A new South Dakota policy to stop the use of gender pronouns by public university faculty and staff in official correspondence is also keeping Native American employees from listing their tribal affiliations in a state with a long and violent history of conflict with tribes.
Two University of South Dakota faculty members, Megan Red Shirt-Shaw and her husband, John Little, have long included their gender pronouns and tribal affiliations in their work email signature blocks. But both received written warnings from the university in March that doing so violated a policy adopted in December by the South Dakota Board of Regents.
“I was told that I had 5 days to remove my tribal affiliation and pronouns,” Little said in an email to The Associated Press. “I believe the exact wording was that I had ‘5 days to correct the behavior.’ If my tribal affiliation and pronouns were not removed after the 5 days, then administrators would meet and make a decision whether I would be suspended (with or without pay) and/or immediately terminated.”
The policy is billed by the board as a simple branding and communications policy. It came only months after Republican Gov. Kristi Noem sent a letter to the regents that railed against “liberal ideologies” on college campuses and called for the board to ban drag shows on campus and “remove all references to preferred pronouns in school materials,” among other things.
Some folks just get way too pissy about simple words. They’re just words, sounds that are emitted from the large facial orifice, and written down or typed in symbols.
What words someone refers to another as change absolutely nothing about the person in question. Looking past the words that are clearly intended to be offensive, innocent pronouns such as he and she are simply meant to shorten and simplify writing and speech, rather than having to write, type or speak the person’s full name every time.
TL;DR - They’re just words, get over it.
I think “they’re just words, get over it” is a good argument in favour of pronoun declaration, no?
Not if you don’t want to spend time pulling people up on it I guess. It’s something to consider on both accounts
Basically, yeah. As long as they’re not deliberately and intentionally offensive anyways.
I’ve been called grandma before, by my good friend’s niece. I’m a grown dude, and ain’t even related to their family.
I just laughed it off, because I know it wasn’t intentional, plus everyone in their family seems to occasionally accidentally use the wrong names or pronouns.
It doesn’t upset me, unless they keep repeating the same mistake intentionally. They’re just words, and sometimes people make innocent mistakes.
So what do people call each other now? Fuckwit/fuckedwit?
They can only call each other their names.
Jim said Jim and Larry were gonna go to the store. So Jim says to Larry, “Hey Larry, what’s on your mind?” and Larry says “Nothing, Jim. Just wondering what time Larry and Jim’d get there at this pace”. Jim checks Jim’s watch and says “Jim and Larry’ve been walking about - what - ten minutes?”.
Jim stops a second, deep in thought. Jim scratches Jim’s chin as Jim thinks. “About two I’d say”
“Alright” says Larry “Let Larry and Jim get moving then”
“Yes let Larry and Jim”
(no first person plural pronouns either)
Those are gender pronouns with extra steps. \s
The tittle butchers the fact. They are not forbidden the use of pronouns, but to list their preferred ones (i.e, Dr Fuckwit (she/her).
When something is this stupid (university banning the preferred pronoums) , why not display it in all it’s stupid glory?
What’s really stupid is that I know a few women with traditionally male sounding names (Ryan, Alex, etc) who add their pronouns because they are sick of people assuming they’re male, but fuck them right?
Their names
That would turn those effectively into pronouns. I guess you are supposed to just hum through the pronouns or leave a marked silence?
I think the “everyone anyone your pronouns” thing in email, slack, whatever is dumb. But if I lived in SD, I’d start doing it right about now.
I originally thought it was a bit silly, but then I realized that there are a lot of cisgendered people who just have names that people can’t tell whether they are male or female, either because it’s gender-neutral or it’s unusual, so it kind of makes sense for a lot of people who aren’t queer as well and are just tired of people misgendering them via email.
I don’t fuss about it, and I totally get that it can be helpful in ambiguous situations. I see it used a lot in virtue signaling, and that annoys me a lot.
I can see the solidarity angle, but I guess I’m old school and feel like the best acceptance of others is just to live and let live.
I see it used a lot in virtue signaling,
What does this even mean? Are you the arbiter of when someone is being genuine and when they’re “virtue signalling”? You get to be the one to determine if it’s performative or some shit? Get the fuck out of here…
Do you consider cis-gendered people (oh no I said it, will I be ruled as a virtue signaller?) stating their pronouns in solidarity as “virtue signalling”?
And follow-up: would you say the same about the white allies that sat hand in hand with black people at sit-in being spat on, physically assaulted, sprayed with fire hoses and had dogs sicced on them?
