[0] https://nb-in-sf.tumblr.com/post/186129553898/distress-by-gr...
I am sorry, I will use she/he or the person's name according to the individual preference but I will never say xher/xhum/them/they/xuei, and I will opt for using ONLY that person's name. If that makes me a bigot, so be it.
Like we get it. There were a couple of experimental machines during the Cold War, but two-state logic circuits have clearly won.
Well, that may be perceived as insulting by the addressee, and they might have a point. The previous consensus was not to presume offense. Too bad we can't all efficiently communicate in a polite language free from irrelevant embedded idiosyncratic perceptual distinctions, so as to avoid giving and taking offense. Yet for some reason we are required instead to recognize new distinctive pronouns and use them consistently or face ostracism. A forced consensus is a false consensus.
> the same way I'm not going to force someone else to refer to me as "my lord".
And there's a good point. Forcing others to use a form of arbitrarily self-determined address and banding together to ostracize and punish the uncooperative is uncomfortably similar to just plain old elitist bullying. I understand the thesis is to show respect for the addressee, but insisting and threatening is to transform it into a transaction of dominance and submission. Some argue that to respond by identifying as a surface-to-air missile is just a glib insult, not satirical criticism of the implied superiority expressed as reductio ad absurdum.