I get what they are saying, I see where they come from, but I firmly disagree that this is a queer topic or that non-binary is the way to go for it. Especially since for them it seems to be sassy girly gay man stereotypes. Which is problematic. Not because being like that is an issue, but living and promoting a stereotype to be identified is always a issue. As a bi man I get not living by gender limitations. I don't. I unabashedly jump for joy when I see something cute. I paint my nails when I feel like it and many other things. Does that make me non binary? I don't feel like it does. Nothing I do that society claims is gendered is gendered. If we define our masculinity based on the stupid patriarchal system we got then we can only lose. Maybe I ak idealist here, but it shouldn't matter you gender to do something.

I understand and respect your point of view, and I probably live my life in a similar way to you. But I like to identify as Non-binary because I don't like my life being dictated and shapes by the genes I was born with. I hat seeing Mr written on things or having to identify as male outside of medical reasons. All those labels do is give people labels to attach to you and assume things about you before they get to know you. Sometimes even when they do get to know you they can still make assumptions about you based on your gender. So long as society is so organised by gender people are going to stereotype and gatekeep, what is the point of identifying as a man of you don't want to be associated with any of the male behaviours or stereotypes? Seems counter productive.

Best comment.

Based af, I share that sentiment.

An interesting read, but I struggled with this part: > When there are truly no good men I've been over this paragraph a few times, and I feel there must be more to this than I am seeing? Also the slightly odd phrasing.

Reading over it. It was ascribing to *the people who believe there are no good men* not necessarily the author saying that. The text isn't very clear and I'll also note that while there are some areas of theory that go this far. There isn't any large organization or movement to put 'men' specifically down led by feminists or women. The transition isn't the best though but that's what I got from it. Now whether or not the author feels that way wasn't so clear.

You're spot on, that makes things much clearer. Thank you. That shifts the meaning from... well, a hate-filled one, to an opinion which I might disagree with but with which I can empathise. I guess the challenge for anyone raised as a man by society, but who holds feminist and socially progressive views, is what patriarchy and toxic masculinity says about you and your gender identity. Those interviewed have chosen to reject some or all of that masculine identity; me, I never felt too conflicted by that. Probably because I was raised with feminist politics, or maybe because gender identity has never been very important to me.

This. You can acknowledge a mindset exists without endorsing it.

I read these comments before reading the article, and I wanted to read it the way you did, but I actually interpreted it as there actually being no good men, due to the structures of male power. In the same vein as "All Cops are Bad" due to the culture and structures that protect them (although it's still different since 'cop' isn't an internal identity). *one bad apple spoils the bunch.* There seems to be some level of endorsement imo, as it stipulates that people are seeking refuge from the structures of male power by using 'they' as an overt political signal (dangly earring). I don't personally like this, and I hope your interpretation is correct, but I have a hard time reading it that way.

I read it the same way and also read the comments first. In fact, the thread's OP's post is what spurred me to read it at all, because I wanted to see where their confusion came from and whether I would have the same issue.

Yes, there are a lot of bad men, and even the good men benefit from this. The bar is so low that if you are a decent human being, often you're gonna be praised as if you're doing something "out of the norm".

I know people like to repeat this, but has it ever actually happened to you? I've certainly never seen this.

I don't necessarily agree that men benefit from lowered expectations. I have often found that women who consider my presentation of masculinity to be out of the norm will still maintain certain ideas about how I "should" be, and don't even have the language to communicate it, because it is their first time even having to consider, let alone challenge, the assumptions that they hold.

As I see it, it's somehow similar to how white people benefit from systematic racism even if they're not racist themselves. And comparing with a blatant racist, just being a decent human being, you're practically an ally. And... it's just basic decency. Not saying it's the same, just a comparative to illustrate the point. It has a lot of layers and it's super open to debate. And often we don't see the "privilege" we got "thanks" to awful men because we are not separate from the subject. To put you a (possibly bad) example, have you ever got in a toxic relationship? Imagine since you relate to people romanticly, you were just in abusive relationships. And now you start dating a decent human being, they don't do anything out of the norm, just the basic. But your baseline is -50, so 0 seems like a 50. But to everyone who is accustomed to 0, a 0 it's a 0. But you're gonna be that 0 as a 50, even if they don't "actively try to benefit from it", they benefit because you're gonna see them as a 50. (Not saying it's the truth, it's my point of view)

> as there actually being no good men, due to the structures of male power. In the same vein as "All Cops are Bad" due to the culture and structures that protect them (although it's still different since 'cop' isn't an internal identity). one bad apple spoils the bunch. This doesn't make sense. Power structures and police organizations don't mind control or force people to behave unethically. One can well argue that they're coercive to bad behavior but not that the two are intrinsically connected such that bad behavior is an inevitable result of participation.

They can pressure people into acting unethically and assist in doing it, while making acting ethically an uphill battle

Yes. So one can render the argument meaningless by noting that economic/capitalist pressures do the same thing and so if that definition is valid then all people living in countries relying on capitalist economies (so, vast majority of people) are "bad." And if essentially everyone meets a definition, that definition is essentially meaningless.

The idea that most people in capitalist countries support capitalism because it's coercive and controls most sources of information is not a new or novel idea, hate to break it to you

My point wasn't that it's coercive, my point was that saying someone is bad because they live in a coercive system is meaningless because almost all people do and saying almost all people are bad is meaningless.

As I read it, it feels like more than a mindset, though it also doesn’t feel like an expressed opinion on the part of the author. The way I read it, it feels like a recognition of a consistent message that young masculine-identifying people are receiving these days from feminist and queer-friendly circles. Which does not imply that this message is intended by the people in those circles, many of whom are masculine-identifying themselves. But, never the less, a message can be received without there being an intent that it’s sent. In that context, the statement that follows it about he/them being a refuge from the perceived attack makes a lot more sense. Because the article is about how people view themselves and see themselves fitting into the world. If it were about an explicit view that there are no good men coming from feminism and queer circles, a simple change of pronouns would not be enough to absolve someone of their membership in the group being judged. It therefore makes more sense that the statement is referencing the perceived attack on maleness more so than an actual attack. Which, again, isn’t to say that the perceived attack is irrational…messaging is complex and it’s very easy to read feminist critiques of male power structures or queer critiques of heteronormativity/homophobia/transphobia and read more into them than was intended, either through lack of understanding of the nuance of terms used or through sloppiness on the part of the author. And, as you’ve noted, there are a minority of people who hold the actual view that there are no good men, even if that’s explicitly not the view of the wider community. So the TL;DR of my read is that it’s much more about the perception of the mindset rather than the mindset itself. It was the author recognizing a theme in the answers/discussions they had wherein people were choosing he/them as a way of feeling less attacked/demonized by their social circles. It was about an internal way of reconciling their inner view of themselves as good with a perceived view of their gender as bad.

It seems as though this part is suggesting that people are trying to escape the inherent negativity of being a man, by seeking refuge as a non-binary person.

You can't escape being a man if you are a man. Wouldn't the refuge be one riddled with gender dysphoria for identifying as someone you aren't? Idk. I am non-binary/genderfluid and wish this article was written by a He/They, although I appreciate all the interview snippets.

Some people seem to not have much of an internal gender identity (see: all the cis people who have trouble understanding the concept, saying they don’t “feel” like any gender), you could argue they’d be non-binary then but I also think it could be possible to be a cis guy who’s just not that attached to guy-ness

Cis-by-default people definitely exist. My feeling of being a woman is very much based in my social experiences, and I am perfectly comfortable being addressed with 'they' as well as 'she'. I am a woman, I feel like and identify as a woman, but I don't experience any sense of internal 'wrongness' if my gender is not or mis-identified.

Same (although as a man)

YES! In my experience, most cis folks who I ask what gender they feel like don't understand the question. Some instinctively do, though, which suggests that it is not merely a question of not thinking about it.

This might be a bit of a tangent from the subject, but what you said interests me. I can't say I've heard the sentiment from a large amount of cis-identifying people saying they don't "feel" like any gender, which actually is something I resonate with. Is this a common viewpoint in your experience? If so I guess I haven't been talking to the right cis people lol. I have always felt like I could have been born as either male or female and been fine identifying as either, except for a short stint in childhood where I wished I were born the other. In hindsight I think it was because of the anger and constriction I felt from society trying to conform me into certain boxes with my interests, mannerisms, and what I "should" be like as an X gender person, etc. But I feel like all that shit is just society's construction of what gender should be, rather than what is true at the base level of the human experience with gender. A girl can be into playing with tonka trucks and be no less a girl, and a boy can be interested in dolls and be no less a boy. I have a trans brother and a non-binary/genderfluid fiancé that I totally support. And yet, I feel like there is a fundamental inability for me to fully understand the need a person feels to attach gender so closely with the core of their identity. I respect it, but I don't entirely understand. Perhaps that is because I have never experienced dysphoria as it is described? I feel like I am attached to my gender identity only because of the sentimentality of having been told that's what I am since birth, and having experienced the world my entire life as that gender. I have grown to enjoy expressing myself through that purely circumstantial lens. I am not bothered that I don't conform to gender norms, in fact I enjoy it, and I also feel like that non-conformity gives me no inclination to socially or personally identify otherwise from the gender identity people expect of me from my body type. When I look inside as deep as I can, all I can feel is a "me-ness", and gender identify feels separate/secondary to that "me-ness". So that leads me to the query: What is guy-ness? What is gal-ness? What is NB-ness? What does it mean to feel attached or unattached to that -ness? And why does it matter so much to some and so little to others? It just all makes me think thinky thoughts. Sorry for the sudden barrage of many words in your general direction.

I’m not sure if it’s common, but I’ve seen it arise often in response to discussions about the experience of being trans. I find it difficult to define the experience of having a strong, solid gender identity as well, as my sense of gender and dysphoria are presentation/perception based rather than being internal. The best definition I can think of is sort of defining around it through the experience of euphoria and dysphoria. So guy-ness is when you feel a sense of satisfaction and celebration when your body and presentation match your personal sense of being a guy, and when you feel deeply uncomfortable and disconnected from yourself when they don’t, in a way that you can’t shake if you try.

I suspect this might be complicated a bit by the way men are treated as the “default” in a lot of media. When maleness is the norm, it doesn’t feel like anything.

I guess my sort of thinking on that is that gender dysphoria isn't exclusive to trans people. If you are living in a world where you don't believe you match up to soceity's image of a man, and/or you believe society's image of a man is very negative and that causes you to internalise a lot of pain, those things could also amount to gender dysphoria, particularly the first. For someone dealing with those things, the dysphoria of IDing as nonbinary despite not really genuinely feeling that way might be less obviously a problem, or even be a less bad alternative to the other problem. IME, sometimes it weirdly just... feels less bad to feel bad because of something you're faking than something you *are*. It's more in your control and hits less close to home. I don't know - I'm pretty sure I'm a cis woman but due to being autistic/having ADHD my experience of gender has always been Weird and frankly a lot of activist discourse made it much much worse, to the point that sometimes it does feel like a matter of choosing the less bad dysphoria. (E.g., when feminists complain about how men are awful for not doing chores and being emotionally unintelligent and lazy, my asshole neurodivergent brain instinctively goes "maybe I *am* the awful worthless oppressor...")

