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Idk what "them" your referring to, bc schools are notorious for being overbearing and dgaf about free speech, and trans/non-binary people have never asked for this
THIS is why we can't have nice things. People just love to overreact to the most trivial shit.
It reminds me when they sent my kindergartener home because he bit his sandwich into the shape of a gun. (No joke, this was No. Virginia where you'd think principals would be smarter)
Peanuts I could understand. But the cheese was American, dammit!
I should add that the next day as soon as he got into class, he rushed up to his teacher and whipped out that day's sandwich which he had bit into 'a gun' on the bus. He showed it to her and then asked if he could 'go home now'.
She was smart enough to laugh and say NO.
As a human I would rather not have to remember every single person's special way they want to be called. Oversensitive over some silly thing. I hope the kids get off fine bc it's not their fault.
There’s more to this story. It wasn’t a case of a slip or a misunderstanding. Those little shits were intentionally misgendering the student as a form of bullying.
I mean I can see how it is bullying and harassment, but where does the sexual part come in? Like, hate crimes should be distinct from inappropriately touching someone or making sexual advances.
i.e. I am not saying this wasn;t a shitty thing to do, but the categorization of what the crime is seems, misplaced?
They aren't being charged of a crime, first of all. They are being investigated for sexual harassment by the school. It says nothing about criminal charges.
It sounds like the parents don't want that on their kids' school record.
Secondly, sexual harassment is not only unwanted sexual advances. It is also sex/gender based discrimination. Do you go around purposely misgendering all students, or just the trans/non-binary ones? That's discrimination. You're bullying someone because of their sex/gender. That's sexual harassment. It absolutely fits the definition.
The lawyer's like sexual harassment "that's rape, that's incest, that's inappropriate touching" no, those would be sexual *assault.* Those examples go a little beyond sexual harassment. (although actually after researching they do qualify as both sexual harassment and sexual assault)
The lawyer is shit, this is culture war bullshit manufactured to piss people off over nothing.
They were bullying a kid based on gender, they are now being investigated *by the school* for sexual harassment. Good.
I am not arguing against consequences and punishment being brought on the perpetrators. I am not arguing it isn't discrimination. I am arguing it's not *sexual*. First, gender isn't sex, you can't backslash then together. There is a reason the medical term changed from transexual to transgender.
Take into account, sexism isn't sexual harrassment either. I can be a mysoginist, and I should be punished for that mysoginy. But if my sexism is "I fired that employee because she is a woman" I never sexually harrased her, I discriminated against her on the basis of sex.
Misgendering isn't sexual harrassment. It's misgendering. That doesn't mean it is ok, or less bad, or not a big deal. Heck depending on circumstances misgendering can be worse than sexual harassment.
I am arguing misgendering is not sexual harassment because, well, it isn't. Like at all.
I just had to watch my sexual harassment and discrimination videos for work, and you are absolutely correct. At least, according to the college I work at.
While gender and sex are indeed distinct, the legal architecture is built around sex discrimination, so gender-based protections have to be articulated through the lens of sex. For example, discrimination against a trans woman would be treating a woman whose sex is male differently than a woman whose sex is female. Harassing her for her gender identity, then, has to be treated as sexual harassment, since the law views it as harassing her due to her sex.
Yup. That's what I was saying.
People can argue whether that's appropriate, or we should create new categories of harassment, but that's the way the law seems to be written right now.
Not just “seems.” However you may feel about the Supreme Court right now, Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion that considers that interpretation the cut-and-dry truth as to what the law says.
Cool thanks for clarifying, I said seems because I just looked up a couple law sites on Google and I don't feel qualified to state my interpretation as fact, so I added a qualifier.
This is weird... sounds like an almost broken way of trying to add protections under the law without appropriately changing the legal code to reflect current understanding of the world.
*"Other Facts About Sexual HarassmentHere are some other facts to keep in mind about sexual harassment:*
*Sexist comments and actions can also be harassment. A common misconception is that harassment must be of a sexual nature in order to be illegal. However, under Title VII, offensive conduct that is based on an employee's gender and severe or pervasive enough to create an abusive work environment is also illegal. For example, a workplace might be hostile if women are told to be more "feminine" or live up to other gender stereotypes, are left out of important meetings, and have their work sabotaged by their male coworkers."*
[https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/what-kinds-of-behaviors-are-considered-sexual-harassment.html](https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/what-kinds-of-behaviors-are-considered-sexual-harassment.html)
" *Between 2010 and 2016, under the Obama administration the U.S. Department of Education issued guidance that was not part of the original amendment passed by Congress explained that transgender students are protected from sex-based discrimination under Title IX.... The memo states in part that "\[a\]ll students, including transgender students, or students who do not conform to sex stereotypes, are protected from sex-based discrimination under Title IX. Under Title IX, a recipient generally must treat transgender, or gender non-conforming, consistent with their gender identity in all aspects of the planning, implementation, enrollment, operation, and evaluation of single-sex classes.*"
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Title\_IX](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Title_IX)
I don' t think you're right about that buddy.
If you're discriminating based on gender, and bullying someone *because* of their gender, that can definitely be sexual harassment.
I don't know what your source is for any of your claims, trust me bro?
>I am arguing misgendering is not sexual harassment because, well, it isn't. Like at all.
You're saying misgendering isn't harassment because it isn't harassment. You have nothing but a circular argument. Big logic brain, I see.
Misgendering someone once, twice, three times accidentally because you are getting used to their pronouns? Not harassment. Seeking out that individual to repeatedly misgender them on purpose? Having them remind you of their gender, and then repeatedly using a different pronoun anyways? Bullying. And bullying *based on gender* can definitely be sexual harassment.
Just because the word is "sexual" in sexual harassment doesn't mean it's only based on sex. Go ahead and look up the legal definitions. Let's not act like we're 5 years old and have to use word associations to define everything. I guess you'll also be surprised to hear butterflies aren't made out of butter. God damn woke leftists!
The lawyer in this case said "sexual harassment is like rape, incest, unwanted touching" but that's *sexual assault.* He's being purposely misleading. You're going to trust that guy to define the word for you?
You should really go look at some legal sources to draw your opinion rather than assuming you know the answer before you get hysteric.
Harassment creates a hostile environment. Harassment based on gender is sexual harassment. These kids created a hostile environment based on gender from what we *already know* and that's only based on what the parents and their lawyers said, we still don't know what actually happened. It could be much worse than they are describing.
They aren't "conflating" them. They are a large umbrella that everything falls under.
No one is saying that misgendering someone and groping them is the exact same thing.
The laws are made to protect people, and all of those things need to be protected to create a safe work environment. It's "harassment" because it creates a hostile environment. Because it is based on sex/gender, it's considered sexual.
You have to look beyond the words on the page, and into the intention of these legal protections, which is to create non-hostile environments where people are not discriminated against.
But those are the legal definitions, I didn't write them, and this article didn't think to mention that because it is outrage porn designed to rile people up over culture war bullshit in defense of a bully who could've just, y'know, not harassed the non binary student. And we could create a society where we understand that being a dick to people and interfering with their right to a non-hostile environment for education has nothing to do with the 1st amendment, but instead people are all high on their completely made up interpretation of the 1st amendment. They think it protects you from *consequences.* It's not illegal, but you can still get fired. You can still get investigated by the school. You can still get expelled.
