How Dare You Not Pretend
In the comments, Mr Muldoon steers us to the latest mental rumblings of Ms Laurie Penny:
Ms Penny is, I think, referring to fellow feminist Julie Bindel, whose review of Laurie’s latest book is not entirely positive, and who chose not to refer to its author as a suddenly ungendered being. But the broader claim is perhaps worth exploring.
I can’t say that my own views on modish pronoun stipulation make me feel “cool and edgy.” If anything, they seem fairly self-evident and unremarkable, not the stuff of obvious scandal or sudden intakes of breath. And I doubt that anyone here is likely to feel “threatened… by the ideas of a more progressive generation.” Though Ms Penny’s tendency to self-flatter – her inevitable trajectory – does catch the eye.
Regarding rudeness, I’m generally polite by default, at least in person, and don’t go out of my way to needlessly put a kink in someone else’s day. I’ve had perfectly civil chats with people who regard themselves as transgender or gender-non-conforming or whatever. Nobody got upset. But what is often being asked – or demanded – is not a small thing, not in its implications.
Taken broadly, we are being asked to affirm, wholesale, a bundle of phenomena that includes not only actual gender dysphoria, whether the result of developmental anomalies or childhood molestation, but also autogynephilia, serious personality disorders, adolescent pretension, and assorted exhibitionist and unsavoury compulsions. The expectation seems to be that we should take these different phenomena, with very different moral connotations, as being one and the same thing, and then defer to them, habitually and uncritically. Which is asking rather more than can readily be agreed to.
We’ve previously noted the ways in which the activism of pronoun stipulators differs from that of other groups with which they are often equated. Someone being gay, for instance, doesn’t generally entail an expectation that the rest of us should pretend that the physical reality we can see is somehow not the case. And unsurprisingly, people may object to being told that they should disregard the obvious and become dishonest on demand, thereby leaving themselves open to any prankster, or bedlamite, or sadistic opportunist in search of leverage.
Some insist that not indulging modish pronouns, including animal pronouns and clown pronouns, and pronouns that can change randomly, several times a day – and being reluctant to indulge any other attendant psychodrama – is a violation of human rights and a basis for severe legal consequences. One might think that coercively eroding the probity of other people, demanding that they lie, and even hallucinate, is a pretty bad thing too. At best, a recipe for grim farce. But there we are.
Laurie’s own adventures in competitive self-definition have dazzled us before and may reward a second visit.
Laurie Penny was a 2015 Fellow at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society (whatever they do.) Same university whose legendary scholars now include Parkman school shooting “survivor” David Hogg who was rejected by every college he’d previously applied to and Jazz Jennings the reality show star famous for being deluded into thinking he’s a girl and getting his junk cut off with parental approval.
One final thought: was Ms Penny happy to be called ‘she’ and ‘her’ before there was all this kerfuffle over pronouns?
She still is, according to the twit message announcing her theyness (at David’s link at the end of the OP). She thinks having been feminist in public has earned her the she, but not just anyone can use it, at just any time. The they/them is purely for grasping at relevancy.
Laurie’s trajectory of oppression is touched on here.
If someone inadvertently makes an inappropriate statement or gesture, a real manager will take it up with them in private later.
Praise in public, reprimand in private.
how well has that worked out for you, in the general case?
You’re right that it does depend on who the boss is. In my case … at least twice … the boss was fairly new and the power-tripping manager couldn’t help but keep behaving badly even with a new boss. It took just a quiet visit, with receipts, with the new boss to get the manager collared and transferred.
I take a dim view of bullying – and that’s how I framed it – and this kind of public harangue is straight out harassment.
in every single case they were toxic because they’d been allowed to be toxic and had been getting away with it forever
My wife’s manager is the longest tenured person at the relatively young company, and the owners openly complain about her – in an “at will” state – and yet here we are. Wanting to be liked and good old inertia are a helluva drug combo.
Jazz Jennings the reality show star famous for being deluded into thinking he’s a girl and getting his junk cut off with parental approval.
There’s no good end for that boy. I loathe reality shows and don’t watch it. But a friend who does watch Jazz says the “cute little *girl*” stuff is gone, he’s gained 100 lbs and talks about his mental issues (duh).
Not just the usual tragic cases of “child stars” whose fame is gone once they no longer kids, but Jazz is precluded from any sort of real, intimate relationship. He was on puberty blockers long before the genital mutilation and is incapable of sexual feelings. He’s trapped.
So 10 years on, at 35, and despite the fact that she has been writing – and getting published – almost continuously during all that time, there’s not one lick of evidence that her writing has improved in any way whatsoever.
And just the sort of prose that would have gotten her a much better grade in English than my to-the-point-less-flowery writing ever received. However, my to-the-point-less-flowery writing got me A’s (well on my papers at least) in AP History class.