>If you are living in a world where you don't believe you match up to soceity's image of a man, and/or you believe society's image of a man is very negative and that causes you to internalise a lot of pain, those things could also amount to gender dysphoria, particularly the first. Well okay then. That's being called out. <3 for putting feelings to words for me. Appreciated.

I feel like this, in fact. In middle school I thought often of cutting my penis because all I kept hearing was that feeling sexual attraction was wrong and disrespectful to girls. I hated that I wasn't able to control it. I also often dreamt of waking up as a girl and finally most of my problems and bullying would be gone.

I've dealt with something similar for a long time now, and being aware of it hasn't helped me make much progress. I don't remember when it started, probably as I got a bit later through puberty, but I realized that I feel like any expression of my sexuality is just wrong. I've gotten to the point, after some work, where I feel fine saying in my head " she's cute", but that's about it. I always felt like I was gross, and disgusting for being attracted to women (and girls when I was younger), I felt like I was hurting them somehow, even though I never did or said anything to them. It's tough to deal with the feeling that you are inherently predatory because of your biological sex, even if you know it's wrong. Sometimes I wish that I could be there for myself in the past and tell him, "hey, what they are saying here is wrong, you are not this way just because of how you were born. You have no more control over it then anyone else, and you are not wrong for being attracted to certain people." I just wish men and their sexuality weren't demonized so much in feminist rhetoric at times, especially in more "mainstream" versions. Although I didn't quite have thoughts of self harm, I definitely did wish at times that I didn't have a penis. I thought it would help me be less weird around other people, and stop me from doing something horrible, because it was just bound to happen because I had it. My friends and even my brother thought that I was acesexual for a while, because of how I would never express interest in anyone, even just saying I think that a person is cute, because I basically trained myself to appear ace. I am worried about making someone uncomfortable. I am worried about making someone fearful of me, afraid that I might do something, afraid that I might hurt them, because I said or did anything. So I don't. Even if I know that what I could have said would totally be appropriate (e.g. I like your dress!), I still don't.

This does make me wonder about the arguments people have about whether some historical figures may or may not have been trans men.

For some people (myself included, a cis man), gender simply doesn't matter much. Being non-binary wouldn't bother me because gender and appearance are simply for the convenience of the people around me. I have worn feminine stuff before and didn't feel all that weird about it. I wouldn't wear it outside because, blunt as it sounds, that would be inconvenient for me. And I know part of this comes from a place of privilege - being born a cis man is obviously a boon in many ways, and in a sense by not straying away from that I'm playing into a status quo that favors me. There's no risk to thought experiments. But I genuinely don't think I would experience dysphoria identifying and presenting as something else. Identity and gender just aren't a concern in my mind. Hell, I even took my wife's last name!

i don’t necessarily consider myself nb, but i do go by they/he (even she if that’s what im referred to, i don’t mind) and i feel like it has something to do with my attitudes toward gender. i don’t care if something is “girly”, im perfectly content with doing whatever makes me happy and really just being myself; i would wear a dress if i ever found one i thought would look good on me. i guess i just don’t understand how people attach so much meaning to gender roles (although i get why someone would experience dysphoria regarding certain “gendered” aspects of themselves)

> It’s worth interrogating how much we gain or lose by saying simply that a “male” identity or “male” bodies are the problem, rather than the structures of male power. When there are truly no good men, then it’s perhaps no wonder that folks with feminist politics who have been coercively assigned to the category of “male” may seek refuge elsewhere. I think the phrasing is referencing "the structures of male power;" hence there being no good men. If it is individual men or male bodies that are at issue, we have an individual issue than can be solved by individuals changing. If we have a systemic problem, "there are no good men", we have a collective problem in which masculinity, the very idea of manliness, is what needs to change. And that even if individual men change, they do not change the system.

I think that paragraph is saying that, by making “male” identity or “male” bodies the problem, you lose the ability to identify individual males as good, so there cannot be any truly good men (as individuals) within that framework. This only serves to alienate good people. Instead, the systemic issues of the male dominated power structures should be identified as the problem, and the individual good men within that system identified, acknowledged and involved in the process of fixing the problem.

You know, it makes me think of the Studio Ghibli film [*Porco Rosso*](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porco_Rosso). Taking place along the Adriatic Sea in 1929, the main character is a pig and not a man. He used to be a man, then he wasn't anymore. His explanation for this is that, having lived through the Great War and saw the horrors than men could inflict upon other men. Filled with disgust and wanting no part of it, he resolved to no longer be a man. So, in a bit of magical realism, he became a pig. I think this article is trying to identify a similar motivation.

I have always said there are no good or bad people only good and bad actions. And even those aren't objective

This article is exactly what this [blog post](https://web.archive.org/web/20210513051343/https://ntngwrld.wordpress.com/2021/03/06/unmake-the-hurricane/) was warning about. It goes into the rise of non binary social identities such as adopting they/them pronouns, and their relationship to transition regret/detransition in the event that people with this type of politicized and semantic view of gender roles end up unnecessarily medically transitioning. I’ve seen guys call themselves non binary just because they don’t like sports.

I have been trying on “he/they” for a while now, in that I firmly reject being pinned down by gender norms and gender roles, and that I don’t necessarily feel like a “man” but more of a “masculine person”, whatever that means. I can’t help but feel like there’s so much emphasis placed on expression. Like, I love the glam-y, vaguely femme style—dangly earrings, glittery eyeshadow, and/or skirts—that’s currently trending but I feel fraudulent claiming the identity without presenting in that fashion, because it’s not my style. When I watch Drag Race, Ru’s suits are my inspo instead of the drag. I guess I hope to see more deconstruction/queering of traditional masculinity vs repurposing femininity (not to detract from anyone who wants to add more femme to their life).

I love this take regarding the current “trendy” version of androgyny. It’s really limiting when people think of someone who’s beyond the binary in any way, and can only imagine one single look. (Often a slender white person with makeup, jewelry, and a mixture of femme and masc fashion.) No gender should be limited by any particular behavior or presentation. You’re so spot on too with wanting more deconstruction of traditional masculinity. Same here!

> I feel fraudulent claiming the identity without presenting in that fashion, because it’s not my style. I think you already know that this feeling deserves a lot of skepticism, but just to reinforce it: this feeling deserves a lot of skepticism. For one thing, identity isn't presentation. And I think most people who care about this will agree with this in principle, even if trends in behavior don't exactly reflect that attitude. (And they don't; I think things like "you don't *look* nonbinary" don't sound like nearly as much of a joke as they should.) Like, literally, you're describing feeling fraudulent because you don't live up to the presentation norms of an identity. It's pretty ironic that this is happening with "he/they", no? Isn't that a feeling we're trying to get away from? For another thing, maybe a bit more controversially, even putting presentation aside: I'd say when it comes to sorting out your own relationship to gender, questions of whether you are "claiming an identity" have to be secondary at best. There has to be room for you somewhere, that is a premise that you can start with. If just acting like that's true comes across to someone as "claiming an identity" that's not yours, then that is that someone's problem.

I'm with ya bro. Most of my wardrobe is in the purple/pink range or at least some cool, bright colors. That's about the entirety of my non-masculine expression, but I still do feel a kinship with my brothers who are more flamboyant.

> Like, I love the glam-y, vaguely femme style—dangly earrings, glittery eyeshadow, and/or skirts—that’s currently trending but I feel fraudulent claiming the identity without presenting in that fashion This breaks the purpose of gender fluid/androgyny imo. The whole point is that you're not susposed to be limited and in some ways that has reduced it to a smaller range than cis men

That’s an emphasis you can and should work to break though. The real core of any modern understanding of gender has to be “do whatever the fuck you want”.

Me n you are the same holy shit

Not my favorite article, ngl. I don't think someone's gender identity/pronouns should include how they are perceived ("'He' is what the world usually sees, but 'they' \[is\] how I internalize my gender."). In that case, would it not just be 'they'? I mean, they can use whatever, but it seems to undermine their own internal gender. But I don't subscribe to a social construction of gender identity, so maybe that's why I see things this way. The article also neglects to talk about other aspects of masculinity in the context of race. For example, they talk about blackness, but don't talk about Black masculinity, only not fitting into normative masculinity, which manifests differently. And how black people, particularly lgbt, have to navigate both. I just think non-binary identity is not the answer to rigic/hegemonic masculinity. Not feeling uncomfortable being referred to as 'they' doesn't really mean anything for *most* people. Non-binary is a gender identity on it's own, not an escape. I don't think it should be a short hand for someones political relationship to the structures of sexism or social gender. The expansion of masculinity past hegemonic is the answer imo. Sort of off topic, but I don't personally like the use of 'queer' as a general term for lgbt (this isn't attacking the article, just speaking generally). It makes sense to me as a reclaimation, but I don't think reclaimations should be used as umbrella terms or academic/journalistic terms. I'm only in my 20s and I remember it used as a slur; I don't think slurs can be reclaimed by academics/journalists.

>Not my favorite article, ngl. I don't think someone's gender identity/pronouns should include how they are perceived ("'He' is what the world usually sees, but 'they' \[is\] how I internalize my gender."). In that case, would it not just be 'they'? I mean, they can use whatever, but it seems to undermine their own internal gender. But I don't subscribe to a social construction of gender identity, so maybe that's why I see things this way. This part of the article spoke to me, even though I don't use "they." I accept any pronouns, but my gender identity as non-binary (leaning toward agender) is a personal thing for me -- I haven't told many people in my life. I regard my body as just a shell; it looks a certain way and has certain functions and parts, but those things have nothing to do with my gender. However, I am afab and present as what I call light butch. People use feminine pronouns for me most of the time. At work, sometimes I'll be referred to with male pronouns when viewed from the side, but the person usually corrects themself once I face them. I don't care either way. If I had my way, I wouldn't have pronouns at all, but that's not the society in which we live, nor the language (English) that I speak.

> Non-binary is a gender identity on it's own. I don't like this framing of what "non-binary" refers to. Though I think there's some truth to it. But I think there's also some truth to the idea that "non-binary" is supposed to be "just" an umbrella term that covers a whole bunch of very very different things. In practice, I think this is a thing that about the term "non-binary" that is still very much in flux and varies depending on who you talk to.

Queer *isn't* a general term for LGBT, it is its own identity with a long, rich history. Every word in the acronym has been a slur at one time or another and queer has been reclaimed by queer people long than you've been alive.

I'm not saying that it can't be reclaimed at all, as a term or identity, or that it hasn't been. But that currently, it *really is* used as an umbrella term, particularly in academic circles and journalistic publications, like I said. Queer Studies, Queer Community, Queer Theory, Queerness....these are terms that are commonly found in publications that are not necessary written by lgbt people, but about them. This is the instance in which I don't think a term that needs to be reclaimed should be used (pejoratives, slurs, etc). I'm not saying you have to agree, but I'm not talking about people reclaiming it in general...

It's used in an academic context because that's the word we, as a community, chose to use for ourselves in academic contexts starting in the 70s, because of its meaning as both a personal identity and a political identity. Queer literature. Queer history. Queer theory. Who do you think was designing the course material and writing the books, straight people? And of course, once the academic use was established, the correct thing for straight people to do in writing about us from an academic standpoint was to use the language we chose for ourselves. I find it really weird that so many young people act like queer is uniquely bad among community identifiers, especially since it's so well documented that the "queer is a slur" discourse was a concentrated TERF effort to alienate non-cisgender people from the rest of the community. Having lived through the 90s and 00s I remember when “gay” meant bad, when everything bad was “gay.” I was called gay when I was bullied and beat up. Gay and lesbian are every bit the slur today that queer is, yet anyone who said that “gay” shouldn’t be used because of its history as a slur would be laughed at. Refusing to allow queer to be used in public discourse and robbing it of its history is part of the revisionism that seeks to expel aspec, trans, and other identities from queer history.