Or would you also tell them that they should have “just live and let live”?
Our trans citizens are fucking dying and motherfuckers call you virtue signalling for doing anything but keeping your mouth shut.
I’d bet my next paycheck you’re a NIMBY too. “Just keep this unpleasantness somewhere I can’t see it.” People like you actively make the world a worse place.
I use gender they/them in that case! If I know the person’s gender I will use it, but if it’s ambiguous I’ll stick to they/them.
Plenty of people aren’t that courteous, which is part of the issue.
I’m one of these, my name is definitely male but when you read it it’s really easy to confuse with the female version. It doesn’t help that it’s really rare in my generation while the female version is much more popular. All this resulted in me getting misgendered on a regular basis. A few examples:
- as a teenager, I won a prize with a monetary award. The check was for the female version of my name.
- when I got my first house, I signed up ONLINE for the electric utility. The invoice ended up being addressed to the female version of my name. I sure as heck didn’t make a mistake in my own name when signing up, so someone over there must have “corrected” my name
- I once went to a week-long course, where we each were assigned an individual room, but bathrooms and showers were shared across all rooms on that floor. I was assigned a room on the ladies’ floor, which took me a while to realize as I thought it was just mixed-gendered.
- and that’s without counting the hundreds of times teachers took attendance. I’d say at least half of them got it wrong.
Anyway, I thought pronouns were a bit of a weird thing for trans and non-binary people, but as a very cis man who’s had issues with people reading my name wrong, I put my pronouns in my signature now.
What made me think of it was a guy I want to college with named Olu. It’s apparently a traditional name in the part of Africa where his parents were from (it’s been way too long ago to remember where), but he was an American, not African, so basically no one in America would be able to tell if he was male or female just by reading his name.
It’s also solidarity with non-cis folks to normalize identifying preferred pronouns so that they can be addressed as they would like.
Understood, but I was trying to frame it in a way that even people who are not allies might understand.
Totally. If someone just thinks it’s “dumb,” they might not be realizing it isn’t necessarily about them.
It is important for cis people to do so for one important reason on top of what you said, if only trans people need to put their pronouns in their profiles is just another way to identify them.
If everyone does it, nobody feels awkward about doing it.
I have a consistently male name, which is fine as I’m a man, but I still put Mr. in front of my name in my email signature. It just cuts down on ambiguity, confusion, and even looks more formal.
I’ll never understand people’s obsession with disallowing gendered or nongenered pronouns. The whole controversy is asinine
And this is probably exactly why they are trying to ban it.
Removed by mod
Hey Class,
Please show up to learn and get off your damn phones.
Thanks,
Mr. Courtney Cybermonk
Doesn’t that just work?
Removed by mod
Land of the free
Whoever told you that is your enemy
Francis Scott Key is your enemy?
Yes, he’s actually a lich, has a lair in the USS Constitution, that’s why they call it a “museum,” to lure unwary tourists for his unholy hungers.
Government small enough to fit in your mailbox
Surely it should be a choice.
Republicans really aren’t fans of letting people make their own choices. You could even say that they aren’t pro-choice.
Removed by mod
Sounds like justification to not use gendered language. Might as well go full gender abolitionist on this shiznat.
Devils advocate, because it is my nature… I work in government. My department has a policy with the formatting of my email signature sent from my work email. My email states my name, rank/position, department, and contact information with the department logo. Nowhere in there does it state my sex or race. And it shouldn’t, it is irrelevant. It serves no purpose in a professional capacity.
However, this situation apparently has prior issues. It was apparently fine to do until they made discriminatory statements then shortly after cracked down on it.
Unfortunately I don’t think the 1st amendment defense would apply when you are acting in an official capacity. You don’t get to say whatever you want while you get paid by the government. On your personal time that is a different story.
And what about tribal affiliation? How do you make that part ok?
What if you have a gender-neutral name and you’re tired of being misgendered in emails?
I also work in government, and nobody would bat an eye if people started doing it. But then again I work in a sane place with generally sane people.
But that is just describing the current government format of your office. That is not a static thing, it’s subject to change for any internal reason for any time. It’s a specific policy not applicable outside of your specific government and essentially your workplace.
