3rd Gender Pronouns

My thoughts on wanting to use 3rd gender pronouns and whether that will resolve invisibility issues or not.

Category:

People & Blogs

Tags:

• Trans
• FTM
• MTF
• Queer
• Genderqueer
• Ze
• Third Gender
• Pronouns
• Gender
• Identity
• Transgender

[LukeMonaco]

Is that the official third-gender pronoun? I'm just wondering so that I can personally know.

[reesekelly]

There are actually a variety of 3rd gender pronouns, but the ones I've heard more frequently are ze/se and hir or even they and them (more gender neutral than 3rd gender). There are others, but I forget what they are.

[LukeMonaco]

Yeah, I always thought that they, theirs, them was more appropriate. I wasn't sure though, because no one's really told me if there's a definite or not.

[reesekelly]

I believe that they, theirs, them is now even considered grammatically correct. However, it's problematic because others would infer you are talking about people in the plural and not a singular person. I believe that is part of why some people tend to take on the ze, hir, hirs and because it makes it more obvious that you are trying to 3rd gender someone or yourself.

[LukeMonaco]

I know what you mean, that's why I haven't been sure. Theirs can can be singular, but none of the others can be, and that's where it becomes problematic. Do you believe that they'll come up with a definitive one any time soon?

[reesekelly]

Well it depends on who "they" are. I do not think that many people are concerned with or would even make an attempt to use anything other than masculine or feminine pronouns with people. I've seen this happen in many cases, for example, people refering to a friend who by ze/hir/hirs by not using those pronouns, but simply not using pronouns in general. I know I've done this before too. It may be more effective to use and "trouble"/challenge existing pronouns rather than create new ones.

[robertethanbowman]

Still there is a part of me that want to find out "what went wrong" from a clinical/scientific point of view. However I think this is a fruitless and ultimately demeaning point of view. Granted, like all other aspects of human behaviour, this is a topic that professional ethical scientists should still investigate.

[robertethanbowman]

I think that for someone like me who has never had an inkling of having another gender in my psychology that differ from my anatomy my first thought was to think that people in your situation are basically fucked in the head. Of course I was 14 years old at the time and that is what people around me said 25 years ago.

[robertethanbowman]

That being said, I really think that it will be a massive uphill struggle to get zhe and zher accepted by more than just a very small portion of society.

in fact I hope that these pronouns don't instead make the people who use them less likely to go out to where people will not understand and will perhaps be offended by these pronouns.

[robertethanbowman]

i will say that I am an average straight male brought to this topic because at this volunteer bike place I attend there is a circle time where they ask 3 questions. They are what is your name, what is your preferred gender pronoun and a random question of the week.

In fact having only taken spanish in high school I didn't even realize that many other languages don't have gendered pronouns even for people until i looked it up on wiki.



[robertethanbowman]

volunteer bike place I attend there is a circle time where they ask 3 questions. They are what is your name, what is your preferred gender pronoun and a random question of the week.

In fact having only taken spanish in high school I didn't even realize that many other languages don't have gendered pronouns even for people until i looked it up on wiki.

[LukeMonaco]

I agree. I personally find using solely the name alright, though I'm not of the third gender so it offends me when people do it to me. But that's a different story completely! Most people that I've met who have been third gender have been really undecided, so I wasn't sure what I should refer to them as, if anything at all. Thank you for your input, though!