There’s also just the basic fucking courtesy of not using certain terms to describe someone if they ask you not to. If you address people of all genders as “dude” and a trans woman asks you not to refer to her that way, the correct response is “okay I’ll do my best not to refer to you with that term,” not “actually I use dude when referring to women sometimes so maybe you should just stop having a problem with it.”
That’s the thing really, I use “bro” gender neutrally all the time (though in a rare instance of treating transwomen differently I’ll avoid it if I know someone is transfem, because that’s just asking for misunderstandings). If anyone asked me to not refer to them that way I’ll just say oh ok sorry I won’t on the future, it’s gender neutral to me I didn’t mean to misgender you.
All of this, all the pronoun discussions, people insisting on deadnames, is the same as reading someones name on an ID, calling them that, and them telling you they don’t like that name and please use a different name (even when it’s just a nickname and nothing gender related). If you don’t accept their preference, you’re just an asshole. You don’t need to walk on eggshells, you just need to do a bare minimum of thinking and most importantly listen to people.
It’s embarrassingly simple to come up with post hoc arguments for why refering to women as dude is fine actually.
Much harder to introspect and determine where that behaviour stems from, then acknowledge the place it stems from is toxic, and start changing. Harder still to unlearn a habit I put 30+ years into learning.
There’s also just the basic fucking courtesy of not using certain terms to describe someone if they ask you not to. If you address people of all genders as “dude” and a trans woman asks you not to refer to her that way, the correct response is “okay I’ll do my best not to refer to you with that term,” not “actually I use dude when referring to women sometimes so maybe you should just stop having a problem with it.”
That’s the thing really, I use “bro” gender neutrally all the time (though in a rare instance of treating transwomen differently I’ll avoid it if I know someone is transfem, because that’s just asking for misunderstandings). If anyone asked me to not refer to them that way I’ll just say oh ok sorry I won’t on the future, it’s gender neutral to me I didn’t mean to misgender you.
All of this, all the pronoun discussions, people insisting on deadnames, is the same as reading someones name on an ID, calling them that, and them telling you they don’t like that name and please use a different name (even when it’s just a nickname and nothing gender related). If you don’t accept their preference, you’re just an asshole. You don’t need to walk on eggshells, you just need to do a bare minimum of thinking and most importantly listen to people.
It’s embarrassingly simple to come up with post hoc arguments for why refering to women as dude is fine actually.
Much harder to introspect and determine where that behaviour stems from, then acknowledge the place it stems from is toxic, and start changing. Harder still to unlearn a habit I put 30+ years into learning.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard “language changes over time and that’s sexist and toxic” from anyone other than Latin teachers with no students