I ask because I have worked for any number of toxic bosses over the decades, and in every single case they were toxic because they’d been allowed to be toxic
This…but that can backfire. Pretty sure I related here of an ex-boss-of-my-boss who, when listening to his banter on pre-meeting conference calls was like watching a drunk monkey play with a hand grenade. Most of what I heard was sexist BS and I let the women know that if they wanted any backup on reporting him, I would support them 100%. Just found out at lunch about a month ago that in some other meeting he was making racist comments. One of my coworker (a conservative, mild mannered but very engineer engineer) had had enough and reported him to HR. Of course one of his punishments resulting from HR investigating that incident was that they had him teach our diversity training classes. The ex-BoMB is friends with a former manager that I worked for/with/coulda-had-his-job-but-turned-it-down-partly-due-to-diversity-BS and in a recent FB discussion that started with football but got political, ex-BoMB proceeded to “wokify” the two of us.
The only case to the contrary I’ve ever seen was when a previous manager was fired for throwing things at one of his direct reports in a meeting
I had a lesbian co-worker remove her undershirt from under her sweater and throw it at me in a meeting. Several decades ago, this was. Good times, good times.
“a more progressive generation.” As Ms. Penny has slavishly followed every half-baked fad that would épater le bourgeoisie, I’m sure it is a shock to her system finding that the younger kids have the same disdain and contempt for her and her views that she had for her elders.
“ungendered” isn’t that the final stage before metamorphosis into her final form: Cat Lady?
a friend who does watch Jazz says the “cute little *girl*” stuff is gone, he’s gained 100 lbs and talks about his mental issues (duh).
I would be curious to see which way the show goes: quietly fold as “Jazz”‘ lived experience continues to undermine The Narrative, or double down on the freakshow.
The only reality show I consume is Below Deck for the occasional segments on running a large motor/sailing yacht, but my ex used to binge all the 90 Day Fiance shows. I have become convinced the producers intend these shows as cautionary tales and morality plays.
he’s gained 100 lbs and talks about his mental issues
Well damn, maybe he is a she.
“a more progressive generation.” consisting of rejection of biological reality, intense narcissism, incoherent thinking, constant agitation and anger, and bullying. Yeah, I want to be liked by such people…not.
“ungendered”–there are plenty of people who don’t have a strong sex drive but that doesn’t make them “ungendered”. Nor do they flaunt it. Just keep it to yourselves, please.
the OK sign: no better signal that you drink the coolaid than making the claim that this is a supremacist sign. It has been in use for 100 years. The joke was started on 4chan as trolling. It is like the college students who claimed that wood paneling in an office made them feel “unsafe”–just letting us know that they are unwell.
the OK sign: no better signal that you drink the coolaid than making the claim that this is a supremacist sign. It has been in use for 100 years.

A college buddy and I used to use that sign to indicate “OK” in a sarcastic context. I apparently use it without thinking in that context today. I’ve been called out on it a couple of times, only because I was the one who originally informed these people about the new meaning, with no conscious awareness/recollection that I had just used it. Can’t wait for some ****** to seriously accuse me. Not that I don’t have (former) friends who accuse me of perusing white supremacist web sites…like this one specifically…
Capisce?
My pronouns are I me my mine, myself, we us our ours, ourselves. For pronouns when speaking to or of others, see any English-language grammar book published before the present juddering era.
“There’s no good end for that boy…”
Heh, heh
Sorry, just scrolled up and saw Karl and JJM (and maybe others too) already made the same point.
(former) friends who accuse me of perusing white supremacist web sites…like this one specifically…
Some people must see a very strange version of the world.
Some people must see a very strange version of the world.
Well, if Larry Elder can be one…only in America.
So Joel was a white supremacist. So sad.
I’m reminded of some mystery novels by Lev Raphael (“Little Miss Evil” especially) from back in the late ’90s, in which his progressive Jewish character, an adjust professor at a University of Michigan-like school (where Lev taught) learns that his department is setting up a Department of Whiteness Studies. He was pretty nonplussed about it. Little did he know he was seeing the seeds being sown.
Relative to MST3K, I’ve been watching a lot of old episodes, and now the white/Hitler Youth jokes don’t seem nearly as funny as they used to. I’ve contemplated compiling a mashup of all the race jokes and blaming them for BLM.
now the white/Hitler Youth jokes don’t seem nearly as funny as they used to
Yes, self-deprecating white jokes that used to seem harmless or mildly annoying now seem like tragic canaries in the coal mine. Red Letter Media comes to mind here.
I can’t say that my own views on modish pronoun stipulation make me feel “cool and edgy.” If anything, they seem fairly self-evident and unremarkable, not the stuff of obvious scandal or sudden intakes of breath. And I doubt that anyone here is likely to feel “threatened… by the ideas of a more progressive generation.” Though Ms Penny’s tendency to self-flatter – her inevitable trajectory – does catch the eye.
This is the intersection (ahem) of progs’/SJW’s perspectives with their projection. Ms Penny’s perspective is that she sees herself as trendy (new pronouns!), thus “cool and edgy”. Meanwhile she projects this desire to be trendy onto the rest of us, so the active avoidance and misuse of pronouns is because someone wants to be “cool and edgy” just like Ms Penny sees herself.
My pronouns are I me my mine
Note how the requirement to use the “correct” pronouns never involves any effort on the part of the person demanding?
If Penny is plural, then she should refer to herself as “we”. Until she does that, I will ignore her demands.