Even inside your government office if you have groups which are routinely not served by that model then essentially you create additional emotional or mental work burdens for some of your employees but not others. You being fine with that is simply your opinion. Your position in believing that these things are irrelevant are because to you that policy holds no barriers. But imagine if multiple people in your department brought forward that they were legitimately struggling with that policy and it was impacting how much mental fortitude it took to get through their work day. Would you join them in changing the policy? It’s a similar question to if your co-worker in a wheel chair needed to take an additional 8 minutes partially outdoors to travel to the bathroom in your building because a set of tiny stairs. To you those stairs do not impact your work experience at all but to the person in the chair they might need to grab weather appropriate clothing for outside and regularly be in uncomfortable temperatures, or get wet in the rain or if they need to rush be forced to painfully hold their innards for the additional time simply because of a set of four stairs. Their experience of life at work requires additional personal fortitude because it’s impacted in an outsized fashion because a ramp most people wouldn’t even notice isn’t there is not seen as needed. How much of your assertion of not requiring a ramp simply because you don’t personally need one?
Critically Universities are not your government body and a level of personal comfort in their communications has been largely normalized. Pronouns in emails was common in a number of Acedemic circles and governing bodies long before they were known elsewhere. Universities are where the practice originates from and it’s became increasingly normal. Why is it being cracked down on now?
Universities tend to be very much forward in general regarding accommodation policies because they tend to be where the discussions of ethical practice and theory are debated and new culture emerges. Consider that disability advocacy is a legacy of University based protests. Also that pronouns in emails have been a thing in some university campuses emails for almost a decade now. Whenever Universities communicate with each other the practice spread.
There’s also a gap in the understanding you put forward about tribal affiliations. In the case of tribal affiliates a lot of them veiw themselves as essentially occupied nations under a foreign government. They aren’t simply telling you their race or bloodline they are telling you what nation they actually belong to because the assumption of them as “Americans” (or innour case “Canadians”) is incorrect. That visibility is vitality important to the cause of the people’s of those nations who literally have faced erassure for centuries.
Alls I can say is, I wear a uniform at work for the sake of a uniform, consistent representation of my department. Official communications and the signature line of my email is the same thing. I am at a fire department, it is very paramilitary and your individualism is beat out of you, you are just a cog in a machine, that is all. Anything else is viewed as a waste of taxpayers $$. Any individual freedom gets people hurt, or in this case just angers some rednecks that view it as a political statement… Either way, those rednecks are taxpayers too, so just remain neutral and use the predetermined signature line. If it is a true problem and not someone… trying to make a political statement, and it’s really important that the building owner of the bar you just inspected and are sending the inspection report to REALLY needs to know that you are they/them, and it is really messing up your mental health if they just assume you are another employee at the fire department, then that is a discussion for someone more important than me.
My personal view is in that and most situations, it doesn’t make sense that it weighs on someone that much. It’s not on par with someone that needs extra time to use the bathroom because of a handicap. Honestly, that comparison is absurd and offensive in itself. There is no reason everyone needs to know your pronouns. Just like they don’t need to know if I am a man or a woman. I am just a person, doing my job.
Either way, my situation is irrelevant. These people work at a school, a very different culture, and these changes were made immediately after they made some stupid comments in the stupidest way.
What about people named Ashley. Or Courtney. Or Kelly. Or Sam. Etc.
Plenty of other commenters here who are similarly ambivalent to pronouns have provided reasons that they can understand their practicality if nothing else.
Sure, for a lot of people being misgendered is nothing but a minor inconvenience. For someone who is used to being intentionally misgendered out of spite, such a small change makes a big difference.
If being misgendered in emails was the only problem trans and non-binary people faced in the world, then maybe saying people should get over it is fine. That isn’t the case. This is just one of a million things someone in that situation might experience each day that acts as a barrier to participating in society and it is such an easy one to change. In fact, the situation in question was already working fine. Effort was put in, in response to some misguided outrage, to actively prevent the simple solution.
I understand your position of apathy, and maybe if the cost of addressing this particular issue was high, it would make sense to weigh up the solution, but the cost of this is nil so why not facilitate an easier world for all people.
They’re not apathetic, they’re having drawn out arguments about it online. That ain’t apathy.
They just think if they couch it that way, people won’t immediately see them for what they really are.
Inside they are a deeply insecure person. To the point where they can’t even be completely honest with themselves about their own garbage beliefs. Sad.
I don’t know if you’re interpreting the situation the same as I am. From my perspective, the other commenter and I are having a pretty genuine discussion from two different points of view about the issue. Being ambivalent or apathetic about the inclusion of pronouns in the email signatures does not preclude someone from joining into the conversation, and it also doesn’t preclude someone from having a strong opinion about the surrounding context.
