And yet you’re totally incorrect! I have absolute respect for gender transitioning individuals. Interwebs doesn’t always allow people to understand one another personally all that well, you know. Btw, love the Cowgirl Ed avatar. 
FYI: Manning identified as female long before these recent revelations.
It’s still entirely inappropriate to do this.
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Well, I already apologized. There aren’t too many guidebooks on the politically correct way to refer to shifting gender over time. True story, have a friend who was female when I met her in college. Transitioned to male some years ago. When I refer to this individual in the past I use his former female name and say “her” and when I,refer to him in the present I use his current male name and say “he.” No disrespect intended, and didn’t realize it was a faux pas? Again, apologies for the abbreviation that made some people instantly jump the the conclusion I’m some anti-LGBT asshole. Anything but, frankly.
As a transgendered American, (and ex service member), I found that use of the pronoun entirely inappropriate. Others may disagree and that’s their right. My subjective opinion is that it’s offensive. I know damned well it would have offended me.
I like Edward Wong Hau Pepelu Tivrusky IV.
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I hear there’s like, a whole internet.
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It’s still entirely inappropriate to do this.
It’s a pronoun. It’s a word used as a referential identifier. The entire point of a pronoun is to convey a degree of specificity regarding which person one is refering to out of the possible options available linguistically.
For example, “John and Marsha live in France, but he is currently in England.” The purpose of “he” in this sentence is to identify which of the two people, John and Marsha, are currently in England. The purpose is not to make some sort of judgement about John’s personal identity or gender roles or anything like that. Those are all unfortunate tangential complications which are linguistically unimportant.
Gender has been incredibly heavily cemented into language over the centuries not because of some sort of overt political agenda or conspiracy, but because it has historically been convenient. When speaking about one person out of a group of others, you could use gendered pronouns to quickly and “cleanly” separate the whole into two differing categories, and at the same time convey a lot of information that would otherwise take a great many more words to get across.
This was of course only possible due to the patriarchial nature of civilization for the past few millenia, but that was the way things were, and you can’t expect language not to conform to the reality of the culture in which it develops.
But now societal values are different. Patriarchy, thank goodness, is losing steam to be replaced with a more meritrocratic, egalitarian form of thinking. But these values have changed very, very quickly, speaking in terms of a historical perspective. Language has simply failed to keep pace.
We do not yet have a proper, deeply rooted, “appropriate” set of rules for how to use pronouns to refer to people who undergo not only radical shifts in how they personally identify, but also radical shifts in their own physical appearance. Dividing people based on their appearance into “he” and “she” categories is still so very damn convenient, and we haven’t come up with a suitable replacement yet that people have managed to agree upon.
Well, technically we already have some, but they aren’t fully accepted.
“It” is linguistically suitable and has a long history of usage, but unfortunately it is associated with reference to non-human beings or to objects, and hence people don’t like referring to people as “it” in most situations.
There are, of course, invented pronouns like “ze” and it’s relatives, but the problem is that invented language never works - you have to develop language organically, it has to “catch on”. Just look at Esperanto - a brilliant idea, except no one wants to speak it.
Of course, there’s also the system most of the world already uses - the “generic” he, or the usage of the masculine form of a pronoun to refer to both genders inclusively when speaking of groups, reverting to the feminine form only to specifically denote an individual of that gender. However, this has historically been criticized by feminists on the grounds of gender bias, so it too is problematic.
“One” is likewise already extant, but suffers from limited versatility. We use it pretty much exclusively for statements of generality, rather than specificity. To say “John talked to one yesterday about one’s use of gendered pronouns” sounds stilted and vague.
Ultimately, I don’t think you or anyone else can really say which pronoun usage is “appropriate”. The language has yet to develop far enough in that respect for us to speak definitively about it. I personally see nothing wrong with the usage of “s/he” when someone is speaking of a transgendered individual, especially if they are using it to convey a sense of dichotomy, change, or uncertainty.
Language, folks. Get over it.
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yeah, they don’t print them out because there generally pretty short:
rule 1: Refer to the person in the gender they identify themselves by, regardless of tense.
rule 2: dont be a dick.
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- I literally came here hoping to get angry at transgender pronoun
misuse trolls, - I liked nearly every post that used the correct pronoun for Ms
Manning. - Im so angry/happy right now
I think i have some sort of problem, it may be the internet.
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rule 3: rule 2 may be self annihilating depending on how you feel about the word “dick” being used to mean a cruel/stupid person.
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the thing i like most about the internet is that there is allays someone who can double-down on your self-righteous ranting
mea culpa.
There’s no such thing as a “correct” pronoun, merely an accurate or useful one.
It’s no more “incorrect” or “wrong” to say “he” when referring to Manning as it is to say “it”, “ze”, “thon”, or anything else - so long as your word choice isn’t obviously, intentionally pejorative, of course.
In this case, the usage of “s/he” was clearly not pejorative, and I find the severely offended reactions to such an innocent usage to be regretable and somewhat depressing. A speaker or a writer has the right to choose the words they feel comfortable using, assuming they do so with no ill-will. If someone feels most comfortable with “s/he”, merely take that as being reflective of the speaker or writer’s uncertainty about the person in question, rather than as a condemnation or a criticism about their gender and identity choices, much less larger socio-political interests.