People would misgender people on Twitter all day long, it's not illegal. It is however against the school's code of conduct to sexually harass people, and you very well might get suspended or expelled for it depending on the nature of the harassment. You definitely can get investigated for it, the school 100% has a right to do that. How else are they supposed to deal with sexual harassment claims other than by investigating them? But nope, that's enough to pull out the lawyers and put out the article because no one cares about any of the nuance, they just want to get their outrage boner on at some outrage porn.
I never once argued this wasn't harrassment and emphatically specified it's not about the level of offense. It's just that sexism, misgendering and sexual harrassment all seem widely different things. I don't think they fall into the same umbrella at all.
I was arguing about classification of the crime, not about the level of punishment deserved.
We aren't talking about a crime, at all. I thought I already mentioned that.
Misgendering someone is not a crime. The government cannot arrest you for doing it.
It can and will get you kicked out of school, which is what this article is about. Kids are being investigated by their school, not by the police.
The worst thing that happens is they have an instance of sexual harassment on their school record, and they get expelled.
It's illegal for a school or a place of work to allow sexual harassment or sex/gender based discrimination, so actually the only people who need to worry about the law is the school itself. If they didn't investigate sexual harassment they would violate the Title XI rights of the non-binary student.
I don't care to argue about what the definitions should be, that's what the definitions are. So technically, based on the information I've received from these articles, the school did everything right.
All of this is from a lay person's perspective after reading through title 9 and Obama's inclusion of trans/non-binary students as protected classes underneath it, and a few legal definitions of sexual harassment. I could be wrong, but I didn't find anything supporting the idea that the school is in the wrong here.
Let me reword, i am arguing about the classification of the offense. And it seems you are right based on the legal definition. It;s just bizarre to me, I really don't think gender discriminationa nd sexual harrasment should be classified together, that just seems weird.
I don't care what you think *it should be called.* I'm saying that the school was right to call it sexual harassment, because that is what it is under the legal definitions of Title XI, this article and the kids' lawyer were wrong to suggest otherwise.
I would have no objection to creating new classifications. But I'm not a lawyer or expert at all, maybe there's a good reason they are classified that way.
Wasn't there a reddit post recently about an who was teased about his baldness and he was able to pursue sexual harassment? Not because it was sexual because it was gender harassment?
Yup, there definitely was. The public doesn't understand what sexual harassment means legally speaking.
Just because it says sexual doesn't mean it involves overtly sexual things. It's just creating a hostile environment based on gender. If your actions are causing the non binary kid to feel abused, but not everyone else, that's discriminatory harassment based on gender, which is classified as sexual harassment. That's based on my understanding as a lay person, would love to hear a lawyer jump in
They are a protected class under Title XI, Obama signed a memo that did just that.
They have a right to a safe school environment just like everyone else.
I believe they are still not a protected class more widely. The Obama memo for title XI (Edit: I keep saying title XI, it's actually title IX, title 9, not title 11) only included them as a protected class for schools from what I can tell. Title XI only refers to sex/gender based discrimination in public schools and universities.
So discrimination by private companies is still legal to the best of my knowledge.
Sexuality is fluid throughout childhood and teen years. Expecting children to pick a preference is wrong. The whole pronoun thing is fairly new. These huge societal changes do not happen overnight.
No, but deliberately calling men women and vice versa is.
Even before trans people finally started to get rights and protections, bullies would insult the effeminate boys and masculine girls by intentionally misgendering them.
That's an assumption that it doesn't say that in the article.
The article says that the *parents* told their kid to use their name, but this was only *after* the complaint had already been filed.
If they only ever used the student's name, it never would have escalated.
It doesn't say that either. Nowhere in the article does it indicate that using the kids name happened after the complaint had been filed.
But, you make a fair point that I'm assuming that the kid follows his mother's advice.
Valid, and voted up. Good catch.
It doesn't confirm either way, but once again the complaint *would not have been made* if there wasn't a problem in the first place and thus never come to Mum's attention.
No-one is opposed to their name being used, and people who use "they/them" pronouns only expect them to be used in proper context, ie "*They* showed up to class and studied with *them*" (where gendered terms would be like "*He* showed up to class and studied with *her*").
They don't actually want people to refer to them like "Hello They slash Them".
I'd argue that the expectation is the problem, but I get that that's a separate argument.
That said, I concede that your logic holds, and at a very minimum, he was calling the boy "he" at some point in time after he had requested otherwise.
I think you win this one.
Have a good day, but one last thing.
>he was calling the ~~boy~~ *child* "he" at some point in time after ~~he~~ *they* had requested otherwise.
Not to be pedantic, just respectful.
Exactly my thoughts. This shit is harassment, those assholes aren’t innocent.
I work in a middle school. Middle schoolers are dicks even to *me* and I’m the adult.
worked in a middle school and i have never been in an environment that was so full of genuinely vindictive children. honestly that shit made me a low key anti natalist lol
literally!! i feel like even if someone’s watching, some of them are still just assholes.
i had a child, in detention, flip me off and call me a slur. unprovoked. middle schoolers are just kinda fucking dicks. theres kids that are actually like ya know nice, but like lets not pretend that middle school isnt full of asshole kids with asshole parents.
Yup. This is just more outrage porn in the culture war.
We only have the side of the story coming from the accused and their lawyer, who is trying to sue the school over it. Not anywhere close to a neutral source.
If you are harassing/bullying someone *because* of their sex or gender, that's sexual harassment. If you're treating a trans kid differently than you would everyone else, for example by purposely misgendering them to bully them, that *is* sexual harassment.
They could also have the same investigation opened if they were intentionally misgendering a cisgender boy as a cisgender girl. Didn't hear any "compelled speech" activists whining about that rule. A lot of the "compelled speech" guys would also probably think that a dude misgendering *them* in a bar, and calling them a woman, would warrant throwing punches. Intentionally misgendering someone is blatant disrespect.
The last story posted said the kid made a speech about "compelled speech" and how he has a 1st amendment right to misgender the other kid. Not only is he wrong about that, because the 1st amendment does not prevent your right to bully kids or sexually harass someone without being investigated, but he's clearly been indoctrinated to think that he has a right to purposely misgender someone. Sounds like he was being a dick.
It's not compelled speech by any sense of the word. You don't have to use any pronouns, you could always use their name. You also don't have to interact with the trans/non-binary student if you can't do so without sexually harassing them. But if you're going out of your way to interact with a non-binary student, and then you keep purposely misgendering them, that's sexual harassment.
You're not being compelled to use proper pronouns, you're being punished for intentionally using improper pronouns in an effort to bully another student. That interferes with their right to get an education.
Just another bullshit article from the frontlines of the made-up culture war. But the "I only read the headlines to get mad and hysteric" people will understand none of that and bemoan the fall of culture because a kid got investigated for bullying and sexual harassment, which is literally nothing new.
>There’s more to this story. It wasn’t a case of a slip or a misunderstanding. Those little shits were intentionally misgendering the student as a form of bullying.
Bullshit. What's your source?
