You RFN, 2012

[Aliantha]

Ibram, I really like you and think you're a lovely fella, but I reckon you need to get over yourself a bit. You're taking it too far, and you're going to make your road very difficult if you're going to take offence at harmlessly humourous comments like Sheldons. Honestly, there are a lot more battles worth fighting than the one you've created here.

Yes I understand you're on a journey and you're finding your way and it's hard but seriously, you have to still be able to make and take a joke, not just on your own terms, but on the terms of the people who mean you no harm at all.

Again, I honestly mean no offence to you. I don't really care what your sexuality is. I don't care what anyone's sexuality is. I really just want to be able to have a discourse without having to worry about who I called a he when I should have called him a she or whatever. if I'm talking to you, then 'you' are what you are, and what I address you as is of no consequence and has no bearing on what you see yourself as. The only person who really has to be happy about you is you. Everyone else can go get knotted.

[jimhelm]

Originally Posted by Aliantha

Ibram, I really like you and think you're a lovely fella, but I reckon you need to get over yourself a bit. You're taking it too far, and you're going to make your road very difficult if you're going to take offence at harmlessly humourous comments like Sheldons. Honestly, there are a lot more battles worth fighting than the one you've created here.

Tilting at windmills, etc.

I agree in a general sense with Ali here. Both points... I like you , but c'mon... you're going out of your way looking for offense when clearly none was intended. Makes you sound bitchy.

[Ibby]

Originally Posted by Aliantha

Again, I honestly mean no offence to you. I don't really care what your sexuality is. I don't care what anyone's sexuality is. I really just want to be able to have a discourse without having to worry about who I called a he when I should have called him a she or whatever. if I'm talking to you, then 'you' are what you are, and what I address you as is of no consequence and has no bearing on what you see yourself as. The only person who really has to be happy about you is you. Everyone else can go get knotted.

This is my point - I find the notion that it's unreasonable to expect people to make an effort to properly gender me to be flat out nasty. I fundamentally disagree with your worldview on gender. And because I'm part of the trans* community, that disagreement takes on a little more weight, because when you treat gender that way, it fundamentally erases me and my identity, and leaves the door open for a lot of really bad things. I don't care if you think i'm bitchy or taking it too far - I'm going to make an effort to educate the cellar as to WHY the things we say can be taken as offensive, HOW our language makes it extremely easy to erase the trans* community, etc. It doesn't mean i'm personally bent out of shape about it. It means I think it's a fundamental human and civil rights issue to talk about these things, and to stand up against language I think is damaging.

[BigV]

Originally Posted by Ibram

And I think that defining things that way, especially to my face, would, coming from a stranger, strike me as offensive. Because it's Shel, and I like Shel and fundamentally believe the best about him, I know that's not what he's trying to say. I'm just trying to point out how comments like that can be hurtful, regardless of intent. I'm not sore or trying to be contrarian, I'm just saying that even if Shel is only interested in people with dicks, using that sort of language and talking about identity, gender, sex, and sexuality in those terms is fraught with peril and it is quite easy to be accidentally hurtful or to, without any malice, without even being aware of it, say things that can feel exclusionary, binarist, and sex-essentialist to those on the non-cisgendered side of things.

Not so very long ago, "i don't mind gay people, I just don't want them rubbing it in my face", or any other variant of the "as long as they don't do it around me" argument, would have been a fairly progressive point of view. But now, to most people, it sounds dated and prejudicial - like it assumes that, while straight people keep sex private, gay people are likely to take it too far, or do it in public, or try to coerce uninterested parties into participation. I really hope that one of these days, comparing a sensitivity to gender issues to being high will sound equally dated. And even if you think I'm being ridiculous by standing up for them, I'm going to KEEP being vocal about defending my identity and on trans* issues that I think aren't being adequately represented here. You can put me on the loony fringe if you like, but I at least want to make the "fringe", progressive, queer, activist trans* point of view heard. The same way one oversensitive nigger ain't gonna keep everyone from saying "black", I don't expect one oversensitive tranny to keep you guys from straying into what i consider vaguely offensive, trans*-erasive, sexist commentary. I know the Cellar is going to be a lot more accepting and positive than most communities. But I also know there's a pretty strong anti-political-correctness sentiment around here, and I'm not gonna go off in tears just because a few people think I take my problems with the genderification and the politicization of language that most people take for granted overly seriously.

Lots of "I" language here. Completely legitimate, and wonderful to hear. The last one, made a little bigger, is a bigger, stronger statement. Huzzah!

Originally Posted by Ibram

This is my point - I find the notion that it's unreasonable to expect people to make an effort to properly gender me to be flat out nasty. I fundamentally disagree with your worldview on gender. And because I'm part of the trans* community, that disagreement takes on a little more weight, because when you treat gender that way, it fundamentally erases me and my identity, and leaves the door open for a lot of really bad things. I don't care if you think i'm bitchy or taking it too far - I'm going to make an effort to educate the cellar as to WHY the things we say can be taken as offensive, HOW our language makes it extremely easy to erase the trans* community, etc. It doesn't mean i'm personally bent out of shape about it. It means I think it's a fundamental human and civil rights issue to talk about these things, and to stand up against language I think is damaging.

More "I" language here, until you make what is in my opinion, a serious mistake, flagged in red.

Ibram/Erica, I hope you do not seriously mean what you wrote there. If so, even if you feel that way sometimes, I sincerely hope you don't waste one more breath on such a notion. It is obvious that Sheldon's language, or any other person's language does not erase your identity. I pray that you merely misspoke. Such a situation as you describe, when it occurs in earnest, truly only reveals the speaker's ignorance and blindness, knowing or otherwise.

Please do continue to fight the good fight as you see it. Live right, speak out, and loudly. Persist and persuade. But don't let something like another person's words or attitudes or actions have much room in your consciousness, much less in your reality. A remark like this may make you *feel* as though you may be erased **TO THEM**, but that is not your problem, it is their problem.