They aren’t debating whether or not people should be allowed to use any particular pronouns, just stating a pretty valid opinion that it shouldn’t be all that important and in their lived experience it hasn’t been. For what it’s worth, I actually agree with that stance in a certain sense. I don’t think we as a society should be placing any stock into gender or sex or sexuality as something that needs to be declared. However, while we do, and while we still have people ostracising and attacking others for being true to themselves, these are issues that need to be tackled. Maybe one day everyone will be on the same page and we can do away with the social construct of gender all together, and maybe we won’t.
I really don’t see anything in their comments that indicates they are secretly hateful. I especially don’t see enough to presume anything about them as an individual.
Ironically enough, I worked with an old, salty captain for the better part of a decade who’s name was Kelly. Never had his pronoun in his email signature that I recall. He is long retired now. And that is a stupid anecdotal argument, just surprisingly relevant and felt obligated to throw it out there.
I honestly agree, it is a simple thing to change if you can control how everyone thinks. Unfortunately, when you work in government, what people think is expensive. Weighing the chances of a successful or even unsuccessful lawsuit and poor employee morale vs pissing off constituents that vote on the next ballot measure to fund your department or for the council member that oversees your department is a decision that usually leads to left handed solutions like “In completely unrelated news, please use this signature line template for the sake of uniformity”
Given the fact that this was a hot topic already, I am sure lawyers or at least HR was involved in their decision and whatever backlash comes they probably already anticipated it.
Very relevant anecdote! There are definitely a lot of different attitudes to names and pronouns outside the context of gender identity. I personally don’t really mind when people get my name wrong, I’ve got a common name spelt a little differently. On the flip side I’ve worked with “Matt”'s that are very serious about not being called “Mat”, and others still who will refuse to respond if you shorten their full name.
That’s a good point. Honestly, given other headlines I’ve seen and also things I’ve experienced in my own working life it wouldn’t surprise me if HR or legal wasn’t involved (or were steam rolled by a signature happy leader surrounded by too many yes-men). In saying that, I’d think it’s more likely that they were.
This comment will serve as my springboard to go and find my favourite, gender neutral word for “yes-man”.
I am pretty sure sycophant is gender neutral.
Bad take… truely advocating for the devil here…
Pronouns are extremely relevant in formal communication. People do their best to infer them from names but that’s not always easy or even possible.
And sometimes people have a name commonly associated with a different gender. A guy named Hilary, or a woman named Max or Justin are likely to get misgendered in written communications without including pronouns. Or anybody named Alex stands a chance of it.
Or an enby named literally anything other than Sock
I certainly hope they’re talking to a lawyer about the school’s discriminatory conduct, about whether they might win, and if it’s worth fighting.
Whether the first amendment applies or not is a question worth asking them, I’m not sure it’s quite so simple. If a state told a Muslim employee they couldn’t pray while on the clock, I would very much expect a first amendment claim. I don’t think this is so clear, but a public university telling an employee they can’t include relevant information like their pronouns for discriminatory reasons seems plausible.
I guess, providing someone time to pray, and that person placing “I AM MUSLIM” On their official correspondence as a public servant/employee representing their department are two different things. I am not defending anyone here, just curious how it applies.
As for this situation, it seems if the memo said “you can’t put your pronouns or tribal affiliation on your signature” vs “Please use this official template for your email signature” would make all the difference in how a lawyer could defend it. And it sounds like they did the latter. But we all know the reason they did it.
Damn, with a username like that your garbage take makes it even easier to block your ass.
I’d comply and remove that info from the signature. I’d just start every email with:
Hello,
Thanks for reading my email. In case we’re not already familiar, my pronouns are he/him and I’m affiliated with…
I think I would go with something like this:
I am female but university policy forbids me to tell you my pronouns. I have a Native American ancestry but university policy forbids me to tell you if I have a tribal affiliation.
Probably in extra-large bold text.
nah just remove all pronouns
Smith,
Name Emma Jones and sophomore Thursday General Physics Class. Writing because in class yesterday mentioned having open positions research lab. found summary of project very interesting, would like learn and talk joining lab. Time in weeks could meet?
Thank time and look forward hearing soon
Best regards,
Emma
Perfectly readable, I’d bet there are some languages where “I’m” is implied
Just replace the pronouns.
“Hi. Steve was wondering if Steve could go ahead and start Steve’s next project since Steve’s current project is now in review? Steve would be working with Kevin on Steve’s next project and Steve knows that Kevin is wrapping up Kevin’s project this week so Steve and Kevin could start next week”
Doesn’t that sound so much more professional? 🙄
I love this. It screams “Why use lot word when few word do trick.”