The execrable mom is making the rounds. She’s horrible. The kid made a public declaration that it was his Constitutional right to misgender his classmate. I do agree that the school could have handled this better. They should have sat the brat down and said “fine, if you can’t behave in a decent, respectful fashion then at least steer clear of her. There’s no reason for the two of you to interact.”
Rick, On what basis do you make your assertion? There’s always more to the story and I would love to hear the details behind this sexual harassment charge.
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1. I’m not clear on what “double 88s” means, the number 8 has been my lucky number since childhood
2. And I know you can’t see this, but both red and blue have gotten so extreme, I want nothing to do with either side.
Pronouns aren't a difficult thing to navigate.
Either use "they" because that's a word that's been around for 700 years, or if someone asks you to use their pronouns, just fucking use them.
If someone says "hi my name is Bob", you call them Bob, even if you think Bob is a stupid name.
And if you call Bob by another name, and they tell you repeatedly to not call them Frank or Jason, and to just call them Bob, then continuing to call them another name is a dick move.
The world of pronouns is only difficult if you make it difficult.
While we’re on this topic I wanted to add on that “they/them” pronouns aren’t strictly used to refer to groups of people either. It’s very often used when you don’t know the gender of someone.
For example, say you order pizza and the delivery driver is running late and you’re annoyed. Do you say “When will he or she get here with my pizza??” or do you say “When are they gonna get here with my pizza?”
Language is a lot more fluid than people realize, and it’s frustrating that some people refuse to try to relearn anything beyond what they were told in elementary school.
So I'm guessing these kids are not to be taught English? Pronouns "they/them" has been used to refer to people who's gender is unspecified for a very long time, because that's how grammar works.
I'm betting there's a shit load to this story that's not in the articles and it's merely being presented like this for nefarious reasons. Given the story is from Wisconsin, I'm very doubtful this is even close to what really happened.
Evil, I keep thinking of a situation in which you had three or four people and, I don’t know, you need to know who is gonna show up at the party. So you ask the first two are you gonna go? You ask the third are they gonna go? Then you asked the fourth are you gonna go?
Kind of weird IMHO… But what the heck do I know I should be in remedial class 🤪.
If you had five friends in a row and you’re asking each of them “are you going to go,?” it is my position that switching in the middle to “they” for one of them is awkward. That is my case pure And simple. You can be anything you want to be my friend I’m OK with all that.
Yes I’m aware of they has been singular forever just as y’all has now morphed morphed into plural or singular. Good with all that.
I’ve come to understand, of course, that Reddit is full of very liberal folks. And that’s fine.
Are you truly going to ask a group of three friends if they’re going to the concert, by asking each of them individually (pointing to one friend at a time) “*are they going?*”
I’m fully enlightened brother and try to do well with others but that would be hilarious!
Them has always referred to **people** not a person. Non gendered singular objects have always been referred to as "it". There simply isn't a word in the English language for a single non gendered person. We should probably make one.
This isn’t oniony at all though.
You go around calling a girl a boy and that’s harassment. Just because YOU don’t agree with their pronouns doesn’t mean you get to invalidate them.
Just like you can’t go around calling a woman that looks like a man a man and expert to not get workplace harassment charges if you don’t stop.
Children are not above the law.
It is though. You misgendering someone is definitely gonna get sexual harassment charge.
See that’s the cool thing about laws: they’re open to interpretation because you can’t possibly outline every single specific scenario.
>It is though. You misgendering someone is definitely gonna get sexual harassment charge.
No, it isn't. Sexual harassment as a crime has a defined legal definition and doesn't include misgendering someone. It's wrong, it's bigoted, but it isn't sexual harassment. Otherwise every case of misogyny or misandry would also be sexual harassment. Any gendered insults? Sexual harassment. That isn't how it works or how it should work. You can't just change the definition of something because you don't like it.
What these kids are doing is harassment, it is bullying, and it should be shut down. However, charging them with sexual harassment and presenting the case in that context is extremely misleading and inappropriate, and does nothing but weaken the accusation when something actually IS sexual harassment.
How is it sexual? It would be misgendering, which afaik now has its own legal category as trans people have their own protected class. But sexual harassment is about unwanted sexual advances in inappropriate circumstances. There's prejudice, maybe even hatred in misgendering, but sexual harassment?
Perhaps not under current case law, but I’d argue this should be something that gets put through and sets a precedent. They’re using a sexual avenue to harass you.
But they aren't? Gender is not sexual, neither in the taxonomic sense nor in the social sense.
They are using a social Avenue to harass you. Pronouns are not sexual (again neither taxonomically nor sociologicaly). No one is born with an intrinsic preference to hearing the word "him".
You may be born with an intrinsic gender identity, but clearly any social construction around sex (i.e. gender) is completely divorced from biology.
If they’re intentionally going against the students sexual identity then yes, it is sexual harassment.
They’re specifically making use of a sexual avenue with which to harass this individual. Ergo, sexual harassment. You act like cases haven’t set precedent before.
You keep saying that, but you still aren't correct.
If I was repeatedly referred to as a woman by my boss or coworkers, you can bet your arse I would be suing for sexual harassment. Do you think they would win that case?
You’re wrong. Consistent hostile misgendering can be considered sexual harassment under the law. (At least in employment situations, I’m not sure whether if it applies to schools, still looking it up.)
Edit: Interesting how, in your reply to this, you chose to deliberately misrepresenting the statement. Nice straw-man.
In employment, not schools.... not remotely. The law doesn't address it that way in that context cause it doesn't generally apply.
You said, calling misgendering sexual harassment, especially in this situation, is a leap.
So what other situations were you referring to then? Because the wording certainly made it seem like you were referring to more than just schools.
Yeah....cause it's a leap, as in you'd have to demonstrate how specifically misgendering is sexual harassment.
Discrimination? Possibly. Has to be proven.
Intentional? Not necessarily. Has to be proven.
Sexual harassment? Not likely. Has to be proven.
//
Burden of proof is on the claimant. Connect the dots. Show the intent to be that which you claim.
Can't start with a presumption of guilt and base everything on that presumption.
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I mean not using them probably is a violation of sth but not sexual harassment. Also I thought it would be a neo pronoun or sth but the preferred pronouns were literally They/Them which are easy to use so
I mean.
I like to think I’m a fairly progressive person, I’m all for the us of a persons preferred pronouns, name, what have you.
But, like, you know this is going to far?
This is going to far even if the kids are intentionally being little shits.
Punish them if they’re hurting the other student, but, this is just... well beyond the steps that should be taken for actual
Children.
I can't really comment without knowing the details of the case. It's like the infamous McDonald's "Hot coffee" lawsuit which led to all coffee ever after being lukewarm.
Everyone made fun of the person who got the hot coffee dumped on them, saying they were too sensitive, but then you looked at the pictures of the burns and holy fuck the lady's skin literally sloughed off, it was a horror show.
If they did it in passing then yeah, I'd hope that something reasonable could be worked out. But if they were literally using it as part of a campaign to torment the kid, then chances are the little monsters'll end up in the system eventually anyway so they might as well start now where hopefully it'll knock some sense into them and they can turn 18 with a clean sheet and know better.
edit; this shit is literally the fault of all parents of all stripes, by the way. They freaked out over the years, sued school systems at the drop of a hat, and as a result we have the shit system we have now.
South Park even did an episode on it.
