gemini://senders.io/gemlog/missing-the-point.gmi
Oh, where to begin! I expected some vile responses, and you, Steph, have not failed me.
You know so little about me, and yet pigeon-holed me. How does it feel when someone does that to you?
I've lived a life of poverty and persecution, and then making something from nothing, hiring people and worrying about how to pay their salaries; I take care of my broke parents, and children, some queer and trans (and I am completely supportive). My life did not include such privileges as choosing pronouns or gender, getting voluntary medical procedures and hormonal treatments, or deciding that other people should bow to me and my lifestyle choices. I was too busy surviving. You are the privileged one here.
Gender is complicated, and our bodies are often not matching our desires or needs. I am happy you get to try to improve your situation, wherever it may lead you. Sadly, you repeat over and over about others being uncomfortable with your existence. That must be very hard to live with, and I hope you are in a place where you are at least safe.
I understand you are angry, but I refuse to believe you are so shallow as to define your entire "identity" by the T in the alphabet soup. Surely there is more to you than that, or the pronoun.
BRO. These aren't arbitrary. They're our FUCKING IDENTITY. JESUS FUCK, you don't get it man. Stop talking. It's embarrassing. Someone being gender, or trans, or non-binary isn't FOR YOU. ITS NOT FOR THE FUCKING CIS HETS. It's for ME. It's for them. It's for xem. It's for us to clearly communicate ourselves.
That is just so offensive. It is precisely the kind of alienating behaviour that, well, alienates certain groups and gives them a bad name. And it looks like you prefer it that way, so you can bitch "those people just don't get it".
This is what happens when you stew in the same soup - you start normalizing horrible behavior. Aside from the name-calling, do you honestly think that you are clearly communicating yourself to anyone? You can hi-five your buds but as an ambassador for your chosen letter, YOU HAVE FAILED, MISERABLY.
I will use whatever pronouns you request -- anything else is just mean. But really, who cares what people call you behind your back, third person. Unless you, of course, wrap your entire 'identity' in a couple of pronouns.
Getting rid of pronouns is actually not a bad idea. Use names -- there is no reason to constantly remind who, in absentia, has a penis and who, a vagina. Or something more complicated than that.
I get misgendered at least once a year, way more often when I was younger. Eh, whatever. I don't derive my identity from that, and why force intimate details of my life on strangers?
Have you heard of Patch? Patch was a sad queer person, a bearded white dude, with a girlfriend whose queerness largely manifested as a demand to use Patch as a gender and a pronoun. Patch was not a good person, litigating everyone who failed to call Patch Patch (sic). Patch would get a job and sue the employer: 'hostile work environment'. Patch would sue roommates for creating 'untenable living conditions'. Patch was briefly in the news when Oregon started issuing X-gendered licenses. Patch later committed suicide.
Yeah, it sucks. And I understand you want to pick up a stick and beat the bigot, or more likely, pick up the phone and have the ACLU sue the bigot into submission. But the reality is that the world is full of bigots, and passing laws to make them 'be nice' is like telling the teacher on some guy bullying you - they just beat you up after school. And there are a lot of them. And many of them are cops.
Worse yet, the bigots are now in full control of policy.
You seem sure that you know how to fix the world. How is it working out for you? It's not great for me, or my trans daughter. But at least people tend to use requested pronouns, in major metropolitan areas.
Good luck to you.
P.S. I am not left-center. I am an anarchist. Not that it defines me.