Yeah no pronouns in emails ever again. That’s way more fun lol
Hello,
Thanks for reading my email. As a large language model….
Haha
No pronouns how are they planning to continue communication this seems like a key element of language
No pronouns how are ____ planning to continue communication ____ seems like a key element of language
F_F_
“This” is also a pronoun
Fixed; thanks!
Hey now, you can still use punctuation!
This measure in a vacuum is not inherently bad, though it is authoritarian and, yes, contrary to a Republican’s (theoretical) advocacy to small government. Rwanda also removed legal distinctions between Tutsi and Hutu, but it was done after and because of the genocide.
What’s the point of comments like this? Truly… Are we in a vacuum? No? Then why even continue with whatever inane bullshit that came next?
Yeah dude perfect analogy. These people are doing this to promote solidarity and show that we’re all the same and shouldn’t be murdering each other. Totally comparable situation.
I get that using and promoting labels for your group promote solidarity. It can also cause division simply because when you call yourself “X”, it’s inevitable that people would form opinions and at worst prejudices on what is “not X”.
My point? Similar policies may result in different outcomes.
Republicans sure love small government /s
The party of small government is now regulating your email signatures.
Noem says shut up and work or she’ll shoot your dog
If you keep your dog on a reserve she can’t get to it.
🐕🔫👩👧
That sounds like a clear first amendment violation to me. It’s not like a political affiliation either, gender and ethnic background are core to identity
On the one hand, I see what you’re saying. It sounds much like something my savior Jesus would say.
On the other hand, something something fuck them queers and Injuns.
The first amendment doesnt apply to governmental communications.
Its the reason that things are able to be censored in public schools.
The reason things can be censored in schools is because of the “bong hits 4 Jesus” case that went to the Supreme Court who said the school taking it down didn’t violate their freedom of speeech because “it could reasonably seen as promoting drug use at a school event”.
Fucking stupid case because if I recall it was at a parade for the Olympic torch coming through their town (doesn’t sound like a school event to me) and was not on school property.
Just a kid who happened to go to school being harassed, outside of school, by a principal at a public parade in their town, for holding a silly sign.
So what is there a caveat to 1A that says, “Congress can make no law […] unless that speech or expression may reasonably be seen as promoting drug use”?
What a bullshit country run by octogenarian Christians who just won’t leave people the fuck alone.
Just in case anyone is wondering what all the pronouns are. Here is a list of the standard, non standard, informal, and archaic pronouns in the English language
And it at least implied that you couldn’t use any of these words at all in an email. So simple phrases like; can you do this or I am able to do that. Would be out.
Personally I think we should just start using the archaic forms just to confuse people.
Don’t forget about demonstrative pronouns such as this, that, these, those, neither, none, such.
This is usually a good point. However, from my reading of just the snippet and some quotes others posted (and without reading the article myself because I am lazy), it may be that they are prohobiting the inclusion of preferred pronouns. If that’s accurate, then it means they are refining their bigotry to be more precise.
But any pronoun could be your preferred pronoun or the preferred pronoun of someone receiving the e-mail, so it really is safest to avoid them entirely.
If I worked there it would br so tempting to just start writing all my emails in scots gaelic. Can’t say I’m using pronouns if you can’t read it!
Plus I’d get to see what form their xenophobia would take. Would they ban foreign languages from email too? How many things are they willing to ban before they simply oust email entirely?
Oh that is absolutely the intention, but who doesn’t like logical extreme
I actually looked up the standard and it is worded in a way that doesn’t explicitly prohibit any specific thing. It just gives a list of things that can be included and says anything else is prohibited. That way they are not discriminating. They are just creating a formatting standard.
Personally I think we should just start using the archaic forms just to confuse people.
If I get to compose emails like I’m Frog from Chrono Trigger, I am all about it.
Thou shouldst do as thou pleases.
- Hop around
- Call everybody “thou”
- Wield a cool sword
- Probably nail Queen Leene
Yeah, methinkest I art down.
This opens the door for malicious compilance, one can report Bible quotes with pronouns and similar as bad.
They’re not even pretending it’s “just” about pronouns anymore. Now it’s just overt racism. Not surprised they went for the indigenous first.
Incidentally, there are over 70,000 indigenous Americans living in South Dakota. Considering the state has less than a million people, that’s not insignificant, so this is going to fuck over more than one or two people.
I mean, if those Indians would just go back to their own county, we wouldn’t have this problem.
- This comment was made possible by the Sequoia District School Board, and the Fighting Chiefs Football Team.
