...We're goin' for a ride.* Or not.
Beseems a couple of the more curmudgeonly folk in this corner of the innernets have gone a-curmudgeoning on the subject of Erin Palette-as-recently-revelated. They ain't at all comfy with matters as they are and are gonna use the pronouns that seem right to them.
Okay.
Curmudgeons serve a purpose and a valuable one: to stand facing Change, shouting Oh Hell No and occasionally putting their shoulder to the wheel to keep it right where it is.
This is a good thing -- too much change too fast can create a terrible mess. I hope folks will be as polite and as tolerant of 'em as they have been of Erin. Yes, yes, some people we like do not happen to agree with one another. It happens. It's okay. Human beings are not ants.
It'd be a damn dull world if we all shared the same views.
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* "The internets got drama, mama, you don't even hafta go outside/Saddle up the drama llama, ride to the Book of Face/There's mean nasty awful stuff there/an' lots of angst to waste." And so on. If I could sing and had a guitar, I could be a famous artiste, if I knew how to play guitar. Even just a little, like a ukelele. Remember, online ain't real life, at least not 'til the P*yP*l bill arrives.
I have no problem with animals, as long as someone else is taking care of them, but I hear llamas spit...
ReplyDelete(the one L lama, he's a priest...)
Perhaps it was because the bearded lady was my mother's best friend, my dad helped the lobster man change flats - and all the other people who do not fit the mold I was raised around, but I cannot understand those who put the hate on people for things physical.
ReplyDeleteThose who are without spirit or tolerance for the differently endowed who should get the shaft.
Stranger
I have no problem with Erin because the internet is where we make of ourselves what we want.
ReplyDeleteBesides Erin came into our world and accepted us as we were, we can do the same with her.
Its probably the Brony thing ....
Larry: Fixed and I thank you!
ReplyDeleteStranger: Let us not confuse putting on the hate with merely not going along -- or, for that matter, with conflict over things other than the central issue of the moment. Active loathing ("Burn the witch!") is not the same as passive squickery ("Ew, the new neighbor is reanimating the dead in his basement? I am never inviting him over for a cookout!")
Nor ought tolerance be a blanket excuse for generalized fail: for instance, if you have a gay waiter and he's no good at the waitering, it's not homophobic to leave a lousy tip.
Conversely, manners matter: Tam and I get along pretty well with our neighbor, The Democrat, because she's a decent and *nice* person. We acknowledge our often-opposing views, they are not secrets but we concentrate on the things we have in common, like a fondness for cats or the 5' each of yard between our houses which would be useless fenced.
As a self-professed Curmudgeon myself, I don't care who does what to whom, when, or where, so long as they don't have any intention of forcing me into their mold against my will.
ReplyDeleteI did marry a card-carrying liberal Democrat, after all.
They get cards? Dang. See, that's what sucks about being an anarchist, there aren't any membership perqs, or even a common logo.
ReplyDeleteThe older I get, the more questions I have and the fewer answers.
But doesn't that mean you get to make up your own cool logo, slogan, and cards? :)
ReplyDeleteMy problem with the whole "gonna use what pronouns feel natural to them" is that it's rude. Before they'd heard about me, they were perfectly fine referring to me as "she" and "her"; now that I've come out, they're going to call me "he" and "him", by golly by gum, when the only thing that's changed is a tiny bit of information.
ReplyDeleteIt's rather like calling your neighbor "Bob" for years, and then one way you find out he doesn't go to church, and from then on you call him "Godless Heathen". What's worse, you do it to his face, in conversation to him.
Where I come from, that kind of outright rudeness earns you a butt-kicking in the real world -- but sadly, it is as yet impossible to kick someone's butt over the internet. This safety from the consequences of their actions leads people to say things they'd never say to someone else's face.
It's a rude world sometimes, Erin. What you call "a tiny bit of information" what sex a person is, is significant. Me being a gurrl in a very tech-y line of work has cost me jobs, raises and credibility. After 20+ years in my job, outside techs and contractors still will turn to any male standing beside me, even the janitor, to discuss engineering stuff I am in charge of.
ReplyDeleteOne cannot demand politeness of others.
I beg to quibble.
ReplyDeleteOne cannot expect politeness of others.
However, I can, and do, demand it. (I don't always get it, of course.)
Whether this course of action makes me principled, stubborn, or foolish is open to debate. ;)
P.S. I dunno how to break this to you but there's not nearly so much butt-kicking per se in Girlville. Reinforcement is more subtle -- and often more vicious.
ReplyDeleteErin. Chill. There are things you don't grok about queueing and male privilege. You may never have to, but right now it is important to remember that we ourselves can be decorous and well-mannered even when some of those around us are not.
ReplyDelete