Tags: discourse, software industry, anecdotal
Status: draft
-> _There's a heart that must be free
-> To fly
-> That burns with the need to know
-> The reason why
-> Why must we all conceal
-> What we think, how we feel?
-> Must there be a secret me I'm forced to hide?_
+> _This is where the party ends
+> I can't stand here listening to you
+> And your racist friend
+> I know politics bore you
+> But I feel like a hypocrite talking to you
+> And your racist friend_
>
-> —"Reflection", _Mulan_ (as performed by Christina Aguilera)
+> _Out from the kitchen to the bedroom to the hallway
+> Your friend apologizes, he could see it my way
+> He let the contents of the bottle do the thinking
+> Can't shake the devil's hand and say you're only kidding_
+>
+> —["Your Racist Friend"](https://genius.com/4498157) by They Might Be Giants
_(Attention conservation notice: rambling Diary-like post that I felt like writing anyway for psychological reasons; likely not worth your time.)_
It started with the pronoun stickers.
-This year, there were pronoun stickers in everyone's conference swag bags ("[...] so we can all help each other get things right. Wear them in solidarity with others too. Help us make [the conference] welcoming and inclusive for all"). Leaving aside [philosophical objections](/2018/Feb/the-categories-were-made-for-man-to-make-predictions/#anchor-pronoun-sticker-discourse) for a moment, I want you to consider [the stress and awkwardness this inflicts](https://theunitofcaring.tumblr.com/post/172800552516/so-i-havent-posted-about-this-since-college) on people who have [_some_ form](https://slate.com/human-interest/2018/05/using-gender-neutral-pronouns-could-actually-misgender-people.html) of gender-related problems but who have chosen some [set of mitigating interventions](/2017/Jan/the-line-in-the-sand-or-my-slippery-slope-anchoring-action-plan/) other than transitioning.
+This year, there were pronoun stickers in everyone's conference swag bags ("[...] so we can all help each other get things right. Wear them in solidarity with others too. Help us make [the conference] welcoming and inclusive for all"), including _they/them/theirs_, _ze/zir/zirs_ (!), and blanks (!!). Leaving aside [philosophical objections](/2018/Feb/the-categories-were-made-for-man-to-make-predictions/#anchor-pronoun-sticker-discourse) for a moment, I want you to consider [the mild stress this kind of thing can inflict](https://theunitofcaring.tumblr.com/post/172800552516/so-i-havent-posted-about-this-since-college) on people who have [_some_ form](https://slate.com/human-interest/2018/05/using-gender-neutral-pronouns-could-actually-misgender-people.html) of gender-related problems but who have chosen some [set of mitigating interventions](/2017/Jan/the-line-in-the-sand-or-my-slippery-slope-anchoring-action-plan/) other than transitioning.
-Which sticker am I supposed to put on if I am to show solidarity? The _he/him/his_ sticker would be the obvious, straightforward choice. After all, that is, in fact, the third-person pronoun people use for me. But in a context where I'm being offered a _choice_, I _don't want_ to choose the male option, because that makes it look like I "identify" with my maleness—as if I were _cis_ in the strong sense of having a "gender identity" matching one's "assigned sex at birth", rather than in the [weaker sense](https://thingofthings.wordpress.com/2015/01/28/cis-by-default/) of being a reactionary coward whose pathological need for a backwards-compatible social identity is preventing her from becoming her best self.
+Which sticker am I supposed to put on if I am to show solidarity? The _he/him/his_ sticker would be the obvious, straightforward choice. After all, that is, in fact, the third-person pronoun people use for me. But in a context where I'm being offered a _choice_, I _don't want_ to choose the male option, because that makes it look like I "identify" with my maleness—as if I were _cis_ in the strong sense of having a "gender identity" matching my "assigned" sex, rather than in the [weaker sense](https://thingofthings.wordpress.com/2015/01/28/cis-by-default/) of being a reactionary coward whose pathological need for a backwards-compatible social identity is preventing her from becoming her best self.
+At the same time, I can't exactly wear the _she/her/hers_ sticker. And I think there's a sense in which _can't_ really is a better choice of words than _don't want to_. It's not that I don't _enjoy_ being refered to as _she_ in a context where that makes sense, like when I'm [crossplaying at a fandom convention](/tag/cosplay/), or in the Secret Blanchardian Conspiracy Chatroom. It's that, in real life, when I'm not playing dress-up and I can't hide my face behind the fog of net, people are going to notice that I'm male and use the English language pronoun for males on such that they need to refer to me in the third person.
[...]
Rod Vagg linked to Quillette
Opal guy said trans people are delusional
+I did a good job of—how do you say?—hiding my power level.
+
"It's just that the people listening think you're an asshole and they're showing you the door"
think I'm an asshole and are showing me the door https://xkcd.com/1357/
"There are views we have decided are unacceptable and we will ostracize you for having them." https://twitter.com/seldo/status/714272018976284672
find the contributor covenant PR where someone wanted to carve out a personal Twitter exemption, and the counterargument mentioned naming the project in the profile
+
+https://where.coraline.codes/blog/oscon/
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projects / Ultimately_Untrue_Thought.git / blobdiff