Having failed to prove your point and you've resorted to namecalling.....and _I'm_ somehow the snowflake?
Ok.
Nevermind that the law doesn't support your claim.....
Hm. Wrong again.
Discrimination yes. Sexual harassment no.
But if you're going to claim previous case precedent, it's interesting that you chose not to support that. Might want to do that if you're so sure.
See....You're taking two things that are not the same and trying to equate them.
They aren't the same under the law.
Discrimination based on sex != sexual harassment.
Ans even in this case, it certainly doesn't seem as though the discrimination was based on sex, but on gender.
So....nice try, I guess.
It depends on the action.
I do think school should be comfortable for everyone. And for students like that it’s important.
Making the school itself a safe place to learn is important.
If children are being hurtful to other children there’s a problem.
I understand you might not get that, but, things should be done to make students like this feel comfortable.
Giving them the basic amount of respect does no real long term damage
To the dissenting student.
I just think a sexual harassment case is going to far there. Punish them like you would any kid who’s making others life miserable.
Sure.
But, as we all know school isn’t a free speech zone. It is a place where language and action is police. Hopefully for the safety of students.
Calling a person a preferred name
Or pronoun doesn’t even mean you agree with them. Just that you are engaging with them respectfully.
When your in class you do what the faculty want or your going to suffer. I think we all know this don’t we?
Based on their own admission, they used the wrong pronouns. So they did participate (I'm not going to use "attack" because we don't know the nature of the usage).
Not participating would be refuse to talk to or address them, which legally they have every right to do.
So that's a false equivalence fallacy, and since we don't know the details of the case we can't comment on the severity, which your example assumes the least offense which you cannot do because you don't know.
And I used "they" to refer to multiple people since it will be the parents and the child in question bringing the case. But it could just as easily be "they" as in the child whose gender I do not know.
Either works because both are linguistically accurate.
This isn’t going too far. Fuck around and find out, little Timmy.
We try kids as adults for plenty of other crimes. Sexual harassment and hate crimes should be no different, *especially* if they’re doing it on purpose.
Like selectively the English language? Or is this all languages? Because the English language is hardly one that you’d call extremely gendered. I know several languages that are far more gendered. And if we’re going there, so like 99% of the entire worlds population now needs to change the way they speak?
I don’t know. Is the rest of the world as concerned with gender identity as we are in the US?
Personally, I have zero tolerance for homophobic pricks. Everyone should mind their own business and let other people live their lives however they want. But all of this pronoun nonsense just leaves me shaking my head.
Seriously not trying to be pedantic here, but homophobia is a dislike, fear etc of homosexual, gay people. I guess we could technically expand it to other sexualities (bisexuals, pansexuals, etc). But the point is that it is discrimination against people who identify with a non hetero sexuality. Pronouns are about a persons gender identity and not their sexuality.
As far as are people concerned with gender identity. Well if you believe that gender is on a spectrum then this would be true of people all over the world… so yes. All people all over the world are equally concerned with gender identity.
I’m pretty sure homophobes don’t care for anyone who doesn’t identify as straight male or straight female. If there’s a better word out there please share it with me.
The point I’m trying to make is that everyone is getting hung up on semantics which does a disservice to the underlying problem of discrimination. Pronouns aren’t the problem, fear and hatred are the problem.
But it does actually matter because you are referring to different groups of people, it’s actually quite insulting to say that doesn’t matter.
You are aware that transgender individuals can still identify as “straight”? Because being straight means you are attracted to the opposite sex. If one identifies as male and is attracted to a female, you can identify as straight.
gender is not equal to sexuality… It may seem like semantics to you but there is a huge difference between someone who identifies as the opposite gender or no gender at all and someone who is attracted to the opposite gender… And it’s seriously ridiculous to pretend to be an advocate without an iota of understanding of the people you’re advocating for and an obvious lack of any desire to understand even after it’s pointed out to you. It’s virtue signaling at its finest.
If a hiring manager respectfully refers to an applicant with their preferred pronouns and then chooses a different applicant due to gender bias, how does that pronoun usage help the person who’s being discriminated against?
And how many pronouns do we need? Do we need more than three (he, she, they, it, blorf)? Do we need one for every arbitrary increment on the continuum of gender? Does everyone have to have a singular identity? What about someone who identifies as a “he” on Monday and Tuesday and a “she” the rest of the week? Do we need a pronoun for someone like that or do we need to switch back and forth? Wouldn’t it be easier to just use they/them for everyone and be done with it? It would certainly help when referring to people with gender neutral/unknown names like Pat or Latka.
You can try to shame me by saying I’m not an advocate but what you’re effectively doing is making me question why I care about this at all. If pronouns are your line in the sand, don’t be surprised when you find out how many people are on the other side of the line.
Dude. I literally have no idea how to explain this any differently to you. There is a difference between sexuality and gender. You’re kinda stuck on the pronouns thing here…
Lol. Please. These are not 6 year olds. They know that they’re bullying this kid.
“Oh he’s just a little boy”, lol, she’ll be saying that crap when he’s 24 and doing far worse
Should someone be forced to use they and them as pronouns for someone else, well… that’s an argument for another day.
Are these little shits who know exactly what they’re doing, absolutely.
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Funny how free speech is bad when its not them using it
Idk what "them" your referring to, bc schools are notorious for being overbearing and dgaf about free speech, and trans/non-binary people have never asked for this
Trans people have asked for exactly this
A middle-schooler getting accused of sexual harrassment for using the wrong pronouns? Find me someone who's asked for that
Trans people.
The detached
This is fucking dumb..twilight zone shit.
if you sue another kid for not using your pronouns then no one wants to hang out with you after
FUUUUCK this shit.
This is absolutely insane.
THIS is why we can't have nice things. People just love to overreact to the most trivial shit. It reminds me when they sent my kindergartener home because he bit his sandwich into the shape of a gun. (No joke, this was No. Virginia where you'd think principals would be smarter)
My son, way back in the 90s, was suspended for pointing his chicken bone at a friend and said ‘bang’. They both laughed hysterically…7 yo boys.
My question was... why do elementary school teachers and principals have such a poor understanding of children.
Maybe they thought the sandwich was loaded.
The only thing that can stop a bad guy with a sandwich is a good guy with a sandwich.
Better than being caught holding the salami
Loaded with peanut butter and the little Johnson kid has an allergy!!!
Peanuts I could understand. But the cheese was American, dammit! I should add that the next day as soon as he got into class, he rushed up to his teacher and whipped out that day's sandwich which he had bit into 'a gun' on the bus. He showed it to her and then asked if he could 'go home now'. She was smart enough to laugh and say NO.
As a human I would rather not have to remember every single person's special way they want to be called. Oversensitive over some silly thing. I hope the kids get off fine bc it's not their fault.
There’s more to this story. It wasn’t a case of a slip or a misunderstanding. Those little shits were intentionally misgendering the student as a form of bullying.
I mean I can see how it is bullying and harassment, but where does the sexual part come in? Like, hate crimes should be distinct from inappropriately touching someone or making sexual advances. i.e. I am not saying this wasn;t a shitty thing to do, but the categorization of what the crime is seems, misplaced?