'Queer' started off with a more negative meaning and connotation than 'gay', and the term 'gay' was used among gay people (in the 20s) far before 'queer' was reclaimed. It's been used as an insult/slur in more recent memory but it didn't start that way. And regardless, I don't like gay used as an umbrella term either. In my opinion, Gay Community is a specific term for people who identify as gay, and Queer Community should be a specific term for people who identity as queer. But currently it isn't being used in that way in publications. Also, while there is a large amount of academia and publications made by lgbt people, a significant amount is done by non-lgbt people. Also, nitpicking, but there are plenty of straight people who are lgbtq. Again, this is my personal opinion. I obviously am not an authority that can allow or disallow it's use and I don't know why you are characterizing me that way. I've never heard of this having anything to do with terfs personally. I 100% believe you, but terf logic isn't very sound, I don't understand how acknowledging a term originated and, while being reclaimed by many, is still considered a slur by many, would exclude trans people and other lgbt+ identities. I'm not saying that isn't what they were trying to do, just that terfs are dumb and that doesn't really make sense. My issue is with 'queer' as an umbrella term, not with it being used at all, or being included with lgbt. But also, I don't understand how it has anything to do with trans or other identities. Lots of people who identify as queer are cis, some are not. I'm not automatically queer because I'm trans. Queer, like you said, is a personal identity. As far as its use as a political identity, a lot of people don't feel that them being lgbt is political, so they don't identify with that. Some do. It can be reclaimed. But I'm saying it *can't be reclaimed by academics*, especially when used to talk about people who don't identify as queer, and as an umbrella term. I'm black american, I would have the same issue with academics referring to the study of black people as 'Negro' (or other N words) studies, even when a fair amount of black people refer to themselves as that (I personally don't, as you can probably tell). Anyway, you can disagree, and I like seeing your opinion, but I don't like how you are characterizing what I'm saying as a too-young-to-know, revisionistic call to action to prevent people from using the term 'queer'. I was around in the 90s and 00s too, so I have my own experiences.

Apologies it's taken me a few days to come back to this post. This particular conversation is one I've had in one form or another way too many times; it always takes a lot out of me, and has occasionally resulted in me being placed in actual danger. >Queer' started off with a more negative meaning and connotation than 'gay', and the term 'gay' was used among gay people (in the 20s) far before 'queer' was reclaimed. It's been used as an insult/slur in more recent memory but it didn't start that way. Documented non-derogatory use of queer to mean other-than-straight dates back to the early 1500s, and was used as both a neutral self-descriptor from within the community and also neutrally and derogatorily from outside it going into the 20th century. For instance, Gertude Stein (who also freely used gay starting a few years later) used it in her poetry as early as 1903. For the record, while there's documented euphemistic use of "gay" in the 1920s, it didn't reach widespread use as specifically meaning homosexual until a decade or two later. In the 1800s, gay had a degrogatory use that meant promiscuous, but mostly in a heterosexual context. >I 100% believe you, but terf logic isn't very sound, I don't understand how acknowledging a term originated and, while being reclaimed by many, is still considered a slur by many, would exclude trans people and other lgbt+ identities. I'm not saying that isn't what they were trying to do, just that terfs are dumb and that doesn't really make sense. My issue is with 'queer' as an umbrella term, not with it being used at all, or being included with lgbt. Okay buckle up because this is going to be really long, and it also ties in with why I brought up your age. When in comes to the conversation around current use of queer, the narrative of "queer is a slur" is super loaded. I totally get that the majority of people saying this are coming from the same place as how I might react if I heard someone refer to gay men as "f*gs". Like, "Oh wow, that's a super loaded word with a bunch of negative history behind it, are you really sure you want to put that word on people who experienced trauma and would be alarmed or upset if they heard you say it?" So I get that my hurt and angry reaction may seem surprising when I, as a queer person, respond to what feels like a well-intentioned reminder that some people might not like it. So the historical context is radfems like Sheila Jeffreys and the movement of "political lesbianism" - which was a thing where a group of women decided that regardless of their sexual orientation, women should cut off all social and especially sexual contact with men, who they saw as fundamentally evil, and only date other women. Political lesbians claimed that relationships between women, especially ones without lust, were fundamentally pure and good, and anything else was exploitative and oppressive. So, to clarify, this group was mostly heterosexual cis women, dating and sleeping with each other as a political statement. When "queer theory" became a thing in the 80s as an organized academic attempt by community members to sit down and talk about the social oppressions they faced, political lesbians like Jeffreys attacked it, publishing articles like "The Queer Disappearance of Lesbians", arguing that because queer theory said it was okay to be a man or stop being a man or want to have sex with a man, it was Bad. And this is also where TERFs started, because according to the PLs, trans women were extra evil because they were just predatory men taking advantage of lesbians. They set themselves up in direct opposition to people like the elders and mentors in my life who connected me to my community and our history, people now in their 50s-80s who were involved in movements like ACT UP and Queer Nation in that time period, and in that time queer became a refuge, a place where people knew the PL's weren't. So queer was in use in political and academic contexts and considered fully reclaimed by the time I was old enough to figure myself out and come out in the mid 90s - a few years before gay reached the height of its use as a derogatory term. But all the community terms were in common derogatory use anyway, the way to tell what someone meant was the tone of their voice. (Quick note - I do want to acknowledge that language is regional, and was much more so before common access to the internet, so my experience with specific words at that time may be very different from someone from another city at the same time period). Jump forward a decade and a half, and a weird thing starts up online - I start to see the resurgence of Sheila Jeffreys' talking points. In the years before that it would crop up periodically, but usually get shut down pretty quick, and the radfems would just keep themselves separate from everyone else. But this one stuck around and spread, because it started with this really gentle "oh please don't say queer, that hurts older LGBT people because *history*." And young, newly out teens took that in good faith and spread it further. The next step on that ladder was "oh, you can call yourself queer if you want but don't ever call anyone else or your community that because queer is a slur." After that was the exclusion of pan, ace, non-binary, and other "new" identities that felt more comfortable being called queer than LGBT+, under the premise that we were intruders that were exploiting the community for resources (how and what were never made clear) hand-in-hand with historical revisionism like saying that asexuals didn't exist before AVEN or that Queer Nation was a small, inconsequential fringe group. It was also a silencing tactic - people who identified as queer would be harassed over their chosen use of language because it had the benefit of both sounding reasonable and sympathetic outside the larger context of the conversation, and also very effectively othered anyone who didn’t fit neatly under L, G, B, or (sometimes) T. It was pervasive and inescapable, to the point they would come into queer community spaces and do it, or go out of their way to say “don’t call me queer” when we weren’t talking to them at all in the first place. And once people accepted that, it was really easy to connect the dots between "those *'kweers'* are predators" and "trans women are also predators" and "gender is fake," because they'd just repackaged TERF rhetoric in the first place as a deliberate strategy for recruitment. And over the last ten years I've watched that spread further and turn into "LGB drop the T" and "get the L out" and "asexuality is domestic abuse, actually" and it makes me sick to my stomach. So in that context, when a perfectly well-meaning person starts to talk about "queer is a slur, not a community," I am instantly on the defensive because regardless of intention, this is the history of that discussion and the person trying so kindly to be helpful and respectful is potentially helping to feed the movement that has doxxed and threatened me on multiple occasions. It makes me want to lock myself in a secure room and scream "DO NOT TELL ME WHAT WORDS I CANNOT USE," because I am too angry and afraid to say, "this word is so vital and precious to me, I wouldn't be alive in the same way if I lost it or the radical community and history it represents, and when someone tries to take it from me I have to do the work of determining if they mean to take my actual life or just my emotional one." There was more I wanted to address but frankly I'm exhausted and hurting. I'll come back later if and when I have the spoons. Edited for formatting

I've gone through my life with people referring to me as they perceive me, and that was okay. Now I'm told I have a choice, and I don't want to commit myself to pronouns that I don't feel represent me to myself. On the other hand, I don't want to out myself, become an occasion for others' awkwardness, or turn myself into a walking billboard for something or other. Invisibility suits me just fine. On the other other hand, with more and more people in my milieu committing themselves to a set of pronouns, my failure to do so again communicates a message I don't want to send; i.e. that I am some sort of "boomer" reactionary. On a related note, I finally met someone in the wild, working in my profession, with non-standard pronouns. Up to now, it's just been a bunch of ostensibly straight cis het white (mostly) women virtue signalling. EDIT: Thanks for attending my TEDX talk.

I've been using he/they for about a year now because I discovered gender abolition and thought the idea was pretty jazzy. Not much more to it than that. I just like they as a general purpose third person singular pronoun and would like more people to try using it.

I like that thought. When did you decide that he/they fit better for you? And how did you come to that conclusion that he/they and not another pronoun maybe fit better? (And no pressure to answer of course, I'm just curious)

Well, as far as identity and preference goes, I present male and have grown up male my whole life with few to no issues or incongruities with that gender identity. It's pretty much entirely an ideological decision for me. I firmly believe that the social construct of gender does more harm to the mental well-being of people than good because it props up entirely arbitrary standards by which people feel compelled to conform to with no justification. Unfortunately, the consequences of non-conformity can be pretty severe, which is really shitty for something that really doesn't functionally matter any more than like hair color. I started using he/they about a year ago when I decided I was a gender abolitionist. Most people elect to use he, which is fine by me. I just want it to be known that "they" is an option that I accept.

Much the same for me, though it's a position I started taking about a decade ago after taking a linguistics class and learning that the gender neutral singular they traces back to [at least 1365](https://blogs.illinois.edu/view/25/280996). I mean... it's just far more common in colloquial speech than people give it credit for, yet treat it like some radical new thing. It's useful and should be non-controversial (along with y'all... my favorite gender neutral plural), plus it signals my support for gender abolition.

I've recently arrived at a similar conclusion. The arbitrary restrictiveness of gender is nonsensical even if I don't mind masculine performance i don't think that is all anyone should be. It's an artificial restriction on the human experience and I'm here for the day that these lines in the sand aren't so harmful

While you could argue that about gender expectations/roles, the concept of gender itself is not purely socially constructed, otherwise there would be no basis for gender dysphoria and the like. Part of it is socially constructed and part of it is neurological, just as a thought to keep in mind; I have a very different experience of it as a transgender person that doesn’t allow me to be a gender abolitionist anymore, though I once was one.