If the “they” is meant to be singular but ungendered, then we have “it” for that in English. I am happy to refer to her as “it”.
Trans “expert” is monster.
Lesbian undershirt* is a strange choice of projectile.**
* – band name
** – album name
“There’s no good end for that boy…”
Nor, it would seem, a happy one.
Trans “expert” is monster.
What the hell is wrong with people?
I wouldn’t trust her with my coffee order (and I don’t drink coffee) but people listen to her okaying radical mastectomies for adolescents?
suddenly ungendered being(s)
Band name
An expressway shooting dashboard. Well, it is a state run by Democrats.
A quirk of Illinois law is that all interstates belong to the State Police… even those running through Chicago. And the Chicago expressways are the shooting galleries you’d expect.
Penny certainly did say she used both ‘she/her’ and ‘they/them’ pronouns, though I think she may have deleted the original tweets. Which makes the publishers sole response to the review – presumably authorised by Penny herself – perfect passive aggression: ““I wanted to highlight that Laurie Penny’s pronouns are they/them (as indicated in the book and press release). Could the review be updated to reflect this, please?” I mean, there’s no way to win against a person who chooses which pronoun you may use and when.
perfect passive aggression
Laurie’s “progressive” milieu does seem to be an endless game of Gotcha!. As noted previously,
But then, this is someone who flies around the world, from Oxford to Harvard, from London to Los Angeles, while tweeting about how oppressed she is.
Chest feeding.
Birthing people.
Menstruators.
The NCAA.
It’s just more erasure of women.
And the Chicago expressways are the shooting galleries you’d expect.
Streets too, though.
It’s just more erasure of women.
They refuse opportunity after opportunity to speak up for themselves. What should they expect? It’s mostly men pointing these things out. Even men who are too such pussies that they won’t speak up for themselves when being excoriated by the women who otherwise won’t speak up for themselves. It’s a spiral down.
“I’m so f***ing stressed out from running my pet lizard Instagram account…”

Not Penny Red any longer but mutated into Penny Dreadful.
Well, all Reds are pretty damned dreadful…
Laurie’s “progressive” milieu does seem to be an endless game of Gotcha!.
It certainly is. And the option to not play is often taken away, especially if this nonsense involves the workplace.
I went back to the Journey To The Centre Of Attention post where there’s a screenshot of her sheness/theyness twit. Clicking on the actual Twitter link gives the “This Page Does Not Exist” message. It’s this passive-aggressive, no way to win/please the other person crap that reduces my desire to be polite and use stupid pronouns as requested. Why bother? These people will never be satisfied, even when their boots are stomping on the faces of their fellow citizens, forever.
Lest we forget, she is one of our betters.

suddenly ungendered being
Ah yes, I remember the Bobbit tragedy.
Ah yes, I remember the Bobbit tragedy.
Heh.
But that reminds me: Female genital mutilation was a hot topic among feminists at the time, and the standard position was that it was never acceptable to cut off a woman’s clitoris no matter how she might have misbehaved. But when Lorena Bobbit cut off her abusive husband’s penis they found that hilarious and justifiable.
In regard to what I just said about women not speaking up for themselves, well I stand (partially…we’ll see about the commitment) corrected. Just got this off a FB post referencing an article in Swimming World magazine. Nancy Hoggshead, with whom I had a slight tiff regarding this issue, has taken it up with some degree of equivocation. At least as I see it based on past discussion. But while I think this needs to be stronger, it is stronger than I expected.
On a lighter note, “A man can consider his day a success if he has worked as hard as these buttons.”
On a lighter note
She’s the Danish Defense Minister? The girl who was Sergeant at Arms for the Juniorettes at my high school was more intimidating.
…Laurie’s ongoing project of self-description…
heh heh
Miami Beach: Liquor store owner beats thieves with stick. I get the impression from some recent news stories that, thanks to Democrat protection of criminals, people are starting to think about taking the law into their own hands.
It seems to me a key attribute of the Left is a complete lack of principles. Conservatives are pretty consistent (though repub politicians can waffle). They support family, country, honesty, hard work, independence, free speech.
The Left is for women’s rights, but then destroys those rights at a moment’s notice for trans rights. It is all about black lives but when most of the rioting was destroying black businesses (which are true source of opportunity and wealth) there was not a hint of caring about it. When actual minorities wanted more police protection, the defund movement was deaf to them. It is just random feelings without any interest in what actually happens.
Hmm . . . What if Biden “fulfills” his promise and nominates a Black transwoman to the Supreme Court?
a key attribute of the Left is a complete lack of principles
Well, their leader Marx did say, after all, “Those are my principles, and if you don’t like them… well, I have others.”
It seems to me a key attribute of the Left is a complete lack of principles.
When dealing with the Left it is advisable to consider that the matter is never one of principles, but of tactics. Hypocrisy, pretending a matter is of principles, is a tactic.
It is just random feelings without any interest in what actually happens.
Those who cannot or will not control themselves will tend to look for at least one of two things: others they can control, and others who will control them. These are both paths of lesser resistance, compared to self-control.