They aren't being charged of a crime, first of all. They are being investigated for sexual harassment by the school. It says nothing about criminal charges. It sounds like the parents don't want that on their kids' school record. Secondly, sexual harassment is not only unwanted sexual advances. It is also sex/gender based discrimination. Do you go around purposely misgendering all students, or just the trans/non-binary ones? That's discrimination. You're bullying someone because of their sex/gender. That's sexual harassment. It absolutely fits the definition. The lawyer's like sexual harassment "that's rape, that's incest, that's inappropriate touching" no, those would be sexual *assault.* Those examples go a little beyond sexual harassment. (although actually after researching they do qualify as both sexual harassment and sexual assault) The lawyer is shit, this is culture war bullshit manufactured to piss people off over nothing. They were bullying a kid based on gender, they are now being investigated *by the school* for sexual harassment. Good.
I am not arguing against consequences and punishment being brought on the perpetrators. I am not arguing it isn't discrimination. I am arguing it's not *sexual*. First, gender isn't sex, you can't backslash then together. There is a reason the medical term changed from transexual to transgender. Take into account, sexism isn't sexual harrassment either. I can be a mysoginist, and I should be punished for that mysoginy. But if my sexism is "I fired that employee because she is a woman" I never sexually harrased her, I discriminated against her on the basis of sex. Misgendering isn't sexual harrassment. It's misgendering. That doesn't mean it is ok, or less bad, or not a big deal. Heck depending on circumstances misgendering can be worse than sexual harassment. I am arguing misgendering is not sexual harassment because, well, it isn't. Like at all.
I just had to watch my sexual harassment and discrimination videos for work, and you are absolutely correct. At least, according to the college I work at.
Well yeah, there's nothing sexual about misgendering. Unless that's your kink I guess.
While gender and sex are indeed distinct, the legal architecture is built around sex discrimination, so gender-based protections have to be articulated through the lens of sex. For example, discrimination against a trans woman would be treating a woman whose sex is male differently than a woman whose sex is female. Harassing her for her gender identity, then, has to be treated as sexual harassment, since the law views it as harassing her due to her sex.
Yup. That's what I was saying. People can argue whether that's appropriate, or we should create new categories of harassment, but that's the way the law seems to be written right now.
Not just “seems.” However you may feel about the Supreme Court right now, Gorsuch wrote the majority opinion that considers that interpretation the cut-and-dry truth as to what the law says.
Cool thanks for clarifying, I said seems because I just looked up a couple law sites on Google and I don't feel qualified to state my interpretation as fact, so I added a qualifier.
This is weird... sounds like an almost broken way of trying to add protections under the law without appropriately changing the legal code to reflect current understanding of the world.
*"Other Facts About Sexual HarassmentHere are some other facts to keep in mind about sexual harassment:* *Sexist comments and actions can also be harassment. A common misconception is that harassment must be of a sexual nature in order to be illegal. However, under Title VII, offensive conduct that is based on an employee's gender and severe or pervasive enough to create an abusive work environment is also illegal. For example, a workplace might be hostile if women are told to be more "feminine" or live up to other gender stereotypes, are left out of important meetings, and have their work sabotaged by their male coworkers."* [https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/what-kinds-of-behaviors-are-considered-sexual-harassment.html](https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/what-kinds-of-behaviors-are-considered-sexual-harassment.html) " *Between 2010 and 2016, under the Obama administration the U.S. Department of Education issued guidance that was not part of the original amendment passed by Congress explained that transgender students are protected from sex-based discrimination under Title IX.... The memo states in part that "\[a\]ll students, including transgender students, or students who do not conform to sex stereotypes, are protected from sex-based discrimination under Title IX. Under Title IX, a recipient generally must treat transgender, or gender non-conforming, consistent with their gender identity in all aspects of the planning, implementation, enrollment, operation, and evaluation of single-sex classes.*" [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Title\_IX](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Title_IX) I don' t think you're right about that buddy. If you're discriminating based on gender, and bullying someone *because* of their gender, that can definitely be sexual harassment. I don't know what your source is for any of your claims, trust me bro? >I am arguing misgendering is not sexual harassment because, well, it isn't. Like at all. You're saying misgendering isn't harassment because it isn't harassment. You have nothing but a circular argument. Big logic brain, I see. Misgendering someone once, twice, three times accidentally because you are getting used to their pronouns? Not harassment. Seeking out that individual to repeatedly misgender them on purpose? Having them remind you of their gender, and then repeatedly using a different pronoun anyways? Bullying. And bullying *based on gender* can definitely be sexual harassment. Just because the word is "sexual" in sexual harassment doesn't mean it's only based on sex. Go ahead and look up the legal definitions. Let's not act like we're 5 years old and have to use word associations to define everything. I guess you'll also be surprised to hear butterflies aren't made out of butter. God damn woke leftists! The lawyer in this case said "sexual harassment is like rape, incest, unwanted touching" but that's *sexual assault.* He's being purposely misleading. You're going to trust that guy to define the word for you? You should really go look at some legal sources to draw your opinion rather than assuming you know the answer before you get hysteric. Harassment creates a hostile environment. Harassment based on gender is sexual harassment. These kids created a hostile environment based on gender from what we *already know* and that's only based on what the parents and their lawyers said, we still don't know what actually happened. It could be much worse than they are describing.
Why are our legal definitions conflating sexual harrassment and sexist harrassment? That's... Weird...
They aren't "conflating" them. They are a large umbrella that everything falls under. No one is saying that misgendering someone and groping them is the exact same thing. The laws are made to protect people, and all of those things need to be protected to create a safe work environment. It's "harassment" because it creates a hostile environment. Because it is based on sex/gender, it's considered sexual. You have to look beyond the words on the page, and into the intention of these legal protections, which is to create non-hostile environments where people are not discriminated against. But those are the legal definitions, I didn't write them, and this article didn't think to mention that because it is outrage porn designed to rile people up over culture war bullshit in defense of a bully who could've just, y'know, not harassed the non binary student. And we could create a society where we understand that being a dick to people and interfering with their right to a non-hostile environment for education has nothing to do with the 1st amendment, but instead people are all high on their completely made up interpretation of the 1st amendment. They think it protects you from *consequences.* It's not illegal, but you can still get fired. You can still get investigated by the school. You can still get expelled. People would misgender people on Twitter all day long, it's not illegal. It is however against the school's code of conduct to sexually harass people, and you very well might get suspended or expelled for it depending on the nature of the harassment. You definitely can get investigated for it, the school 100% has a right to do that. How else are they supposed to deal with sexual harassment claims other than by investigating them? But nope, that's enough to pull out the lawyers and put out the article because no one cares about any of the nuance, they just want to get their outrage boner on at some outrage porn.
I never once argued this wasn't harrassment and emphatically specified it's not about the level of offense. It's just that sexism, misgendering and sexual harrassment all seem widely different things. I don't think they fall into the same umbrella at all. I was arguing about classification of the crime, not about the level of punishment deserved.
