Can't quite get a handle on the number of states that legislated bills disallowing the use of pronouns to identify oneself (in a school setting, in their professional/educational email, etc.). What did these pesky pronouns ever do to politicians?
All persons use and identify with pronouns. We do. When someone writes the biography for a book they've written, they write in the third person – for instance: John Smith graduated from XXX and he has been recognized by XXX. Someone accidentally notes a person as "she or her" but the person is a "he or him" based on their first names such as Carol, Dana, or any other name that can be used by both sexes – the speaker is corrected and requested to use the correct pronoun (self-regulating - get the idea?). Textbooks are littered with pronouns – will politicians ban these, too? Oh, wait! There is book banning happening, just not because of pronouns, yet.
Secondly, what difference does it make to those who legislated these bills on how a person prefers to be identified? Isn't the government supposed to be limited in governance? Then why is it necessary to govern how people identify themselves?
Instructors/teachers/employees/employers (etc.) aren't forced to use the pronouns anyway. They can, and many do, identify their students/employees/employers by first or last names or preferred nicknames (provided it isn't "untoward"). Self-identification is an important tool in understanding who one is, where one wants to travel in life, and how one chooses to live. So, again, why the hubbub about pronouns?
I apologize to all those pesky pronouns that politicians would like to blast into oblivion.
The Trust Project