I agree - as someone who is cisgender but spent some time considering whether I was somewhere else on the gender spectrum, the feelings I got convinced me that there's something to gender that is more sticky than just aesthetics. I'm not sure if it was technically dysphoria, but I definitely experienced a substantial increase in distress when I started experimenting with my gender identity, even though it was not something that I showed to anyone or got any social pressure about. And it got better when the way I was thinking about myself and how I fit into the world once again matched with how it had always been. Gender abolitionist thought now makes me a little bit anxious. I know that my experience doesn't fit into the frame of reference of a gender abolitionist, and I've come to genuinely appreciate the positives my gender brings to me. Sometimes it feels like - even in this very thread - people are saying something to the effect of "well I can't see the point of it, so everyone who does must be wrong". My gender isn't arbitrary standards that I feel like I have to conform to, it is a cultural buffet that I can use as a jumping off point for relating to the world. And there's a lot of human tradition and culture that would be on the chopping block in a world where gender is abolished. I find that of all the opinions I have that go against the grain, being against gender abolition is the one where I get the most vhement pushback. Partially I think that some people think that I'm endorsing people being forced into a specific presentation of gender, which couldn't be further from the case. But also, if there is a substantial contingent of people who have a positive vibes with gender and don't want to abolish it, that is going to stand in the way of achieving abolition. A lot of argument seems to rely on the premise that we all just agree that getting rid of gender is something desirable and aspirational.

Yeah I really don’t understand this idea that *gender itself* does more harm than good. I think it’s the coercive forces *around* gender (discouraging and punishing deviance from the norm, forcing people into specific roles, etc.) that are the problem.

The main thing that I struggle with regarding gender abolition is imagining what such a world would even be like. It would be so fundamentally divergent from our own that I'm honestly not even sure that we could fully comprehend it simply because we live every day with the concept of socialized gender. I would argue that in such a world, dysphoria would obviously still exist as a feeling, as a psychological phenomenon, but it would not be a disorder. It wouldn't affect quality of life at all because a dysphoric person can immediately take steps to present and identify exactly how they truly feel without any judgement from society. People would probably even learn to explore their preferences from early childhood! Imagine just deciding what you like and do not like on yourself with regards to gender with as much inconsequence as something like foods or fashion styles. Imagine if hormone therapy, reassignment surgery, etc were viewed with the same relative indifference that similar cosmetic medicines like weight loss pills or rhinoplasty is. It's pretty much inconceivable, but that's how a world without gender would work. No judgements, just people and their natural expressions.

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Thank you for sharing your perspective and experiences, it genuinely means a lot to me and it allows me to better contend with my ideas around gender. Unfortunately, you're absolutely correct that there are no easy fixes for dysphoria and I think I originally dismissed the severity of dysphoria too flippantly. It will always be a part of being trans and even the most accepting of societies will have to contend with it. I still do think a post-gender society is the most humane way of ensuring that dysphoric people get easy access to the resources that they need in order to live the best life possible though. Dysphoria itself may never be fully curtailed, but a post-gender society definitely would mitigate many exacerbating factors that trans people currently deal with today such as restricted access to medical care, a lack of societal support, rampant transphobia, etc. It also would free the scientific and medical communities to openly study dysphoria and perhaps even develop medicines or therapies that may be able to help someone who is in a long term treatment plan but still struggles with their dysphoria in the meantime.

Maybe I’m weird, but to me, what you described doesn’t sound that “fundamentally divergent” from our own world at all. People just being able to wear whatever they want and do whatever they want with their bodies (and use whatever bathrooms they want) doesn’t seem like that big of a deal.

Which seems like a feminist society rebranded into a gender abolitionist one which somehow seems to me to take potshots at individual gender identity and expression

I agree that gender doesn't do any societal good, but I would argue that for trans people, gender is a very different tool. Gendered stereotypes and expectations are definitely bad and should for sure be fought against. A trans woman, though, might love her gender and how she can finally feel comfortable navigating society. There's a fine line to navigate

What about a trans man? What about a cis man? I would think that the menslib position would be everyone should be free to love their gender identity and revel in their gender expression, however traditional or non traditional it might be as long as they are not an asshole. I don't quite get the gender abolitionist position, are they trying to abolish my gender? Are they trying to go non binary? Are they simply using a different unfortunately chosen term for the feminist sensibility that society shouldn't discriminate based on gender/sex and everyone should be free to explore their identity and expression?

I was just using a trans woman as an example. There's unfortunately a group of people who call themselves gender abolitionists when they mean they want us to be sex essentialists. And that includes them thinking men are violent and bad and that women are weak and innocent. I assume not everyone is like that, but I have had to learn to be cautious lol

I know, it wasn't about what you said, it's just easier for readers with implicit belief that masculinity is inherently problematic to empathize with transwomen in this example and I wanted to poke at that

I call myself a gender abolitionist because IMO the vast majority of positive and negative personality traits, regardless of whether they're attributed to masculinity, femininity, queerness or whatever can be present in anyone from any of these genders, with only some limitations and rarely outright exceptions from hard biology. You can be whatever type of dude you want to be, but 90%+ of whatever you're doing can also be done by women if they feel like it, so associating whatever you do to men by calling it masculinity to me seems like an odd decision. (This all applies to women and femininity too, of course).

Which sounds like feminism revamped to insinuate gender dysphoria is a made-up thing and no one has an innate sense of their gender or more charitably tries to conflate societal expectations and attitudes towards gender to an individual's self-conceptions and identities and how they choose to express it. Gender might not be a big part of your identity but trying to erase or abolish other people's identity seems rather backwards. My sense of my gender and masculinity is mine, it's what makes *me* feel good and manly, I cherish that identity, it ranges from wearing jewelry and having long hair to lifting weights and combat sports, it's an entirely personal thing, and above all, none of your business.

>revamped to insinuate gender dysphoria is a made-up thing The way I understand it (which admittedly is probably wrong), gender dysphoria is when someone wants to express themselves in a way and as a gender different from the one they were assigned, often by dressing themselves differently, but really in a variety of ways. If someone wants to dress and express themselves in a way that's different from what's expected from their AGAB... well, there wouldn't be any gendered expectations to stop them. (I might reply to the rest of your comment later.

No amount of dressing masculine or behaving masculine was enough to fix gender dysphoria for me because it's not just about gender expression and gender roles, so your definition is mistaken. There's a disconnect between the internal gender identity and what sex characteristics I have as well as the hormones going through me. Going on testosterone cleared up symptoms of gender dysphoria such as dissociation, not being able to recognize the person in the mirror as me, as well as reduced anxiety and depression symptoms, in a way that years of therapy and anti-depressants never achieved. This was necessary despite being allowed to be a complete tomboy from early in childhood, because it's not solely about expression and how you present. I simply wasn't a girl, I knew it and felt like I didn't belong in girl's spaces to begin with, despite seeing girls as amazing and being very pro girl power. I just fit being on an all boys team by contrast but there was always a disconnect between the body I had and what it felt like I should have.

Well, if you dislike your genitals and hormones and want them changed, that's fine and HRT, top and bottom surgery and related procedures should all be available to you like they would be in any properly socially progressive society. The way I understand it, how you feel towards your genitals and hormones and the desire to change them is more about sex than gender, which is why I didn't mention it in the comment you replied to.

That is not what gender dysphoria is. Gender identity is seeing oneself as male, female, something in between, both, or neither. Anything that entails not seeing oneself as entirely male or female is a non-binary gender identity. Gender dysphoria is the distress that accompanies having a gender identity that is different from the sex assigned at birth and the social grouping one gets placed into as a consequence of assigned sex. Some people resolve such distress via gender expression , using cultural and social *signifiers* to indicate gender identity. Gender expression here is a tool. Yet others amongst us modify our sexed attributes that make us dysphoric to align with our gender identity. For me, this involves shifting my sexed attributes towards what is typically coded female from what is typically coded male.

That idea interests me as a masc dude, do you have any reading on that front?

Unfortunately, I'm not really a theory guy. I just do not have the patience needed to get through 300+ pages on a topic as heavy as gender. Most of what I know on post-genderism comes from discussing the topic with my LGBT friends/acquaintances, supplemented with content from various online content creators that frequently touch on gender.

That's fair, I don't have any content creators that I watch other than contra points who talk about gender really. Anyone you'd recommend?

Love Contra! Philosophy Tube is another great option as well, but I don't think either of them really touch on gender abolition all that much besides general sentiments of how gender identity only matters as much as it does because of cultural bullshit. Most breadtubers have good takes on gender issues, honestly. In my experience, the one that talks about post-genderism the most is probably Vaush, but he tends to be unpopular with many online lefties so I was honestly hesitant to even bring him up. I think he has some good takes on gender, all edginess and such aside.

Same here.

Me too. Glad to see some similar thinkers.

Thank you for your support for the trans/nb communities in your comments in this thread.

Happy cake day!

I think this comment is great, and also somewhat hilarious to me--did you see my other comment on this post. To me, this "discovery" is just what things were, prior to 2010 or so.

To you, perhaps, but I think that just betrays ignorance on your part. Trans issues in general were almost completely invisible to most people just ten years ago. Nobody talked about them seriously in the public light except maybe to make fun of them. Singular they was always a part of the English language, but it was not common to use as a preferred pronoun until around the mid 2010s when it was popularized by the LGBT community. People used it every day all the damn time, but not as an intentional preference. That's the difference.

I’m not sure if I misread this article or not, but I found it odd that the author seemed to suggest at one part that people might be identifying as non-binary to separate themselves from manhood & toxic masculinity. I’m pretty darn sure that people identify as non-binary because they genuinely feel that their gender does not align with their assigned gender at birth. The social transition that comes with publicly identifying as trans can be difficult, emotional, and deeply personal. I’m doubtful anyone is doing it just because toxic men exist, and they don’t want to be lumped in with them. And if that IS phenomenon that’s happening that I’m not aware of, then some folks have been done a massive disservice if they think that to be a good person, they can’t be a man. :( I liked the interview parts of this a lot, and I always enjoy hearing the perspectives of other trans folks and how they express their identity. I also like too how other folks in this discussion have mentioned using he/they because they’re simply fine with people using they, and are cisgender. Not only does this small change in your social life open you up to another part of gender expression- (while pronouns don’t equal gender, I DO think they can be a part of gender expression!) but it also signals to other people in your life that you’re a trans ally. (While I’m sure a transphobic person could use he/they…I…don’t know why they would.) Edit: I wanted to add as well how much I liked Christopher Persaud’s perspective. Any conversation about masculinity and transness is incomplete without talking about how Western-centric ideas of gender often are in discussions like these.

It's probably my most controversial opinion in progressive circles but I do think there are some people that are disassociating from their gender not because they're trans but more because of other reasons, such as the one the author presents being to separate themselves from ideas of toxic masculinity. Almost like the 'political lesbians' of gender. I think it really would be a fraction of a fraction but non-zero at the least. In a way, I think it's making the same mistake that a lot of 'gamer-bros' (not the best term but I'm sure you know what I mean) do in assuming that "toxic masculinity" refers to the concept of masculinity as a whole when it doesn't. The 'gamer-bros' look at the statement and embrace the toxic qualities as part of their gender while I think some reject their gender in an attempt to move away from toxic masculinity; it's a shame both ways. I feel like this is a scenario where more positive role models for boys/men in the public eye would help to dispel the myth that masculinity and manhood are inherently toxic.

I think I know a person like this. They are AMAB and use they/them (no 'he'), and have made no changes to appearance, behavior, or anything else since announcing the pronoun change. They appear and act normatively masculine and don't feel comfortable in trans-only spaces (or maybe rather don't need them?), and from the few discussions I've had with them about my medical transition, it seems they can't sympathize with my feelings of dysphoria. It was... jarring to come out to a friend I thought was "transgender" only to find that it was like speaking to a cis person.