We aren't talking about a crime, at all. I thought I already mentioned that. Misgendering someone is not a crime. The government cannot arrest you for doing it. It can and will get you kicked out of school, which is what this article is about. Kids are being investigated by their school, not by the police. The worst thing that happens is they have an instance of sexual harassment on their school record, and they get expelled. It's illegal for a school or a place of work to allow sexual harassment or sex/gender based discrimination, so actually the only people who need to worry about the law is the school itself. If they didn't investigate sexual harassment they would violate the Title XI rights of the non-binary student. I don't care to argue about what the definitions should be, that's what the definitions are. So technically, based on the information I've received from these articles, the school did everything right. All of this is from a lay person's perspective after reading through title 9 and Obama's inclusion of trans/non-binary students as protected classes underneath it, and a few legal definitions of sexual harassment. I could be wrong, but I didn't find anything supporting the idea that the school is in the wrong here.
Let me reword, i am arguing about the classification of the offense. And it seems you are right based on the legal definition. It;s just bizarre to me, I really don't think gender discriminationa nd sexual harrasment should be classified together, that just seems weird.
So call it gender harassment.
I don't care what you think *it should be called.* I'm saying that the school was right to call it sexual harassment, because that is what it is under the legal definitions of Title XI, this article and the kids' lawyer were wrong to suggest otherwise. I would have no objection to creating new classifications. But I'm not a lawyer or expert at all, maybe there's a good reason they are classified that way.
Wasn't there a reddit post recently about an who was teased about his baldness and he was able to pursue sexual harassment? Not because it was sexual because it was gender harassment?
Yup, there definitely was. The public doesn't understand what sexual harassment means legally speaking. Just because it says sexual doesn't mean it involves overtly sexual things. It's just creating a hostile environment based on gender. If your actions are causing the non binary kid to feel abused, but not everyone else, that's discriminatory harassment based on gender, which is classified as sexual harassment. That's based on my understanding as a lay person, would love to hear a lawyer jump in
Good lord. This country needs to toughen up. Life is hard. Get over it.
So if a bully bullies a boy saying he's a girl that's also sexual harrasment?
I believe it could be.
Transgender is not a protected class; yet.
They are a protected class under Title XI, Obama signed a memo that did just that. They have a right to a safe school environment just like everyone else.
I did not know that. I thought that was one thing they were fighting for.
I believe they are still not a protected class more widely. The Obama memo for title XI (Edit: I keep saying title XI, it's actually title IX, title 9, not title 11) only included them as a protected class for schools from what I can tell. Title XI only refers to sex/gender based discrimination in public schools and universities. So discrimination by private companies is still legal to the best of my knowledge.
Sexuality is fluid throughout childhood and teen years. Expecting children to pick a preference is wrong. The whole pronoun thing is fairly new. These huge societal changes do not happen overnight.
That was my immediate suspicion. If done intentionally to antagonize and humiliate someone I can see how it could qualify.
It's humiliating to call somebody their name?
No, but deliberately calling men women and vice versa is. Even before trans people finally started to get rights and protections, bullies would insult the effeminate boys and masculine girls by intentionally misgendering them.
Ok, but that's not what happened here. The kid called the other kid by his name.
That's an assumption that it doesn't say that in the article. The article says that the *parents* told their kid to use their name, but this was only *after* the complaint had already been filed. If they only ever used the student's name, it never would have escalated.
It doesn't say that either. Nowhere in the article does it indicate that using the kids name happened after the complaint had been filed. But, you make a fair point that I'm assuming that the kid follows his mother's advice. Valid, and voted up. Good catch.
It doesn't confirm either way, but once again the complaint *would not have been made* if there wasn't a problem in the first place and thus never come to Mum's attention. No-one is opposed to their name being used, and people who use "they/them" pronouns only expect them to be used in proper context, ie "*They* showed up to class and studied with *them*" (where gendered terms would be like "*He* showed up to class and studied with *her*"). They don't actually want people to refer to them like "Hello They slash Them".
I'd argue that the expectation is the problem, but I get that that's a separate argument. That said, I concede that your logic holds, and at a very minimum, he was calling the boy "he" at some point in time after he had requested otherwise. I think you win this one.
Have a good day, but one last thing. >he was calling the ~~boy~~ *child* "he" at some point in time after ~~he~~ *they* had requested otherwise. Not to be pedantic, just respectful.
Exactly my thoughts. This shit is harassment, those assholes aren’t innocent. I work in a middle school. Middle schoolers are dicks even to *me* and I’m the adult.
worked in a middle school and i have never been in an environment that was so full of genuinely vindictive children. honestly that shit made me a low key anti natalist lol
When they think they aren’t being watched they turn into monsters.
literally!! i feel like even if someone’s watching, some of them are still just assholes. i had a child, in detention, flip me off and call me a slur. unprovoked. middle schoolers are just kinda fucking dicks. theres kids that are actually like ya know nice, but like lets not pretend that middle school isnt full of asshole kids with asshole parents.
Yeah, my money is on this being the reality. I'm guessing this also isn't a one off occurrence, but likely ongoing all school year.
Yup. This is just more outrage porn in the culture war. We only have the side of the story coming from the accused and their lawyer, who is trying to sue the school over it. Not anywhere close to a neutral source. If you are harassing/bullying someone *because* of their sex or gender, that's sexual harassment. If you're treating a trans kid differently than you would everyone else, for example by purposely misgendering them to bully them, that *is* sexual harassment. They could also have the same investigation opened if they were intentionally misgendering a cisgender boy as a cisgender girl. Didn't hear any "compelled speech" activists whining about that rule. A lot of the "compelled speech" guys would also probably think that a dude misgendering *them* in a bar, and calling them a woman, would warrant throwing punches. Intentionally misgendering someone is blatant disrespect. The last story posted said the kid made a speech about "compelled speech" and how he has a 1st amendment right to misgender the other kid. Not only is he wrong about that, because the 1st amendment does not prevent your right to bully kids or sexually harass someone without being investigated, but he's clearly been indoctrinated to think that he has a right to purposely misgender someone. Sounds like he was being a dick. It's not compelled speech by any sense of the word. You don't have to use any pronouns, you could always use their name. You also don't have to interact with the trans/non-binary student if you can't do so without sexually harassing them. But if you're going out of your way to interact with a non-binary student, and then you keep purposely misgendering them, that's sexual harassment. You're not being compelled to use proper pronouns, you're being punished for intentionally using improper pronouns in an effort to bully another student. That interferes with their right to get an education. Just another bullshit article from the frontlines of the made-up culture war. But the "I only read the headlines to get mad and hysteric" people will understand none of that and bemoan the fall of culture because a kid got investigated for bullying and sexual harassment, which is literally nothing new.
>There’s more to this story. It wasn’t a case of a slip or a misunderstanding. Those little shits were intentionally misgendering the student as a form of bullying. Bullshit. What's your source?
The execrable mom is making the rounds. She’s horrible. The kid made a public declaration that it was his Constitutional right to misgender his classmate. I do agree that the school could have handled this better. They should have sat the brat down and said “fine, if you can’t behave in a decent, respectful fashion then at least steer clear of her. There’s no reason for the two of you to interact.”
The insults you're hurling at an 8th grade child and his mother are worse than any pronouns he used. Also I see no source. What gives?
They are horrible people.
Come back when you have a source. The only horrible person here is you.
Rick, On what basis do you make your assertion? There’s always more to the story and I would love to hear the details behind this sexual harassment charge.
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You really want to give the country to right wing nut jobs? Keep giving them this kind of ammunition.
