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Comment by hyperdunc | Hacker News Reader

Sorry, a person's gender identity just isn't that interesting, and the extra cognitive load of remembering pronouns isn't something I'm willing to bear.

This trend isn't meaningful, it's narcissistic.

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I'm learning Japanese and they have dozens of pronouns, perhaps hundreds of them. Not only is someone's gender identity bound to their pronoun, but other important aspects are bound as well such as job and age. I don't see anything wrong with introducing a few more to the English language, we've been too restrictive for too long and the language is just getting downright creaky.

Some of the recent pronouns I've seen are barely pronounceable. Getting others to refer to you in an unwieldy way seems more like a power play to me.

We already have some titles that signal achievement, like Doctor. I'd be for introducing more of them. Maybe we can get rid of the hereditary ones, too.

It's easier to just think of it like someone's name. Even if someone's name is hard to pronounce, we generally make an effort *if* we want to socialize with them.

I won't disagree there's power plays going on. Lots of people glob onto any well-intentioned movement to push their own egos. But I'm more concerned with being kind to those in the margins than accidentally validating a narcissist. Idk. I get where you're coming from. But. A lot of these people are genuinely not "he" or "her" and it's just kind of degrading to force them into one of those buckets.

it not being interesting to you doesn't mean it isn't incredibly important to them. The fact that it is incredibly important to them is obvious, and the "cognitive load" you're talking about is completely trivial. If you're not willing to take even the tiniest effort to make the people around you feel welcome, you may be the one being narcissistic.

Count me as another long-time HN user who refuses on principle to play the My Pronouns game. Burn me at the proverbial stake if you will, or bring out the HR version of the portable guillotine—but I will never, ever knuckle under to the heresy hunters and virtue signallers.

>Burn me at the proverbial stake if you will

>bring out the HR version of the portable guillotine

>I will never, ever knuckle under to the heresy hunters

My god you really need to take yourself way less seriously. Is this what happens when you've lived your life in first-world middle class comfort? You think you're a martyr for... being slightly impolite to people?

In my view (and actually the view of a lot of people, given the responses in this thread), it has almost nothing to do with politeness and everything to do with avoiding being manipulated by wokeists.

It being incredibly important to them is part of the narcissism.

They can believe whatever they want, but they don't get to demand validation from anyone who's not willing to freely give it.

This pronoun nonsense is as much of a coercion as it is a kindness. I won't participate.

I don't quite get your stance. You're free not to use those words. It's not like it is against the law to not use those pronouns. It is a simple and nearly effortless courtesy, that you can ignore if you want, with the consequence that people may think you're a twat and treat you accordingly.

Like, you're not mandated by law to greet someone with "good morning" instead of saying "fuck you". Yet it is widely understood that if you do this and refuse to say good morning, people will be upset and become hostile towards you. It's a perfect analogous situation. I'm not really sure what you want.

It's no more coercive than any other social norm. If you act disrespectful to the people around you, they will treat you accordingly. Everyone everywhere accepts this in 99% of situations and it is interesting to see the specific exceptions they make.

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