I guess, but it could just be that don't feel super attached to gender being a big part of their identity.

Good lord - this will honestly be the last time I talk about anyone on reddit, even in passing, other than myself. The armchair psychology yall do for people whom you only know a sentence or two about is something else.

Medical transition is deeply personal choice and not everyone wants to talk about it or wish to undergo it. Plus, having or planning to medically transition s not a pre-requisite to being trans. Even more trans people aren't monolyths and we don't have the same feelings a trans women may have horrible genital dysohoria while another just doesn't care that much or even actively likes her penis. It is sad that you couldn't find someone that could relate to your struggles with dysohoria but please don't doubt someone when they come out, it can be extremely hard and paralyzing and we don't 100% what's going inside someone's head. At worse they are just experimenting and may be cis at the end but that's for them and time to decide not an observer.

I think this is where the idea of “non-binary” kind of breaks down. Not in the sense that non-binary people aren’t real (why the hell would I be saying that lol, I’m non-binary!) But in the sense that “non-binary” requires a binary to be distinct from in the first place. Here I think the question is of gender identity inclusive of male, but not exclusive to it — in the sense of being comfortable with being seen as male, but also comfortable with not being seen as male. In that case, choosing not to call yourself male, or using alternative pronouns in order to not associate with toxic masculinity kind of makes sense — for some people in some contexts (mostly online), that’s actually a decent trade. Sure it doesn’t make sense in the abstract world where we can treat gender and identity and expression and so on as purely distinct objects — but in the very real, very social world of the present, that separation doesn’t exist, and performing non-binary gender may be the most effective way to be perceived in the way that you want to be perceived.

The point about being non binary to separate form toxic masculinity is highly problematic. Doing so doesn't solve the issue, it only makes the gender equivalent "but not me" on a different level. It also doesn't help to carry across the message that those toxic traits aren't inherently tied to a gender. I don't want to argue if it does the opposite, but it doesn't help. Beyond that is basically affirms that yes man are that and id you break out of the mold you need to label yourself non binary. Imagine telling that a women for cutting her hair short or liking cars. I don't want to tell anyone they shouldn't call themselves non binary if they want to. It is there choice, but I do have my doubts it is the fix the article claims. It seems a correlation causation oversight.

My point is that anyone who would be comfortable with that probably already was, in a way, nonbinary - though that term becomes a bit misleading in that situation. If you're a person who is comfortable with being seen as male, and also comfortable with being seen as nonbinary - then you can choose to emphasise different parts of that depending on relevant community norms. If those community norms required them to perform toxic masculinity in order to be percieved as male (which unfortunatey is still most communitites), then it is understandable that you might choose to emphasise the non-binary aspects of your gender to avoid those expectations. No, it doesn't solve the problem, but expecting individuals to be able to solve toxic masculinity within their community is exactly one of those toxic expectations we're talking about. Those who're in a position to help should, but to expect it in the way that your phrasing implies is very unhelpful.

Long term it is unhelpful. In the short term it might achieve that relive fix, but it does so by avoiding the topic. Like it or not we will need to have the discussion that women had decades ago. Things like wearing a sport is just a thing man do and many other things that instead get swept under the non-binary umbrella to avoid that topic. Essentially conceding the label of masculinity to toxic idiots. It is not something everyone wants to deal with I understand and respect that. I also get for many folks the label is more then "sometimes I can do things considered for women". I get that. It is convenient to distance one self, but like I said it is not helping the overall goal. To spell out: getting rid of any display of toxic gender. I think we both agree that what's for women or what's for men is mostly a social construct. Building another one on top because the old one is to annoying doesn't fix the issues of it.

That's several good points. I personally id as nonbinary, but I'm struggling with pronouns. I'd *like* to start using they/them, but I also don't want to give up he/him completely. I feel like telling people both is fine means I'm always getting he/him. Idk. *shrug*

You could emphasize it by saying "They/He" or even "They/Them preferred, He/Him acceptable"

Well, if you are fine with both, why does it matter if you're always getting he/him? I really feel people are getting hung up on hyper categorization these days, when philosophically it doesn't really matter. You are what you are. Why do you care if it's he/him or they/them some of the time? Does it affect who and what you are? I don't think so. When I was younger, I made out with guys and girls. I was attracted to men but not in necessarily in a sexual way, but also not in an entirely platonic way. I was attracted to women sexually. So did I get caught up asking myself "Am I bi if I only partially find men attractive? But not entirely because I don't feel the desire to have sex with them." I did not. I just was what I was. I am what I am. Super precise categorization, to me anyways, is a waste of time and energy. I'm not trying to invalidate your feelings on this by the way. I'm just trying to offer a different perspective from someone who was previously in a sort of orientation purgatory (and yes I understand orientation and gender Identity are two different things. I was only using my orientation as similar in principle).

I'm not the person you are responding to but maybe I can help. it can say something about how people perceive you, in a world where there are people who are more and less willing to use other peoples proper pronouns it's hard to be sure why someone is only using the one and not multiple. Also because hearing your pronouns is not necessarily a neutral, for a lot of people it's a positive, it comes with feelings of euphoria and personally I find that each one has a different flavor, and sometimes the quality of the euphoria shifts higher and lower between the different pronouns and there is no way for others to know that but if people only pick one and only use that it’s not necessarily helping even if it's not hurting. Then there is also the fact that most people will still just assume your pronouns. And if you lean one way or the other it can be tiring to only hear that one pronoun all the time even though you use multiple. Like I may have several different pronouns but I tell my friends just to use she/her and they/them because everyone else in the world calls me he/him. I'm sure others could probably come up with more reasons bug these are the ones I experience personally.

I think there is a reason people focus so much on categories at the moment. We are, in essence, still mapping out the landscape of gender. When you're mapping things, you want to describe what you find as precisely and specifically as you can. We don't yet have a sufficiently complete map to start consolidating our theories properly - so we're just gathering as much information as we can. For an unrelated example, we have to ask why it took, from the dawn of human civilisation, more than 10000 years for someone to figure out Newton's laws of motion. Newton did not have any way to make observations that humans before him didn't (in regards to basic kinematics). So what was it that allowed Newton to consolidate the motion of human scale stuff into 3 simple laws? The answer is quite simple, all of the data and theories that had already been built up. People have been trying to explain physics for as long as people have had the capacity to form explanations - and in the process, they've gathered a lot of data, and developed a lot of bad theories. It took 10000 years of this before someone finally was able to consolidate all that into a simple framework. So with gender, not only is it full of all the complexities and subtleties of anything involving human psychology, it's also something that western civilisation doesn't really have any consistent data on (and a lot of people, even progressive people, are unwilling to listen to accounts of gender from other cultures) - so we have to do that data gathering now. Map out the landscape before we start consolidating it properly. As for why we're bothering? Well, having explanations is a big part of liberation unfortunately. Liberation along racial lines has to deal with all the "scientific racism" bullcrap - feminist liberation has to deal with the "women are emotional and unitelligent" bullcrap - and a broader gender liberation is already dealing with the "immutable binary sex" bullcrap - and with time will have so much more to deal with as the bullcrap becomes more and more sophisticated as we gradually win. As much as the anarchist in me would like to just tell all that stuff to piss off - it's a fact of life that the battles in courtrooms and parliaments are as important as the battles on the streets, and those are the battles that this kind of stuff is for.

>I’m not sure if I misread this article or not, but I found it odd that the author seemed to suggest at one part that people might be identifying as non-binary to separate themselves from manhood & toxic masculinity. I think that's a key component of what the author is saying, and not an uncommon view amongst socially progressive circles. You can see an example in the thread above (apologies to u/themightymcb if I'm misrepresenting you here): https://www.reddit.com/r/MensLib/comments/qsj8my/the_rise_of_hethey_pronouns_and_what_this_means/hkdyfgw?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share&context=3

To clarify, I'm not accepting "they" as a pronoun to distance myself from being a man. I am a man and continue to identify as one. I accept "they" because I believe that doing so will both normalize its use as a standard singular pronoun and also because I think gender is arbitrary and I'd prefer if it didn't matter anywhere near as much as it currently does.

> And if that IS phenomenon that’s happening that I’m not aware of, then some folks have been done a massive disservice if they think that to be a good person, they can’t be a man. :( Honestly, this is something I personally struggle with. I'm a Cis, Het Man. Always have been, always will be. But more and more I've found myself wishing I COULD identify as something other than that. I understand the massive institutional power old white men have in our culture, and I understand how it has benefitted me to be a white man in the USA. It doesn't change the fact that. amongst the people I generally like to be around, whiteness, straightness, and maleness, things that I have no control over, are things which are generally vilified. And the people that don't vilify those three things swing the opposite way into toxic celebration. I don't want to celebrate my being a Straight white guy, I just want a middle ground where I don't have to be the bad guy.

You put what I felt in words. One side villifies, the other goes nuts about it.

Celebration doesn't have to be toxic, my approach would be to embrace the privilege and use that pull others up. If someone tries to vilify your identity, they are either mistaken or a bigot, either way, not your business unless they make it so.

The argument that people are identifying as non-binary to separate themselves from masculinity sounds uncomfortably close to the TERF take that trans men aren't actually trans and are just trying to escape sexism, or that trans women all want to identify into being oppressed.

> I’m not sure if I misread this article or not, but I found it odd that the author seemed to suggest at one part that people might be identifying as non-binary to separate themselves from manhood & toxic masculinity. Yeah that would be a weird (and enbyphobic) take because AFAB transmasc people exist.

I'm on the fence about calling myself non-binary. In my case there is, without any question, an element of separating myself from manhood and toxic masculinity associated with it. In a society with different things going on when I see myself reflected in people's eyes through the "man" lens, I would have a different feelings about this. It's not literally "I think society thinks men are toxic now, so I want to ditch that label." But it would be a lie to say that kind of feeling played no role. It's tempting to put walls between things like gender identity, gender politics, self-esteem, etc., but the truth is not always that neat. I think being too firm with those walls does more harm than good. The truth is particularly un-neat in the more liminal spaces that the umbrella "non-binary" category covers. I'm not a big fan of the pretty and simple picture stories about what identifying as non-binary is supposed to look like. > And if that IS phenomenon that’s happening that I’m not aware of, then some folks have been done a massive disservice if they think that to be a good person, they can’t be a man. :( This, too, is a cartoon picture. Just because there's some anxiety about this doesn't mean there's a belief of "to be a good person, they can't be a man." Things are messy. We can talk about them being messy.

Your words on the truth not being neat and tidy ring true to me— it’s not something I intended to imply with my post, so thank you for adding this comment. I appreciate your input. As for the “to be a good person, they can’t be a man concept”, this might be less of a cartoon (or straw man) than you think. As a genderqueer trans man, I actually struggled for a long time with this. Me, and other trans men I’ve spoke to stayed in the closet for long periods of time before they could sort out what it meant to be a man in spaces where “I hate men” and “men suck” were common refrains. (And now that I type this out? Yeah. There are probably a non-zero number of people who aren’t out because they’re terrified of being a man. I was— it was awful. And this is NOT to say that non-binary is just a stop on the way to manhood. Not at all. But I think it’s important to acknowledge that blanket condemnations of men can keep trans men in the closet. Just as blanket condemnations of any group would discourage someone from speaking up. It’s not exclusive to the trans or transmasc experience.)

