#degendering

In the comments of this post:

Correct gendering: when a persons gender is affirmed through correct use of name, pronouns and other gendered words in positive, neutral and negative situations in the same way it would be for a cis person. e.g. "This is Mandy, my girlfriend." (gf is a trans woman)

Misgendering: when a persons gender is not affirmed and they are instead refered to as their SEG in every possible context. e.g. "This is Mandy, my girlfriend." ('g'f is a trans man)

Degendering: when someone avoids Correct Gendering in a way that also avoids Misgendering, thus giving them plausible deniability. The person will often avoid using the persons name and pronouns where possible and if pronouns are required will exclusively use 'they/them' with the excuse 'but those pronouns are literally neutral' even when aware of the actual pronouns and gender of the person they're speaking about/to. e.g. "Why are you mad I called you they/them those are neutral pronouns it's not transphobic to be gender neutral." "No it's not, but I've told you again and again that my pronouns are 'she/her' and I don't like being refered to neutrally. It feels like you have an issue with my womanhood." "Clearly you're being overly sensitive and just trying to make me out to be the bad guy." "I'm just asking for basic respect and correct gendering." "They/them is neutral though so it counts as correct." ad infinitum

Malgendering: when someone seems to be engaging in Correct Gendering but the Correct Gendering is conditional on the context always being negative and in some situations is actively revoked if the person hates an individual or group enough to start employing Misgendering. Malgendering involves insults, stereotyping, predjudice and bigotry based on the persons gender. However, since it avoids Misgendering, people who employ Malgendering techniques also engage with plausiable deniability about their predjudice/bigotry. e.g. trans men being denied medical care on the grounds of 'being men' despite having the body parts that medical care is designed to help, trans men being deemed suddenly 'unsafe around women' for being men and told 'that's how it is to be a man', a trans woman being arrested for taking off her shirt due to laws against women being topless (when she is in other situations by law considered a man instead), a trans womans lack of ability in male-dominated spaces/hobbies being attributed to her gender.

And I should know better as somebody who also uses it/its. Yes the pronouns can feel weird because it pronouns are typically used towards objects. Using any set of pronouns you're not used to can feel clunky and awkward but learning and adapting is more important than personal comfortability.

I allowed my own personal neutrality on the topic to cloud my better judgment. I personally don't care if somebody avoids using my pronouns with my name, same as many other trans people. But for others this can feel deliberately disrespectful (even if not done maliciously) and like the individual isn't seeing you for you (which can especially be hurtful if the person doing it is somebody you care for).

After doing a bit more research, I found this TikTok done by this lovely trans woman about this. It's apparently called "degendering" and this video gets into misgendering, degendering, and malgendering - what they are and how they can cause harm.

(Don't get info off TikTok, obviously. But it can be helpful at times).

I also found how this can directly affect intersex folk as well and how degendering can not only be transphobic but intersexist as well.

Unfortunately I wasn't able to find any other resources on degendering specifically in this context (only degendering as in unassigning gender to things like chores, clothes, and such).

So instead I'll leave other resources to general misgendering and their affects.

Misgendering: What it is and why it matters by Harvard Health Publishing

What Does It Mean to Misgender Someone? By KC Clements and Reviewed by Dr Janet Brito on Healthline dot com

Misgendering: What It Is, Why It Hurts & How to Do Better by Pride Palace

Misgendering: What It Is and How to Handle It? by Giovanna D’Ambrosio and Reviewed by Dr. Scott Mosser on Gender Confirmation dot com

Protecting Gender Identity: How Misgendering Can Affect Mental Health by BetterHelp and Reviewed by Dr Corey Pitts

And if you're still unsure on how to use it/its pronouns and other pronouns of the sorts:

Pronouns and Names Tester

Pronoun Dressing Room

Pronoun Tester

Practice with Pronouns

Pronoun Wiki

I will not be deleting my original post. I feel like deleting it would be avoiding accountability and trying to cover up and sweep under the rug my wrongdoing. Proper accountability means allowing others to see what I did, see how I was corrected, and how I chose to respond to that.

But if they truly believe that, why do they never ask regular afab women their pronouns? Just because they look cis? I thought we're not supposed to assume anyone's gender just because they wear makeup and a dress.

I've heard many times from passing trans women that they also don't get that kind of dehumanizing treatment from TME people.