Post #1519025

I don’t ever ask someone’s pronouns, but I’m part of a community that happens to attract a fair few enbies and trans people. Without explicitly asking, I and my fellow longer-term members of the community make a very careful effort to get people’s pronouns right. Usually I make a judgment call based on how they present, and if I’m unsure I’ll use “they” until/unless corrected. I think the important thing to remember is that the “culture war” we see exported from America is not people asking for or trying to use others’ preferred pronouns. The culture war is the idea that doing the aforementioned (which is really just one specific example of “treat others with kindness”…it’s not a big deal) is something to get angry about or to specifically avoid doing to make a political point. In other words, the culture war is not created by the left or by trans or gender nonconforming people; it’s a war invented by the bigoted right.