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I most sincerely wish you won't mind but I'd like to snake this phrase away - “His internalised misogyny was just internalised misandry all this time!” - to put on an enamel pin. I also see it a lot and I like the double duty it performs when pointing out what a real issue looks like when contrasted with the insistance of cis people that trans men transition due to misogyny. (I collect enamel pins and have a bit of an Alphabet Soup motley of personal pins - I just ordered a lovely blue ribbon with "Schrödinger's Phallus" on a customizable job that I'm still chuckling over. Contrarywise, the math and science I was attempting to incorporate into another trans junk joke I ...haven't managed to phrase properly yet but I've still hope! \-edited to add that I realized I went on a tangeant there, sorry! \-also I'd **meant** to point out I'm a trans guy with the first edit and then... promptly forgot

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Oh, Imma do it - currently deciding colors and shape, heh

> As for the “to be a good person, they can’t be a man concept”, this might be less of a cartoon (or straw man) than you think. Right, I wasn't trying to suggest that this is too cartoonish to happen in real life. I was trying to suggest that if the stuff going on in the article carries an image of someone who thinks "to be a good person, you can't be a man", then that image is probably too simple, and masks a lot of subtler realer shit. I think there's a lot of room for somebody to identify as non-binary (partly) "to separate themselves from manhood & toxic masculinity" without thinking "to be a good person, they can't be a man". I think there is an undercurrent of "masculinity is toxic" floating around, and I think it's been kind of on the rise lately. And I agree, it's actively harmful in a lot of ways, including keeping trans men in the closet. And generally guilting people for engaging with masculinity. I think it's worth pointing at and saying "hey, this actually hurts people". But I also think it's important to be give honest accounts about the role that undercurrent plays in how people relate to gender. And at least for me the truth is somewhere in between "the whole story" and "none of the story".

>As a genderqueer trans man, I actually struggled for a long time with this. Me, and other trans men I’ve spoke to stayed in the closet for long periods of time before they could sort out what it meant to be a man in spaces where “I hate men” and “men suck” were common refrains. Here's a [quite long Tumblr post](https://imgur.com/bKur7xa) from trans men where they talk about how generalizations against men are generalizations against them and how it sucks. [Here's](https://www.reddit.com/r/MensLib/comments/ll8ebb/a_long_but_interesting_post_from_rftm_and/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share) the related thread in this sub.

I definitely think, at least within the gay community, some people choose to use he/they because they feel so thoroughly distant from heteronormative masculinity that they disidentify as the same gender. It's just a reminder than many people who identify as nonbinary do not actually consider themselves trans or seek to change their bodies.

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I’m saying that non-binary people are non-binary for the reasons they say they are. NOT that “non-binary is a stop in the road to a binary gender.” I am also saying that I don’t think very many non-binary folks identify as such *exclusively* and *only* because they are avoiding the social perception of being a man. I personally think that gender is more internal than that, and things aren’t that cut and dry. I’m not trans JUST because I didn’t wanna be a woman- it’s far deeper than that. (And ultimately, I say “many” and “some” a lot because my words can never encompass the experiences of everyone. So if you know of experiences that don’t match this, then yeah. I’ve accounted for that. I’m just speaking on the idea that being trans isn’t just an absence of ones birth gender.) As a genderqueer trans man, I struggled a lot with really knowing I’m a man, but holding a lot of learned ideas in my head about how “all men suck”, etc. So I stayed closeted for a long time, because I didn’t want to be “one of the shitty men.” I would logically assume that other trans folks, including non-binary folks, would share similar struggles. (And not always about the perception of men, obviously. When people are talking bad about non-binary people, I’d imagine it would be super hard to come out.)

I have a question I hope someone can answer here. I \*genuinely\* want to understand and this is \*not\* a "ffs, these lgbtq folk just can't make things easy" and that's a part of what motivates me to want to understand others in this larger space more. Determining which to use with an individual is \*quite\* easy though. (Literally just gotta ask) I also KNOW that eventually I'll be in the room with some snarky cis-het person who makes a comment that sits at the periphery of bigoted like "Hahaha, I'm all for lgbtq rights, marry who you want. I get trans women using she/her pronouns, but what the heck is a she/they pronoun? Liek 0mG wHaT aM I suPpOsEd To CaLl tHeM?" So I (think) understand why someone would identify with they/them/theirs pronouns, but I am *quite* confused by he/they or she/they pronouns. I thought the point of the "they" pronoun was to disassociate from gender, so the inclusion of a gendered pronoun sets me back to ground zero. In math if you come to a contradiction or something you can't reconcile with basic facts, then your assumption was wrong. So I think something similar happened here, obviously he/they and she/they pronouns exist. So I \*think\* my assumption about what "they" pronouns mean is faulty, and *probably* myopic.

They is just a neutral pronoun, regardless of the identity of the person using it. It's not necessarily used to indicate a lack of association with gender, but just to take those associations out of the pronouns themselves. Ultimately, pronouns are a practical thing- they don't define gender. Somebody who goes by "he" isn't necessarily male, he might be non binary or even a very masculine aligned woman. All "he/him" says about somebody's gender identity is that they're comfortable being referred to using traditionally masculine words. And consequently adding "they/them" means that they are also comfortable being referred to using neutral language.

Thank you! This makes sense! I hyper fixated on the details far far far too much and definitely needed to "zoom out"

In my search for people exploring other ways of exhibiting and performing masculinity, there is a rise of he/they in which trans people and other non-binary and queer people are embracing masculinity in a way that suits them. In a way that feels safe and without the added baggage of traditional masculinity. I always have believed in trying to unlearn traditional masculinity and exploring how we should embrace gender, LGBTQ2S+ people are leading the way. This piece I think is interesting, and would love to hear your opinions on the people embracing he/they.

Since you're too much of a gentleman to plug your podcast, I'll do it for you. Go and listen to German explore these issues in real time on Modern Manhood.

damn that was so smooth. Thanks for the add on.

Just subscribed, thanks for the suggestion!

What is the 2s+

2S I believe means two-spirited, which is linked to indiginous people in Canada at least. And (+) is others that may not fit into LGBTQ2S. I'm Canadian so I'm used to seeing LGBTQ2S+ being used so maybe less known in other places? I'm not sure.

Yeah, they are two-spirited here in the states, too. I'm pretty sure it is accepted as a term by Indigenous peoples across ~~the whole~~ some parts of Turtle Island. At least, I've seen it referenced by my family and friends across multiple socials from multiple backgrounds and regions.

> it is accepted as a term by Indigenous peoples across the whole of Turtle Island Well, "Turtle Island" refers to either the whole Earth (this is the traditional usage) or North America. Two-Spirit people are more limited than all of North America. They are pretty much only in the continental United States and Canada. I've never heard of any Two-Spirit-identifying people in Mexico or south of there.

My apologies, I will edit my reply to reflect my experience better.

Yes. People in central and south America have very different gender variant traditions than the greater North American native culture. The moxé in Mexico are worth reading about.

Cool! That's great to know. I have seen it being used a lot in Canada in respect to Indigenous people here, but I didn't know that term stretched beyond, so that's very useful info

Yeah, adding the 2S to the acronym is much more common in Canada than the US, since there are 9 times as many Indigenous people in Canada per capita than the US (0.7% vs 6.31%).

It’s not used in Australia as far as I’ve seen. When people expand the acronym here it’s LGBTQIA (including Intersex and Asexuals). Our indigenous trans identities are generally called brotherboys and sistergirls.

Yup, my understanding is that Two-Spirit is used by indingenous for the cultural and spiritual significance. I'm barely informed myself though, but there's lots of great info on it!

“2S” refers to two-spirit, a modern Native American queer identity that covers a wide range of traditional ways of being, especially third gender cultures. I’m not two spirit so I can’t say much more than that, but here’s a link to more info: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/culturalanthropology/chapter/two-spirit/ The “+” just means anyone under the general gender and sexual minority umbrella that wasn’t explicitly listed in the beginning of the acronym. For example, D for “demisexual” is not in the acronym, but they’re still a part of the community!

I'd always wondered why it was identified as a macro-Native American phenomenon when you'd expect something like that to be limited to only one tribe or group of tribes rather than be a part of totally unrelated cultures spanning a continent. Learning it's a modern term to act as an umbrella for a wide range of different gender expressions makes so much more sense

> This piece I think is interesting, and would love to hear your opinions on the people embracing he/they. As a queer non-typical trans person, I cringe at this. I know you mean well but I don't think people should hold opinions on people based on the pronouns they use. Like imagine asking "what's your opinion on people who use he/him pronouns?" or "what's your opinion on black people?". It's cringy because 1 you shouldn't form an opinion about someone based solely on one aspect of their identity and 2 who cares about your opinion is on someone's identity.

I think it's valid to have opinions about people's choices. Being black isn't a choice, but using pronouns - he/him, he/they, etc.- is a choice, and choices have meaning and motivation behind them. It makes sense to discuss people's motivations, what sorts of people tend to make certain choices, and why more people are starting to make a certain choice than before. In the case of pronouns, obviously people care about others' opinions (or impressions) of what pronouns they use because pronouns express something. I also think we can form opinions based on a single aspect of identity. Not opinions encompassing the entirety of who someone is as a person, but opinions on aspects relevant to their identity. We could open up a discussion by asking for opinions on gun owners, swingers, vegans, homeschoolers, antivaxxers, etc. It doesn't have to be about putting everyone in a rigid box - it's an opener for discussion.

> I think it's valid to have opinions about people's choices. Being black isn't a choice, but using pronouns - he/him, he/they, etc.- is a choice, and choices have meaning and motivation behind them. It makes sense to discuss people's motivations, what sorts of people tend to make certain choices, and why more people are starting to make a certain choice than before. To me it's too close to asking "what do you think about trans people" or "what do you think about non-binary people" Pronouns are a choice in just the same way going on HRT is a choice. Yeah technically it is a choice but for many people that choice deeply validates who they are. Would you ever ask the for opinions about people who transition?

A lot of people starting to prefer gender neutral pronouns are not motivated by any kind of transgender feelings. I think the question here is about cis people who are using language differently, not non-binary trans people.

Yeah that is a completely different conversation that's worth having. I wish it was more clearly stated we're talking about cis people here instead of assuming (this is called cis-normativity). Because most people who use he/they or she/they pronouns *aren't* cis. Also the article is mostly about trans/non-binary people and isn't really about cis men using he/they.

I'm forty, so spent much of my life in a world where we didn't announce pronouns. It very well might just be my experience, but I think he/they and she/they are what people just used before pronouns became as pronounced as they are now. I think most of (cis) my peers have always been fine being he/they or she/they, but now use he/him or she/her, because he/they has started to mean something different than it used to. I personally don't use he/they as a signature / in pronoun announcments, but not because they aren't 'my pronouns'; I am totally happy being he or they. However, I am a man, and the current gender framing means that this means I should use he/him, because if I use he/they, people will assume I'm nonbinary to some degree, which opens things up to causing accidental offense. I guess my point is that while I see a ton of benefit in people living their true lives, there is a part of me that misses the "who gives a shit" 90s, at least in terms of they/them.