I hate biting on these things but i think i can see you arguing clarity of author’s intent when there is none.
in this case, other then the authors own apology afterwords the only clue we have as to the intent of the ‘sub-optimal’ pronoun is that it is also used by people when they wish to be derogatory or discriminate against transgender persons.
given that the rest of the post is somewhat critical of Ms Manning’s statement, the assumption that the person is being intentionally antagonistic is safer then the assumption that they are not. - though granted, both are still assumptions.
Well, all I can suggest is to try to give people the benefit of the doubt. It’s one thing to speak out against clear ill intent, and quite another to chastize someone who may simply be guilty of being too vague or indefinite in their word choice. Innocent until proven guilty and all that.
Politically correct? ding ding ding
Nothing political about it. It’s called having good manners. Morally correct.
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You speak as if manners or morals were some sort of universal constant.
In Iran, it is a grave breech of manners and morals for a young woman to attend a public soccer match, and yet I highly doubt you agree with that way of thinking. There are certain cultures in the world, still extant today, which practice ritual cannibalism of the deceased, and for a family member not to partake would be most grievously ill-mannered and amoral. Yet I will say with near certainty that the mere concept of cannibalism is abhorant to you, so much so that it might even make you physically ill merely to consider it.
Just because you personally think one particular way of speaking or thinking is right, doesn’t mean it necessarily is - particularly in regards to a portion of human culture that is rapidly and unevenly changing in ways that have essentially never been seen before. Gender identity has literally never been this fluid, on a scale this large. There is no obvious, objectively correct way to cope with the effects this sorts of changes are having on global cultures. So please don’t act like there is, or use such a misguided belief as justification to berate others merely because they don’t agree with you on what is “good mannered” or “morally correct”.
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You’re not wrong, but if I politely asked that you refer to me in the future as Galactic President Superstar McAwesomeville, what’s the harm in agreeing to that request?
I mean, even if you disagree with it, why not acquiesce to a polite request regarding one’s name, perhaps the one single solitary subject every individual is entitled to be the preeminent expert in the world on?
Because I have less interest in acquiescing to your particular eccentric whim than I do in addressing you in a convenient and understandable manner. No offense. 
There may not be any substantial harm in meeting your request, but at the same time I may have perfectly valid reasons of my own for not meeting it.
Also, the comparison to a “polite request regarding one’s name” is misplaced, for two reasons. First, a pronoun is not a name, but stands in for one. Second, a polite request is a direct personal interaction - in this context the trial of PFC Manning is a topic of general discussion and a matter of current events, and Manning is not a friend or an acquaintance making a personal request of an individual.
Respecting the legal wishes of others is pretty universally ‘correct’. It’s a basic cornerstone of freedom. But yes, out of context, in some countries some people wish to oppress others. Is that relevant?
‘Politically correct’ is a term generally used by people who wish to dismiss something that’s considerate to the wishes of others as something dictated by law. As if to imply the only reason anyone does it is because
they have to.
It translates almost directly to “I have to be polite to you, but only because I have to, and I want you to know that I’d rather not be”. It’s belittling.
I’ll refer to Manning as a ‘she’ because that’s her wish, not because anyone is making me do it. By labelling that act as ‘politically correct’ implies the opposite. It alters my reason for doing something. It’s cheap and a tactic primarily employed by tabloid newspapers and bigots.
I would argue that what you’re describing is ‘cultural correctness’; which is a far less weighted term.
(Sorry for all the edits)
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As I pointed out, as a transgendered person, I was very offended when people have referred to me in that manner. Why? Because we spend our entire lives being treated in such a way. My brother did it to be disrespectful, three of my ex bosses did it in order to justify firing me. Maybe you should judge less before you know what you’re talking about. While what you’re saying about the LANGUAGE may be correct, you have a whole lot to learn about how cruel people can be toward transgendered folks. It’s about dehumanizing people, it’s about treating us as “less than”. I don’t know who convinced you that you know everything there is to know but they did you a disservice.
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Legal wishes?
I say again - a pronoun is not a name. I can refer to you as “it” all day long, no matter what your legal name is, and no one has a leg to stand on objecting to that.
“Politically correct” is actually a term used to refer to the act of stating something potentially controversial or divisive in a weak or noncommital way, so as to appeal to the largest number of people and avoid appearing to disagree with the same. The term originates from this sort of behavior being used by politicians - calling a the Vietnam War a “police action” is a perfect example of the trope. The conflict was clearly a war, but the “politically correct” way of referring to it was as to use a less controversial phrase.
Thus, in actuality, “politically correct” is the opposite of what you are complaining about. Instead of referring to something in a way that shows you don’t care about who might or might not be offended - for example, calling a war “a war” and calling torture “torture” - a “politically correct” person is entirely concerned with not risking alienating others by their word choice, and instead talks about “police actions” and “enhanced interrogation techniques”. Consequently, you’re decrying the very trait you yourself are unwittingly displaying.
As for your own motivations for referring to PFC Manning with one pronoun over other, your own personal choices are not a benchmark for the behaviors of others. While you feel that your choice of pronoun is a sign of respect, others may feel that their choice of pronoun is immaterial or trivial. Each is merely a personal opinion, not fact nor even mere rational conclusion.
Again, if the choice of pronoun was clearly intended to be an attack or similar, this would be very different discussion.
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