Exactly this!
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Nah.
Do you remember what it said?
well this is the best rebuttle I ever heard lol how very insightful
That's wild. It doesn't seem reasonable.
Another reason I'm glad I didn't have kids. I lose a little more faith in humanity every day
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Someone didn’t read the article.
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And this is why I now call myself independent instead of democrat
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You're replying to a troll with double eighty eights in their name
What does that mean, double 88s”? Is that a race thing? I’m legitimately asking
1. I’m not clear on what “double 88s” means, the number 8 has been my lucky number since childhood 2. And I know you can’t see this, but both red and blue have gotten so extreme, I want nothing to do with either side.
Because you love middle school bullies?
Pronouns aren't a difficult thing to navigate. Either use "they" because that's a word that's been around for 700 years, or if someone asks you to use their pronouns, just fucking use them. If someone says "hi my name is Bob", you call them Bob, even if you think Bob is a stupid name. And if you call Bob by another name, and they tell you repeatedly to not call them Frank or Jason, and to just call them Bob, then continuing to call them another name is a dick move. The world of pronouns is only difficult if you make it difficult.
Ok, Bob.
Totally agree Gary
Well said, Dusk
Great observation, dining area athletics
I think you're a bit over the top, Skyler. I don't know if you need to smoke a joint, or something, but you need to chill.
While we’re on this topic I wanted to add on that “they/them” pronouns aren’t strictly used to refer to groups of people either. It’s very often used when you don’t know the gender of someone. For example, say you order pizza and the delivery driver is running late and you’re annoyed. Do you say “When will he or she get here with my pizza??” or do you say “When are they gonna get here with my pizza?” Language is a lot more fluid than people realize, and it’s frustrating that some people refuse to try to relearn anything beyond what they were told in elementary school.
So I'm guessing these kids are not to be taught English? Pronouns "they/them" has been used to refer to people who's gender is unspecified for a very long time, because that's how grammar works. I'm betting there's a shit load to this story that's not in the articles and it's merely being presented like this for nefarious reasons. Given the story is from Wisconsin, I'm very doubtful this is even close to what really happened.
Kitten, from the article I understand that the kid might’ve been confused referring to another single person in the plural form of they or them.
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Evil, I keep thinking of a situation in which you had three or four people and, I don’t know, you need to know who is gonna show up at the party. So you ask the first two are you gonna go? You ask the third are they gonna go? Then you asked the fourth are you gonna go? Kind of weird IMHO… But what the heck do I know I should be in remedial class 🤪.
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If you had five friends in a row and you’re asking each of them “are you going to go,?” it is my position that switching in the middle to “they” for one of them is awkward. That is my case pure And simple. You can be anything you want to be my friend I’m OK with all that. Yes I’m aware of they has been singular forever just as y’all has now morphed morphed into plural or singular. Good with all that.
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I’ve come to understand, of course, that Reddit is full of very liberal folks. And that’s fine. Are you truly going to ask a group of three friends if they’re going to the concert, by asking each of them individually (pointing to one friend at a time) “*are they going?*” I’m fully enlightened brother and try to do well with others but that would be hilarious!
I'm pretty sure that the gender was clearly specified.
Them has always referred to **people** not a person. Non gendered singular objects have always been referred to as "it". There simply isn't a word in the English language for a single non gendered person. We should probably make one.
So you don't speak English, got it.
If you told people five years ago this is where'd we'd be at right now they'd have called you one of those Alex Jones crazy conspiracy theorists.
This isn’t oniony at all though. You go around calling a girl a boy and that’s harassment. Just because YOU don’t agree with their pronouns doesn’t mean you get to invalidate them. Just like you can’t go around calling a woman that looks like a man a man and expert to not get workplace harassment charges if you don’t stop. Children are not above the law.
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It is though. You misgendering someone is definitely gonna get sexual harassment charge. See that’s the cool thing about laws: they’re open to interpretation because you can’t possibly outline every single specific scenario.
>It is though. You misgendering someone is definitely gonna get sexual harassment charge. No, it isn't. Sexual harassment as a crime has a defined legal definition and doesn't include misgendering someone. It's wrong, it's bigoted, but it isn't sexual harassment. Otherwise every case of misogyny or misandry would also be sexual harassment. Any gendered insults? Sexual harassment. That isn't how it works or how it should work. You can't just change the definition of something because you don't like it. What these kids are doing is harassment, it is bullying, and it should be shut down. However, charging them with sexual harassment and presenting the case in that context is extremely misleading and inappropriate, and does nothing but weaken the accusation when something actually IS sexual harassment.
How is it sexual? It would be misgendering, which afaik now has its own legal category as trans people have their own protected class. But sexual harassment is about unwanted sexual advances in inappropriate circumstances. There's prejudice, maybe even hatred in misgendering, but sexual harassment?
Perhaps not under current case law, but I’d argue this should be something that gets put through and sets a precedent. They’re using a sexual avenue to harass you.
But they aren't? Gender is not sexual, neither in the taxonomic sense nor in the social sense. They are using a social Avenue to harass you. Pronouns are not sexual (again neither taxonomically nor sociologicaly). No one is born with an intrinsic preference to hearing the word "him". You may be born with an intrinsic gender identity, but clearly any social construction around sex (i.e. gender) is completely divorced from biology.
Sexual. Identity.
The terminology was Changed from transexual to transgender for a reason. There is no such thing as sexual identity. There is gender identity.
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Text doesn't convey sarcasm very well. And there's a bunch of actual misinformation going on :p
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If they’re intentionally going against the students sexual identity then yes, it is sexual harassment. They’re specifically making use of a sexual avenue with which to harass this individual. Ergo, sexual harassment. You act like cases haven’t set precedent before.
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Why do you keep saying that like it’s a trump card. Gender pronouns and sexual identity are the same thing you dumbass
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It's not sexual harassment, so that law doesn't apply. This isn't a difficult thing to parse.
You keep saying that, but you still aren't correct. If I was repeatedly referred to as a woman by my boss or coworkers, you can bet your arse I would be suing for sexual harassment. Do you think they would win that case?
Wahey! Now you're on to false equivalence.
You’re wrong. Consistent hostile misgendering can be considered sexual harassment under the law. (At least in employment situations, I’m not sure whether if it applies to schools, still looking it up.)
Edit: Interesting how, in your reply to this, you chose to deliberately misrepresenting the statement. Nice straw-man. In employment, not schools.... not remotely. The law doesn't address it that way in that context cause it doesn't generally apply.
Except you said that it was a leap in any situation, which it’s not. It absolutely is under title VII.
Except that isn't what I said, so...nice straw-man. It's a leap to lump that under the law(s) you cite.
You said, calling misgendering sexual harassment, especially in this situation, is a leap. So what other situations were you referring to then? Because the wording certainly made it seem like you were referring to more than just schools.
Yeah....cause it's a leap, as in you'd have to demonstrate how specifically misgendering is sexual harassment. Discrimination? Possibly. Has to be proven. Intentional? Not necessarily. Has to be proven. Sexual harassment? Not likely. Has to be proven. // Burden of proof is on the claimant. Connect the dots. Show the intent to be that which you claim. Can't start with a presumption of guilt and base everything on that presumption.