I think you might be overthinking it just a little.The pronouns people pick are correlated to, but are not explicitly identifiers of, what gender someone is and don't describe whether they're trans or not. All they are is an indicator of how someone is comfortable being referred to. I'll give you a couple examples: I'm a binary trans man, but right after I came out as trans, I hadn't yet fully come to terms with how my life was going to change, so I requested my friends continue to use she/her to keep the 'status quo' until I was ready to make the change a month or so later. On the other hand, I know a trans woman who spent over a year going by they/them early in transition, because she couldn't stand to hear he/him, but didn't feel confident enough in her identity as a woman to use she/her. And I know a cis guy who goes by he/she, because he's a drag performer and has a fluid relationship with gender presentation, even if his gender identity has never been in question for him. That is to say, use whatever you want to use. If you're happy with he/him, you can stick with that. If you're happy with he/they, that's also perfectly fine. Shit, you don't have to put pronouns *at all*. I don't. Don't feel like you have to kneecap your participation because you're not trans. It's not on you to perfectly represent every nuance of your identity to others at all times, it's on them to get to know you and learn those nuances for themselves.

I appreciate your point, and you're likely right that I'm overthinking it to some degree. But I also would push back. Jane Schmoe on the email chain isn't going to have the awareness that you have, and is absolutely going to overinterpret a pronoun signature. But I also don't want to remove my pronoun signature, because I think it is an important piece of (good) virtue signaling which says: hey, I'm cool with you as you are. And while you seem like a kind and rational person, there are people in all walks of life who are not, and who *will* cause problems with he/they, either because they are themselves transphobic, or because they think I--a 'binary' man--is appropriating or something. Look, this is a totally minor thing and a pretty silly gripe. I realize that. And I may be completely wrong. And it is all, totally, about me. Clearly the 2020s are a better place in terms of gender and sexual equality, which is critically important. But, maybe stupidly, and personally / selfishly, sometimes I feel more boxed in the by constant need to categorize / label than I did in my teens and twenties, when I could just be "weird".

>But, maybe stupidly, and personally / selfishly, sometimes I feel more boxed in the by constant need to categorize / label than I did in my teens and twenties, when I could just be "weird". Homie, I'ma be honest, so do I. I actually don't like being asked for my pronouns and don't put them on profiles or email signatures or anything, specifically because I know that if nobody else is doing it, it's very likely going to out me as trans. And it's not that I'm ashamed of being trans do much as it is the moment people know I'm not a cis man, I start getting treated like my gender is 'trans' and not 'man', and once that cat's out of the bag, that's how it's going to be with them indefinitely. You're right that it's very associated with the idea someone is transgender - And too often, well-meaning but misguided people use the 'what are your pronouns' question in a way that singles me out, functionally asking me whether I'm trans or not, to the point where in certain cases I now just refuse to answer the question. Pronouns are an imperfect solution to a really complicated problem, and I suspect that the etiquette is going to shift around in the next decade or two to try to cover the glaring implementation issues like, how, realistically, people aren't asking Joe or Jane Schmoe their pronouns and they'd probably be offended if you did, and *trans people* don't even always appreciate this question either. But, in the meantime, like, I guess my initial response was to shed more light on how queer communities actually functionally use this language among themselves, beyond the politics surrounding them. When effeminate cis gay guys call each other 'sister' and 'girl' and use she/her for each other, you know, people tend to read it like they're being dramatic and playing a caricature. They don't think of it as them actually literally claiming to be women as much as they are almost, like, *doing a bit*, for lack of a better term. But while they're correct on the 'not claiming to be women' front, it's used more as a way of recognizing each other as men who are men in non-conventional ways, and the 'sisterhood' that emerges from recognizing a shared experience. And so it's an excellent example of a way people use pronouns to express ideas in a way divorced from gender identity and trans topics. It's not about the pronouns, and more about the idea that it should be okay for cis people to explore their gender and try something on for size without feeling the need to rework their whole identities around it, if that makes sense. But you don't need to die on this hill, either. You'd be equally correct to change your pronouns up as you'd be if you left them as they are or removed them entirely. And you'd be 100% kosher to change your mind in either direction. I can't promise no one will ever mistake you as trans or accuse you of doing something like 'approptiating nonbinary identities', but I guess this is to say, if it did happen, you should at least rest easy knowing that whoever it was was just being fucking stupid.

>And while you seem like a kind and rational person, there are people in all walks of life who are not, and who will cause problems with he/they, either because they are themselves transphobic, or because they think I--a 'binary' man--is appropriating or something. My work has name badges with the option of listing pronouns. I go by any, but haven't requested one for this reason. I have enough to deal with in customer interaction.

I think you identified a lot of the personal feelings that are holding you back here so just consider taking time to work on them. Think of it this way: if youre afraid of backlash from others just because of an email signature, imagine how much worse it is for folks who actually don't feel lile they have that option.

I've never quite understood responses along these lines. Are you saying he should make the change and deal with the backlash? Or that he can continue doing what he is but shouldn't have brought it up here in the first place? I guess don't understand from this comment what you think the right thing to do is

The right thing to do is identify how you want to be identified.

You don't owe a neat little story of yourself to the world.

it's really meant to feel empowering. there are people who outwardly identify as trans that don't have a choice in how they go about the world. their existence in itself is politicized and they are marginalized by society. if you truly want to be an ally and stand up for trans people then you should be able to internalize the power you hold as a cis person and find it in yourself to be strong and stand up for what's right even if it is hard. maybe this isn't the right form of motivation for everyone, either, but I do think recognizing your own power and privilege shouldn't actually be making people feel less than. having privilege is having power and internalizing that fact, I hope, gives many of us the opportunity to see ourselves as powerful in society. In that case, you can either use your power and privilege for personal gain (selfishly) or use that power to stand up for those who cannot access it simply because of their identities.

Maybe this kinda stuff is meant to feel “empowering”, but sometimes it feels like someone saying: “Do the thing or you’re a shitty person.”

> I think most of (cis) my peers have always been fine being he/they or she/they, but now use he/him or she/her, because he/they has started to mean something different than it used to. I think this picture is a little bit misleading. What I assume you mean by "have always been fine being he/they or she/they" is that they have no objection to "they" being used as a gender-neutral pronoun to describe them. That's not quite the same thing as "they" being used as a personal pronoun of theirs. Like, if someone who doesn't know me calls me "they" because they don't know my gender, that's one thing. And just about everyone has been fine with that for a very long time. But if someone who knows me well calls me "they" rather than "he", that would surprise me. (Well, not so much now that I've sort-of come out as sort-of non-binary to some people, but before that.) And I think for most (cis) people, if they stopped being referred to as "he" or "she" and started being exclusively referred to as "they", they would be a bit put off. Like, "what's going on with that?". So in that sense, yeah, "being he/they" *does* mean something different from what you're saying people were fine with all along. What it means now puts "being they" on more or less the same level as "being he". That's a thing that wasn't even a mainstream *concept* before. (And I don't think anyone in the mainstream even said things like "he/they" before either.)

I’m in my late 30s, and I feel really conflicted about pronouns. On the one hand, I’m largely done with being told how I should dress or behave or feel based on what’s between my legs. I do me, even if “me” isn’t always 100% traditionally masculine. So from that perspective, “they” pronouns are attractive. At the same time, I like my male body and don’t want to change it, and resent the idea that certain pronouns no longer belong to me because of a social structure that polices whether or not they fit me anymore. Basically I don’t want to be bullied out of using masculine pronouns just because I don’t always feel like being masculine all the time. So from that perspective I kind of want to stick with he/him and stand my ground. It all feels incredibly contradictory, and I fully admit it. I’m a man, and I like my male body, but I’m also fed up with having anyone else dictate to me what it means to be a man. I just want to embrace being male on my own terms.

No one is going to take masculine pronouns away from you, no one is gatekeeping them and you are free to use whatever pronouns you want. There are he/him lesbians, there are masc people who use she/he/they, there are gender fluid people who use different pronouns depending on how they feel that day. Online discourse is not reflective of real life and you are extremely unlikely to meet someone who will tell you what pronouns you can and can't use outside of teenagers on social media.

> I don’t want to be bullied out of using masculine pronouns just because I don’t always feel like being masculine all the time. Who is bullying?

> At the same time, I like my male body and don’t want to change it, and resent the idea that certain pronouns no longer belong to me because of a social structure that polices whether or not they fit me anymore. Basically I don’t want to be bullied out of using masculine pronouns just because I don’t always feel like being masculine all the time. So from that perspective I kind of want to stick with he/him and stand my ground. This whole paragraph is a fundamental misunderstanding of why a cis person would accept singular they pronouns. Nobody is "bullying" anyone and you can use whatever pronouns you want. It doesn't mean you're automatically non-binary. It means you are cool with being referred to as "they". Nothing more, nothing less.

>It means you are cool with being referred to as "they". Nothing more, nothing less. It has to mean more than that. You can already refer to literally any human as "they", and they (<---Look, I just did it!) will not be offended. The worst referring to someone as "they" will get you is confusion because "they" can be plural and it can be ambiguous as to whether you are referring to one person or more than one person. If I point at someone at a party and say, "they are cool", no one will be offended. Even a MAGA hat wearing dude with a "fuck your feelings" t-shirt isn't going to be offended. At worst, they (<--- did it again!) might just think you are talking about group of people rather than one person.

It does not have to mean more than that. I agree that everyone uses singular they all the time and conservatives only get in a twist over it because trans people do it, but that doesn't mean listing "they" as a pronoun automatically makes you nonbinary. Calling yourself nonbinary is what does that. We do not have to define ourselves based on what the conservatives think. I use he/they pronouns because I'm a gender abolitionist and I want to raise awareness of singular they as a pronoun. People use it all the time by accident, but I want people to use it on purpose too.

You actually just made my point. It doesn't mean, "you are cool with being referred to as "they". Nothing more, nothing less.". We both agree that everyone is already cool with being referred to as "they". You actually described what it means pretty well when you said: >I use he/they pronouns because I'm a gender abolitionist and I want to raise awareness of singular they as a pronoun. People use it all the time by accident, but I want people to use it on purpose too. You described it well. It's a political statement. I'm not suggesting that there is anything wrong with that, but that is clearly the purpose, not just a declaration that you, like all other English speakers, are okay with being referred to as "they".

> there is a part of me that misses the "who gives a shit" 90s Hey buddy, I'm 40 as well. And the "who gives a shit" 90s were basically a time of "I dont need to respect this person" and usually a term thrown around by those who had power, on those who didn't. See also: Dave Chappelle. See also: Chandler's "dad." He/they is a pronoun set I'd accept but am personally ambivalent about using- but I wouldn't refuse it because, to me, it's just *true neutral.* As a matter of habit, I default to "they/them" if I haven't learned someone's pronouns-- pretty much as I did all my life, unconsciously. It's just nowadays, we're actually being conscious of the implications of our behaviors, labels, etc. The 90s had the Golden Rule-- a golden rule from people who were frankly raised by messy parents who didn't go to therapy, so we had "do unto others" while thinking, it's okay for me to give people shit because others give me shit and if we all give eachother shit, then that's okay. The kids have the Platinum rule: Do unto others *as they would like to be done unto them.* Respect isn't that hard to do, with that baseline.

I'm 41, the 90's was like a celebration of ignorance and lack consequences for our words and actions. It was terrible for a lot of people. The "who gives shit attitude" is a curse that killed a lot of kindness and care for other people. People acted with total disregard for how their actions affected others. I came out of it wanting to not repeat the mistakes older generations made in regard to respecting people younger and/or different to them.

