundish ⋆t) 00:56, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

For #4, I still included use common sense and the 'twice a year' example. For #5, I get that that's really a non-issue. My lead is short because it doesn't need to be long. I can make it longer if necessary.

Generic he is a bit more controversial. I honestly don't know what to do when it comes to that. Should editors be allowed to use generic he? I mean, it's a valid, standardized pronoun formulation of the English language (alongside generic they), so probably. Generic they is much less likely to irk anyone, though. I don't know. Honestly, if the same people who don't like they/them as a standardized gender-neutral pronoun didn't try to eat their cake and have it by also disagreeing with some new formulation (xe/xim for example) as a standardized gender-neutral pronoun, we could do away with generic he and controversial singular they. Cessaune [talk] 01:18, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

It sounds like y'all want this to be written like a guideline. It isn't a guideline; it's an essay. It "contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors". It is not formal; it is not neutral; it is not meant to be a succinct statement of consensus that someone can point to and say "that's the rule". You're welcome, Cessaune, to disagree that it's dog-whistling to deliberately refer to someone only by their name (while not doing so for people who take binary pronouns). That is not, however, the opinion of this essay, nor this essayist, nor the many people who have thanked me for writing this essay or cited it in subsequent discussions (including the person to whom it was originally more-or-less addressed, who had not understood that doing that would be taken as dog-whistling). If you want to write an essay that says "Don't misgender people, but avoiding specific people's pronouns is fine, but also occasionally accidentally misgendering people isn't fine," then you can write that essay, but it would be a different essay.

Now, in terms of what is in keeping with the sentiment behind this essay, I like the simplified "Furthermore..." paragraph of § "Why does it matter?" I disagree with basically every other removal, though. You're taking a persuasive essay and removing almost all of the persuasion. If this were a guideline, it wouldn't need to have examples, make analogies, etc., because it could just say "This is consensus and you must respect it". But the point of this essay is to argue a specific position, primarily addressed to those who do not already hold that position. It will not succeed at that if it's simply bossing people around. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 01:26, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

I came here after you left this comment at ANI: Shameless plug for WP:EDPRONOUNS, featuring guidance on general pronoun practices, finding a specific editor's pronouns, and how to handle mistakes regarding pronouns. I was unaware of ths essay beforehand. If the essay stays in its current state, then, frankly speaking, it isn't applicable in most contexts.

I will defend all of my substantial removals.

1. Most speakers of English request to be referred... and she/her for women. Uneccessary context: why does it matter that it is perceived as a phonomenon unique to transgender/nonbinary people? Why is this an important point to make? Also, on the requested pronouns versus preferred pronouns front, preferred pronouns and requested pronouns mean the same thing. Connotation and all that, yes, but realistically, it would be really rare for anyone to actually deeply care about the distinction; it's possible, of course.
2. In many professional circles, intentionally... before these norms became commonplace. Unnecessary example. Sure, this is true, but why is it important?
3. If you really wouldn't care, that's valid... many people do care about, strongly. I reworded it to be more concise and cleaner.
4. and in some cases, can be a harbinger... often targeted for violent crimes. Unnecesary example. And, when you think about it, the analogy doesn't perfectly line up. I cut it out and left a sentence that I thought was pretty representative of the general sentiment.
5. Most men (cisgender and transgender)... for others, there may be equal preference. Unnecesary context. Sure, this is true, but what is the point you're trying to make by including this? More importantly, why does this matter?
6. You are not under any obligation to figure out people's pronouns. Your obligation, rather, is to not use the wrong pronouns. Hmm. Fair, but I don't think it's strictly necessary.
7. as it is likely to be taken... consider editors who take other pronouns. This is an example of the persuasion you speak of. I don't really think it does a good job of persuading the reader. The initial point it makes has already been made above. And the second point it makes is addressed below, in the ... can I make an exception for the weird ones like xe? subsection.
8. Pronouns aren't special in this regard... finds the term "girl" infantilizing. Okay, but this point is made constantly throughout the article, and does not need to be repeated.
9. This is, in effect, no better... refusal to gender the person correctly. Is it really always dog-whistling? I think many people avoid pronouns all together due to an aversion to singular they, generic he, and new pronouns like ze/hir. I would contend that a lot of people who attempt to do so are trying to be gender-neutral, and are not trying to 'secretly' refuse to gender the person correctly. I would also contend that a lot of people do it explicitly to dog-whistle, but my point still stands: it isn't always dog-whistling, so the essay shouldn't act like it is.
10. And is it really worth the effort when all you have to do is use the word someone asked you to use? Removed because this is the entire point of the essay, and does not need to be stated again.
11. Most transgender and non-binary people have, at some point in their lives, misgendered someone by accident. Explicitly refers only to transgender and nonbinary people, when, as I stated, "misgendering cisgender people is, in a technical sense, an issue of equal importance".
12. This essayist, being part of... between "very polite" and "a tad curt". Again, refers only to transgender and nonbinary people; super informal; isn't as persuasive as it could be. If it was worded more neutrally, I think it would be better, but I don't think it's necessary.
13. Repeated errors can be more complicated... Some people make typos. Rewritten. The examples are not strictly necessary.
14. There's no bright line... tenor of the conversation can also be clues. Rewritten.