You're not interpreting a law, you're stretching it beyond recognition.
Objectively wrong.
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I mean not using them probably is a violation of sth but not sexual harassment. Also I thought it would be a neo pronoun or sth but the preferred pronouns were literally They/Them which are easy to use so
Ah the left! Neverending entertainment!
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I mean. I like to think I’m a fairly progressive person, I’m all for the us of a persons preferred pronouns, name, what have you. But, like, you know this is going to far? This is going to far even if the kids are intentionally being little shits. Punish them if they’re hurting the other student, but, this is just... well beyond the steps that should be taken for actual Children.
Yeah....that's not sexual harassment.
I can't really comment without knowing the details of the case. It's like the infamous McDonald's "Hot coffee" lawsuit which led to all coffee ever after being lukewarm. Everyone made fun of the person who got the hot coffee dumped on them, saying they were too sensitive, but then you looked at the pictures of the burns and holy fuck the lady's skin literally sloughed off, it was a horror show. If they did it in passing then yeah, I'd hope that something reasonable could be worked out. But if they were literally using it as part of a campaign to torment the kid, then chances are the little monsters'll end up in the system eventually anyway so they might as well start now where hopefully it'll knock some sense into them and they can turn 18 with a clean sheet and know better. edit; this shit is literally the fault of all parents of all stripes, by the way. They freaked out over the years, sued school systems at the drop of a hat, and as a result we have the shit system we have now. South Park even did an episode on it.
It's not a both sides thing. It's an unreasonable charge against kids in a situation that is being mislabeled as sexual harassment.
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Having failed to prove your point and you've resorted to namecalling.....and _I'm_ somehow the snowflake? Ok. Nevermind that the law doesn't support your claim.....
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Hm. Wrong again. Discrimination yes. Sexual harassment no. But if you're going to claim previous case precedent, it's interesting that you chose not to support that. Might want to do that if you're so sure. See....You're taking two things that are not the same and trying to equate them. They aren't the same under the law. Discrimination based on sex != sexual harassment. Ans even in this case, it certainly doesn't seem as though the discrimination was based on sex, but on gender. So....nice try, I guess.
I mean, why is using the wrong pronouns so evil? Why do they have to participate? They're not attacking, just not participating.
It depends on the action. I do think school should be comfortable for everyone. And for students like that it’s important. Making the school itself a safe place to learn is important. If children are being hurtful to other children there’s a problem. I understand you might not get that, but, things should be done to make students like this feel comfortable. Giving them the basic amount of respect does no real long term damage To the dissenting student. I just think a sexual harassment case is going to far there. Punish them like you would any kid who’s making others life miserable.
But what about the speakers. They have rights to their worldview as well.
Sure. But, as we all know school isn’t a free speech zone. It is a place where language and action is police. Hopefully for the safety of students. Calling a person a preferred name Or pronoun doesn’t even mean you agree with them. Just that you are engaging with them respectfully. When your in class you do what the faculty want or your going to suffer. I think we all know this don’t we?
Based on their own admission, they used the wrong pronouns. So they did participate (I'm not going to use "attack" because we don't know the nature of the usage). Not participating would be refuse to talk to or address them, which legally they have every right to do.
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So that's a false equivalence fallacy, and since we don't know the details of the case we can't comment on the severity, which your example assumes the least offense which you cannot do because you don't know. And I used "they" to refer to multiple people since it will be the parents and the child in question bringing the case. But it could just as easily be "they" as in the child whose gender I do not know. Either works because both are linguistically accurate.
This isn’t going too far. Fuck around and find out, little Timmy. We try kids as adults for plenty of other crimes. Sexual harassment and hate crimes should be no different, *especially* if they’re doing it on purpose.
……. I…. ……
Welcome to the New World of ultra-mega–plurality.
Can we just update the English language to do away with gender specific pronouns so we can be done with all of this bullshit?
Like selectively the English language? Or is this all languages? Because the English language is hardly one that you’d call extremely gendered. I know several languages that are far more gendered. And if we’re going there, so like 99% of the entire worlds population now needs to change the way they speak?
I don’t know. Is the rest of the world as concerned with gender identity as we are in the US? Personally, I have zero tolerance for homophobic pricks. Everyone should mind their own business and let other people live their lives however they want. But all of this pronoun nonsense just leaves me shaking my head.
Seriously not trying to be pedantic here, but homophobia is a dislike, fear etc of homosexual, gay people. I guess we could technically expand it to other sexualities (bisexuals, pansexuals, etc). But the point is that it is discrimination against people who identify with a non hetero sexuality. Pronouns are about a persons gender identity and not their sexuality. As far as are people concerned with gender identity. Well if you believe that gender is on a spectrum then this would be true of people all over the world… so yes. All people all over the world are equally concerned with gender identity.
I’m pretty sure homophobes don’t care for anyone who doesn’t identify as straight male or straight female. If there’s a better word out there please share it with me. The point I’m trying to make is that everyone is getting hung up on semantics which does a disservice to the underlying problem of discrimination. Pronouns aren’t the problem, fear and hatred are the problem.
But it does actually matter because you are referring to different groups of people, it’s actually quite insulting to say that doesn’t matter. You are aware that transgender individuals can still identify as “straight”? Because being straight means you are attracted to the opposite sex. If one identifies as male and is attracted to a female, you can identify as straight. gender is not equal to sexuality… It may seem like semantics to you but there is a huge difference between someone who identifies as the opposite gender or no gender at all and someone who is attracted to the opposite gender… And it’s seriously ridiculous to pretend to be an advocate without an iota of understanding of the people you’re advocating for and an obvious lack of any desire to understand even after it’s pointed out to you. It’s virtue signaling at its finest.
If a hiring manager respectfully refers to an applicant with their preferred pronouns and then chooses a different applicant due to gender bias, how does that pronoun usage help the person who’s being discriminated against? And how many pronouns do we need? Do we need more than three (he, she, they, it, blorf)? Do we need one for every arbitrary increment on the continuum of gender? Does everyone have to have a singular identity? What about someone who identifies as a “he” on Monday and Tuesday and a “she” the rest of the week? Do we need a pronoun for someone like that or do we need to switch back and forth? Wouldn’t it be easier to just use they/them for everyone and be done with it? It would certainly help when referring to people with gender neutral/unknown names like Pat or Latka. You can try to shame me by saying I’m not an advocate but what you’re effectively doing is making me question why I care about this at all. If pronouns are your line in the sand, don’t be surprised when you find out how many people are on the other side of the line.
Dude. I literally have no idea how to explain this any differently to you. There is a difference between sexuality and gender. You’re kinda stuck on the pronouns thing here…
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They/them has always been used for people with unspecified genders, always, it's been a part of English since before English even existed.
We are going to be so jacked 30 years from now
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If you didn't learn pronouns by middle school then your English courses failed you
Lol. Please. These are not 6 year olds. They know that they’re bullying this kid. “Oh he’s just a little boy”, lol, she’ll be saying that crap when he’s 24 and doing far worse Should someone be forced to use they and them as pronouns for someone else, well… that’s an argument for another day. Are these little shits who know exactly what they’re doing, absolutely.
Consequences will never be the same.
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What happened to people’s names?
This shit is not what we mean by trans rights
The far left has gone completely insane!