• Teacher refused to use trans student's pronouns, school fires him.
    213 replies, posted
If one person gets a special pronoun, shouldn't we all just choose to do the same? I don't fully understand the need to invent pronouns. I'll refer to you as whatever variant of "he/she" you'd like and never make a peep about it, but I'm unclear on why I need to respect invented pronouns? I don't think it really benefits anyone to have those, to be quite honest.
But you could certainly think I was. The key is, no one else would
I can consider anything anyone does to be an “asshole” move, it’s not a good metric to base things on.
Yeah, but but it's up to the school faculty to determine if the behaviour present is acceptable, so it really is if they think he's an asshole.
It's still intentionally avoiding calling them by their pronoun and also treating someone differently than you would anyone else, because the person in question is trans. On top of that, unless they got a one-syllable name like Bob or Sue, you're gonna have some really awkward sentences when you have to refer to them several times in a short timespan. Just think of the last conversation you had about a third person, and try to count the times you used 'he' or 'she' to refer to that person. Now replace all of those with a full name instead. It just doesn't work. No, that'd be quite right to do. And having a game-plan isn't bad, it means you've put some thought into how not to be an ass ahead of time.
This poster is a model for how the world should be. In reality every faction is divided with their own dogma and stigmas towards each other.
I fail to see how attempting to negate an issue is harassment, trying to avoid an issue that both sides have opposing views on is the only logical solution in a situation when neither party is going to change their view. You treat this like its a black and white scenario, you either hate trans folk and are racist or are loving and caring but thats never realistic in practise. If he was refusing to do anything of the sort then yeah fair enough, but in this situation you effectively have someone trying to meet in the middle but having the ideals of someone else forced on them, the exact thing that everyone is so up in arms about against this guy.
“Judge not, and you will not be judged; condemn not, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you will be forgiven;" -Luke 6:37 I don't get why this is hard for some people
So are you saying we should fire teachers because students consider them assholes? If your perspective is "literally anything goes and you're just an asshole for not referring to anyone however they please", you're setting up a shitty situation that's waiting for abuse. There has to be an actual line here.
ummm... no?? The school faculty and board decides whether or not to fire him for that reason
Yes, and they would come to that decision by looking at the behavior of the teacher and judging it, and the end result of your logic is that refusing to use made-up pronouns would be a justifiable reason to fire someone. You refuse to acknowledge that not every preferred pronoun is a reasonable request made upon others. If every preferred pronoun is reasonable, by your logic, then of course teachers should be fired for not following reasonable requests. What I'm asking you is where the line is, and so far the only answers you have given are essentially that there is no line; that ignoring any and all requests to refer to someone in a particular way makes you an asshole. I don't think you can reasonably justify that answer.
And that would obviously be part of their consideration as well?
https://media.giphy.com/media/ohdY5OaQmUmVW/giphy.gif
TBH the vast majority of trans people I met used "he/she" and in some cases, "they" if they were more unsure. I don't think I actually met in real life a person who actually uses "invented" pronouns, maybe online once. I almost wonder if "they are inventing new pronouns because they are special snowflakes!!!1!!" is a thing more riled up by transphobes rather than actual transgender people.
Try playing lots of VRChat in VR. It's fixed my language right up because you literally cannot tell someone's gender in that game, even sometimes while talking to people. You learn really quickly to use "they" in place of any pronoun, or just refer to them by name, and its just become part of my vernacular to never refer to someone by gendered pronouns. (They/Their/They're works and doesn't sound awkward in pretty much every situation.)
Honestly I don't get why posts like this always seem to just get a slap on the wrist, especially when they're by people with history like Chryseus.
I think its more that the lines are a bit blurred on what parts of the pronouns issue is limited to what, as in what is something thats an issue to trans people and whats an issue to others like genderfluid etc. A few people I went to highschool ended up on the genderfluid train and are all in on those crazy long made up genders but also associate themselves heavily with trans topics so it becomes a bit muddled together. Its probably less a trans-phobic thing and more just it being hard to tell them apart, especially when the the later example is far more vocal than any trans person I've ever known.
People actually complaining about having to go the monumental effort of gendering people correctly unreal
Disclaimer, this is my opinion and I just comment my two cents. Feel free to disagree, but this is blown way out of proportion. Yeah, and apparently, what I find most ridiculous, is that a lot of people genuinely believe that avoiding using pronoun to avoid conflict of personal beliefs and using the name directly is harrasment. What the fuck is wrong in your lives that you resort to such mental gymnastics just to find a thing to be offended at. Somebody here posted along the lines "its not rocket science to call somebody by his preferred noun", well guess what not everybody in this world is as enlightened as you are. Some people were raised with a certain package of beliefs, in this context the person is a devout Christian, which is, remind you, the "go-to religion" of the West. Him being uncapable to understand how is it possible for a person to suddenly become reversed gender is perfectly reasonable due to the upbringing and values he has. He was born in a generation where this thing was unheard of. What I also do not understand that if you are so compassionate about this subject, why do you not understand and forgive his ignorance? Instead of actively looking for enemies of your gender politics state you should at very least be more reasonable and respectful that somebody else holds different beliefs, but goes beyond the issue by offering a compromise. But hey, turns out thats still bullying a person because you do not recognize his gender since you use his name instead. One of the dumbest shit I read here.
Oldpunch ban history doesn't exist anymore. We basically have to either go by memory, or their newpunch ban history. Sorry!
I think the people asking "Well intentionally misgendering a student is wrong but what if they have a totally weird one like xer?" have to realize how seriously few people go by those. And more often than not they just say "Oh and you can just use they/them too."
part of your job as a teacher is to be respectful. yes. teachers should be coerced into being good teachers, and if they cannot be coerced, they should be replaced with good teachers. that's just...common sense, not anything horrible. "Coercion" isn't automatically bad dude, you're using it as a bit of a bogeyman word. You don't keep someone who can't do the job, you get someone who can.
This is a bit over the top in my opinion. The obvious 'slip up' shouldn't be held against him because it's so easy to do, particularly because he was familiar with the student and was probably used to referring to 'her'. I know I'm not supposed to swear in front of my young nephew, but when I've just dropped a glass on the floor and reflexively say 'Oh shit', I wasn't exactly stopping to think about my language. It’s not suggested that the 47-year-old West Point High School French teacher deliberately referred to the student using female pronouns in the student’s presence
it's because he's literally only wanting to use the name because he wants to avoid using pronouns at all, and acknowledging them as who they are
Exactly, and yet it reads that it was the school itself and not even the student who took offense to this. Consciously deciding not to use 'offensive' words and trying to find a compromise to avoid the issue altogether is now something that can cost you your job. This is a problem.
I dont excuse racists because thats just how it was when they grew up, so i dont excuse religious assholes for being transphobic or homophobic.
just looking at this thread makes me glad for what I have jesus chrsit
I feel like there's an inaccurate perception of where the line gets drawn on these things and when they get considered harassment. if you call me by my old name that I hate, just once, that's totally understandable and fine, I'll correct you and we'll move on. if you do it repeatedly and intentionally I'm going to be fucking pissed because that shit physically hurts. children are probably going to be more sensitive to misgendering so it makes sense to take it more seriously then.
Also I've never seen him post before so I was really going off that singular post.
Nobody in the article was being purposefully misgendered.
Sorry, you need to Log In to post a reply to this thread.