My main issue with it is that it is essentially an essay written to cishet people on behalf of the LGBTQ community, when it should be an essay written to all people on behalf of Wikipedia editors. If this was a userspace essay, then it would be fine, but it isn't.

• All non-userspace essays I've read fall into one of two categories: psuedo-guidelines, and humor pieces. This is neither. Since is is a non-userspace essay, and it is not a humor piece, I think that it needs to be written more formally.
• On the persuasive front, a lot of the examples and analogies included simply aren't persuasive. A lot of them are. I got rid of the ones that I didn't find persuasive, or the ones that I found excessive. Generally speaking, if you disagree with the point of the essay, none of the examples are going to make you pause and say 'Wait a minute. That makes sense.' The best form of persuasion, in my opinion, is to make them believe that this is the way to do it, and not that this is the way we would like it to be done, and by cutting out examples, we make that point clearer. All good essays do this. Honestly, I think it will succeed if it bosses people around.
• The most salient points are buried underneath excessive examples and edge cases. For example, the entire common pronouns section is pretty irrelevant.

Again, this is all my opinion, but, for a topic of such importance, I feel like the method of delivery isn't all that great. I get that you have an idea as to what this essay should look like, but, the thing is, once it's no longer in userspace, you don't own it anymore, and your specific idea is as good, or, conversely, as bad as any. I'm not saying that the way you want it is bad, but, strictly speaking, it's just too much of an opinion piece and too little of an explanation piece, and I think it will truly succeed if it trends towards the latter. Cessaune [talk] 02:34, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

Many essays are written with an informal tone without being humor pieces; see, to pick a few at random, WP:BLUE, WP:NOTBLUE, WP:TNT, and WP:ROPE. And this essay was never in my userspace. I wrote it in projectspace because no one had previously thought to write an essay on the topic. It, once again, represents the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors, no more no less. It sounds like you have a different idea of what that advice and opinions should be. I, absolutely sincerely, look forward to seeing what sort of essay you can write—or even what sort of guideline you can propose—to convey your own preferred approach. This is what I did when it became clear that the maintainers of WP:No Nazis were not interested in my suggestions of how to improve it; WP:Hate is disruptive has done quite well for itself since then. If your pronouns essay proves more popular than this pronouns essay, well I certainly won't be complaining.

P.S. I think you misread the bit referenced in point 11. It's not about trans and nonbinary people being misgendered. It's about us doing the misgendering. The point is to refute the canard of the hypersensitive pronoun-policing trans person. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 03:56, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

I'm fine with writing my own essay about this, but, fundamentally, it's not really my essay, is it? In the same way that this essay isn't really your essay? That's kind of a WP:OWN violation, right?

I don't have a different idea from what you have written here. I added basically nothing to the points you had already laid out.

Also, point 11 is not about whether or not transgender/nonbinary people are being misgendered or doing the misgendering. It's about the fact that all people misgender, and to make it a transgnder/nonbinary vs cisgender thing is unecessary IMO. Cessaune [talk] 04:09, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

WP:OWN doesn't apply to essays. Not that this essay belongs to me. An essay belongs to the people who agree with it. Your proposed changes include three significant changes to this essay's purpose: You want to remove the explanation of why avoiding a specific editor's pronouns, while not doing so generally, is problematic; you want to assume less good faith of potentially innocent misgendering; and you want to frame the essay more as a pseudo-guideline. Those are all reasonable ideas. This just isn't the page to pursue them on. I do plan to implement some of your proposed changes, and would also like to take a look at whether I can better bridge together the topics of trans-correlated and non-trans-correlated misgendering, so please don't think I'm ignoring your critique. I just think it's important that this essay maintain the positions it's always held. -- Tamzin^{[cetacean needed]} (she|they|xe) 04:22, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

I partially disagree with Cessaune's removals, since you made good points, however I really hope you will consider my edit removing the footnotes and whatnot. Regardless of how essays are meant to be written my and Cessaune's original point still stands that there are way too many examples/different types of people mentioned. On Wikipedia no one can tell whether you are cisgender or trans unless you say it, just your pronouns, so is it really necessary to, for example, dive into how cis people can use other pronouns? This essay reads less like a Wikipedia opinion and more like a how-to guide for real life. I'm not going to force my suggestions on the page but currently this isn't an essay I would ever link to simply because it is barely relevant to Wikipedia. (Roundish ⋆t) 11:44, 24 May 2023 (UTC)

Input on specifications for a version of Template:User-multi that includes pronouns

 You are invited to join the discussion at Template talk:User-multi § Edit request 11 August 2023 2. {{u|Sdkb}} ^talk 15:17, 12 August 2023 (UTC)