The use of "gender pronouns" on college campuses across the country is somewhat of a new phenomenon. Although I imagine those who are reading this are well aware of their existence and purpose, those who graduated college even a couple of years ago may be confused as to the exact nature of these oft-expected personal introduction points.
The use of gender pronouns can be summed up as an exercise in politeness and appearance. If a person looks, talks, and acts like they are female, we call them a girl and if a person acts and looks like a guy, we call them a guy. If a person looks and acts like a female, but considers themself male, we'll probably initially call them a girl as it's impossible to know what any random person thinks of themself. Gender pronouns are the supposed solution to this problem. If you ask for a person's pronouns (he, him, his for example), you will avoid potentially offending that person by calling them a gender that they don't consider themselves a member of.
The title of my article sums up my feelings of gender pronouns. In many of my classes on campus, the introduction exercise often includes going around the room and introducing yourself by name and what pronouns you prefer. Nothing is particularly surprising in nearly every case. 99.4 percent of the population does not consider themselves transgender, so most of the time there isn't a single transgender individual in the class.
But of course, that's not the problem. A very large percentage of the trans community passes well enough that we wouldn't even be able to tell that they were trans. Individuals who pass well don't even have to face this problem because they look like the gender they want to be.
So, my question is: what's the point? Why do we do it? College is about learning how to be a functional member of society. It's about enduring the challenges that life throws at us because life is never going to be easy. College is about toughening up.
The second you get out of college, nobody will care about your gender pronouns. Nobody will hold your hand. Nobody will shield you from the outside world. You don't want to get your feelings hurt? Too bad. Welcome to being alive. Life doesn't care about your feelings. If you give it a chance, life will punch you in the stomach and kick you while you're down. You just have to learn to power through it.
What's the point in conditioning people to believe that they will be accepted no matter what they think and how they appear if we know that it is not and will never be true? If you're transgender, but still outwardly appear to be your biological sex, you have to get used to the confusion. In general, the pain and confusion that we, as children, feel will only serve to help us in the future. It builds our emotional body armor and makes us stronger as people.
Trying to survive the terror of gender dysphoria isn't fair. It isn't fair that some individuals are subjected to it while the majority aren't. But life has never really been fair, has it?
There's nothing wrong with being transgender, there's nothing wrong with telling people that you're transgender, but don't condition yourself to believe that society will bend to your whims because it won't. If you choose to engage in the latter, you're only magnifying the pain that will find you later in life, and there are far too many complacent people who will encourage you to do just that.