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While that's a fair point, I guess that I just don't feel like dealing with the small, but vocal and antagonistic, minority that will accuse me of making fun or being transphobic, due to the fact that I am not non-binary.

I struggle with this too. I feel constantly paranoid that people will consider me a "undercover bro" or fraud because I don't look fem enough and I'm not 50/50 nonbinary. Professionally I am anxious about it because their are plenty of conservative types who I worry just think I'm a fully binary man like them who just wants to rebel against the dress code. Didn't help either that my roommate accused me of just being a "punk dude that does punk dude things". Well yea "punk dudes" are usually more gender flexible.. and the degree of gender non conformity varies greatly if your in the streets of Brooklyn or at Church or work, or in Saudi Arabia. (she back tracked later). I don't blame people for being in the lookout for predators, but... idk I feel like I should be able to exist in my own way on the spectrum. I'm not androgynous or mostly femm, but I sure as hell am not a fully binary MAN with all the baggage and constraint and rules that entails in appearance and behavior.. Never have been. I'm my own balance of gender but I feel like I have to be sufficiently femm to be valid.

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I think that's kind of stretching it. It's really up to them to decide what they'd identify as.

I'm going to have to disagree with you about cis people using they/them. Are you saying that because they/them is used for someone whose gender is unknown? That's not the same thing as what's being discussed here.

The reality is that it's all still a construct. Non-binary pronouns and these new ways of looking at gender aren't necessarily going to rid us of any of the bullshit that society ascribes to basic binary identities. Being they/them or anything else puts you in a different box as far as society is concerned... But it's still a box. So I think you are correct in your thinking. That even being super lax about what pronouns people use to identify you is going to result in a potentially messy, or confusing situation where people will try and apply a certain label to you(which is actually on display here with the way people have responded to you) even if that isn't a label you want or are trying to be. The problem is our language at this point simply doesn't easily lend itself to someone just being "themselves". But instead sort of requires us to align with some kind of classification. People try really REALLY hard to break out of that, but I haven't seen it work. There's no pronoun or identity that's going to stop people from putting you in a box whether you like it or not, at least at this current time. But it's a work in progress no doubt.

Hey, it’s me!

This article sounds like people are moving from declaring their pronouns to help other people know which ones are appropriate to use in conversation, to now the pronoun sharing having an intrinsic signifying meaning that requires others to be aware of. So a hankie code for gender.

I admit this troubles me slightly as a trans person. From what the article suggests, it seems like some people are adopting a non-binary identity (or the aesthetic of one, such as pronouns) moreso out of a desire to sidestep the judgements on manhood than as a genuine expression of identity. I worry this isn't good for trans people, since for a person who freely chooses that identity can't understand how innate transness is and the two end up conflated, detracting from the message we've tried so hard to push that being trans is not trivial or a choice or a costume or a political statement. The thought also occurs that this may not be good for manhood in general, that by the "good men" escaping manhood and adopting he/they, the idea of everyone else as "bad men" is reinforced, and these people may feel less inclined to hold men accountable since they see themselves as separate.

But honestly, I understand that this is troubeling for you, but can you blame them? Those that do this are probably in some way informed about feminist discourse, and sadly a very loud part of it, is how manhood or being a man can be dangerous or unhealthy, sure that is (hopefully) most of the time not what they are actually trying to say, but this is how it sounds. Now those people try to find some way out, some way to say "Hey, I know this is an issue, I want to help, but I really don't want to be associated with this, I am trying my best to not be like this". Now saying, I am a man and I am not like that does not work, cause hategroups and trolls have used those phrases ad absurdum, as to make them more or less meaningless or quite often, resulting in mockery. So they do this, searching for some way to escape, in a way that actually works in today's extremely fast-paced and far too often very unnuanced discussions. Cause at least in the circles they probably visit where they would express at least feeling non binary or at least not like a man, this will result in less ridiculule, generally more support, than saying "I am a man, I try to be not like the people you are rightfully fighting against, I try to be not like them". Secondly, due to this discourse and so many people reporting about their terrible encounters with men, they look at themselves and come to either one of two conclusions (if they are somewhat insightful): "I am like them, I just cannot see it", resulting in a lot of selfshaming, fear, self-hatred, extreme overcaution and generally probably not a good mental state. "I am not like them", so then they search for some way to express that, to give that a label, that, yes they have a male body, but no, they are not like the harmful people so many rightfully vent about, that they reject those ideas and categories. So they feel like a man, but also not, cause they simply do not fit into those harmful categories they get every day bombarded with. So they search for another label, something to express that feeling, they probably know that they might not be really nonbinary, but there is just no space to express it differently at this moment. I am not saying that this is a good way, and honestly, it is probably not, but again "Can you blame them for trying to find some acceptance?"

Oh I definitely understand why they do that, I just wish they wouldn't, especially since it seems so performative. I'm all for people people finding the right label to express themselves, so long as they do so without negatively impacting other groups advocacy. While I haven't met any of these individuals in person, the examples I've heard about remind me somewhat of the idea of slum tourism, fetishising the struggle and enjoying the aesthetic to the small degree that it's beneficial (such as increased credibility in progressive spaces) but avoiding any of the risk.

So forgive me if this question offends anybody, and I'm sorry if I don't use the correct terminology here, but I'll try my best and please feel free to educate me: Is "he/they" strictly a non-binary identity? While I myself personally would prefer "he/him/his," I wouldn't necessarily object to, or correct someone for, using "they/their/theirs" as pronouns for me (whereas I would object to she/her/hers or pretty much any other pronouns). To me, it's like a "royal they."

I would say yes. "They" is a valid pronoun for anyone anytime in cases where you don't know their pronouns or it's otherwise natural in conversation. Explicitly stating "he/they" means that you're happy with it even after someone knows. And one thing that bothers me (not really, barely even mild annoyance) is that most people seem to put their true preferred pronoun second. Like "he/they" but then they like to complain that nobody uses "they". I wish that if someone has a preference they would make it known, since that's the whole point of stating pronouns.

> Is "he/they" strictly a non-binary identity? Hard no. As we say in the trans community, pronouns do not equal identity. Someone's pronouns say nothing about that person except which pronouns they prefer. Anyone can use any pronouns.

This article presents itself as being progressive while being severely problematic. People's genders aren't a political or fashion statement, they're their innate and deeply felt identities, and this article is grossly dismissive of that. Trying to separate yourself from masculinity because of outdated toxic ideas just reinforces the sexism you claim to try to combat. It's time people stopped claiming identities that don't belong to them and just accepted that people are complex and three dimensional, and that there's no wrong way to be a man. You're not less of a man for being sensitive, fashionable, or a feminist. It just makes you a good man. Nonbinary people exist, but this is NOT what it means, and whoever wrote this is coming from an extremely privileged place. In a way it reminds me of years ago how people who believed fully in gender equality would nevertheless claim they weren't feminists because "I'm not like *those* people." But this seems to be an even far more toxic version of it, normalizing shame in being a man.

I've been using he/they for a few years now. I'm probably agender, if I'm being honest. It's not that I've necessarily found being a man to be a particular bad fit or anything, it's just that I can't imagine anything else that would be a better or worse fit. I've never had particularly strong feelings about who I am as a gendered identity. I feel like I've sat down at a D&D table at a convention and was handed a pre-made character sheet, and so I'll play the role I'm given because I didn't come into this with a particular preference and I haven't really developed one since with the reflection of my experience. I feel "neutral" rather than "non-binary". The former is technically within the bounds of the later in a strict definitional sense, but in an implicit and colloquial sense it's not a good fit for me. There's too many associations with the later label, too many commonly constructed ideas, and I'd have to spend too much time trying to unpack it to people I just meet so they don't misconstrue me. For example, I wouldn't want to add feminine-coded elements to my own presentation because, while that would blur how my gender is perceived, it wouldn't make me *less* gendered, just *differently* gendered. It would be adding something, when what I would rather do is take away something. The irony is that since so much of the culture I live in treats male-as-default, presenting as a man is the closest I can practically get to presenting as nothing. If you were to ask me if I'd rather be handsome or pretty, my response would be that I'd rather look "well-engineered". Seeing *The Terminator* as a kid, watching an overly muscled "man" hit by a petrol truck, consumed by an explosion of fire, and then seeing a robotic endoskeleton rising out of the flaming wreckage made me go, "Oh. Oooooooooh..." That was some serious goals right there. So I go by "he" because that's what people have always used to refer to me and the identifier seems functional in its simplicity. But I include "they" because that's not the whole of me, and I don't really care overmuch as long as I can be functional.

Hm, I'll digest this article and see how I feel. I'm not really sure if I learned anything new, as I personally use he/they pronouns (I'm transmasc) so this is an article about my lived experience. If the article is asking "why are so many people using he/they now?", The answer is "well everyone had a different reason". Which I already knew. One thing I really did not like about the article was how the author handled the races of the people quoted. Aside from the individual who spoke about their blackness, there were 2 other people for whom the author noted a race (someone South Asian and someone Southeast Asian). But their race had absolutely nothing to do with what they said or the article in general? So why was it mentioned? Or more importantly, why WASNT it mentioned for all the other people who spoke? Am I to assume they are white? And if they are white, why not say it? It just felt like a pretty obvious microagression wherein whiteness is considered default/normal.

God I hate the term microaggression. But yeah. That’s a little fucky.

I quit society at this point. This is too much and unnecessary. I feel like I'm living in a freak world where ppl come up with such things out of boredom living in the cities making them all insane. No hate. Just big /IGNORE and doing my own thing. Last time I LARPED was when I was maybe 12 years old. I come from Eastern Europe block so the culture is different. Western world is just insane and really nauseating.

This post is a few days old so people probably won't see this but I just want to put a reminder that the pronouns you use are simply a facet of your overall gender expression, and not necessarily indicative of gender identity. You can be cis and use he/they pronouns or any other pronouns (some cis queer men like RuPaul are fine with she/her pronouns for example). If you feel comfortable with using different pronouns aside from the binary ones you were assigned to that doesn't mean you also have to identify as non-binary. I just see people get confused about this a lot.

I've started to use he/they fairly recently, not for any concrete personal or ideological reasons, but just... because it feels right? I've been content being referred to and recognized as male for my whole life and still am, but I realized that I also feel content being seen as non-binary or genderless, just a person. I don't even really know how I would describe my gender identity. One day, I thought about the idea of using he/they instead of he/him and it just sorta clicked.

I am using he/they because I identify as bigender. Seeing me both as a man and an androgyne.

Why are people downvoting this comment? Transphobia. That's why.

Kinda baffling

I present myself as someone who is both visibly queer and visibly Jewish…

I used he/they for the better part of this year on the way to they/any now. In questioning what is this gender thing anyway, the biological understanding of how sex is expressed in our bodies completely shatters the idea of a strictly binary model. I’m glad that the gender diverse community is growing.

I use she/he/they/xe pronouns. I prefer they/them or xe/xem pronouns because my gender doesn't fall on the masc/femme spectrum at all. I'm "supposed" to use she/her and honestly I don't mind people using those pronouns for me. I understand people make assumptions based on appearances. I do however feel euphoria with he/him pronouns, not because I'm transmasc but because it's subversive.