Call Me By My Name If Pronouns Are Tough

Call Me By My Name If Pronouns Are Tough

I know people are caught up in the whole pronoun thing. Before we started getting into the whole notion of putting your pronouns in your bios, I was encountering people who would be stubborn and would intentionally misgender me.

A good rule of thumb, at least as far as I'm concerned, is if I'm presenting to you as female, she and her will do. I don't need you to look at me and say, "you weren't born a female and so therefore I take it upon myself to tell you that you're male." I don't need that.

I feel a great deal of anxiety where I'm at. I had to return to a former work site to get back to California. I didn't really want to do it. I wanted to retire, but my skills help the place. The problem is I built my reputation in my previous life, as it were. They knew me as the guy. I also know that I have a lot of love out here from people, and I love them back.

Basically, there are a lot of people who accept me as I am. My name is Candice now, and I prefer female pronouns. The women are really good about this, and many of the men. Those who misgender me generally aren't doing it out of negativity. They just remember me for all those years as somebody else. It becomes hard for them to wrap their minds around it.

Now, I know some of the trans community would say these guys need to learn. I get it. I don't like beating people over the head about this, but I also don't want to keep dealing with it. Some of these people not only go with the male pronouns, they also call me by my old name.

Honestly, I didn't want to come back to this job, but I deal with the reality that many in the trans community deal with. You've got under employment as a concern. You might not get a job, so the fact that I've got a situation that keeps a roof over my head and keeps me in the game, so to speak, is important. I have to tolerate it.

If I had my druthers, I wouldn't be in this line of work, at least not here. I'd be out as myself somewhere else where they didn't know the old me. That way there's no question about what my name is. I might have to deal with pronoun issues, but if you call me by my name, there's no problem here. I'm okay with you calling me by my name.

I go to church. I had an amazing friend getting me back in connection with Jesus. I say that not to tell anybody what to believe. This is what works for me. What works for you may be something different. I know one of the concerns people have about religion is the judgmental attitude. People start thinking they've got the answers, and they're going to judge for God.

In my church, they only know me as Candice. So it's very easy to say hello to Candice. By logic, me wearing dresses to church and makeup and presenting as female, you would think that the pronouns she and her would come with it. However, there are still a few people who go the other way with it.

When we have that moment where the pastor tells us to make acquaintance with our fellow churchgoers, we go around shaking hands. A couple of the people might have called me Candice, but I ended up getting a sir out of them as well. That's painful to me, and it almost took me out of church last week. 

I know at church you might expect worse than this, but this is as bad as I've seen so far. At the hint that they're judging me for being trans, I'm done. I don't need church to have a relationship with God. I go there to be with others who are praising Jesus. That's why I go. But my mind was taken out of it after the greeting part.

At the beginning of the services, the ladies get up there and sing, and we're encouraged to sing along. I like to sing and move to the music. I like to feel. At the moment we were done greeting each other, my mood shifted downward. I thought about whether I should stick around or just leave right then. I've had a few moments like this.

Just a few weeks ago, I was helping one of the churchgoers when somebody else tried to get my attention. This ended up with somebody threatening to beat my ass after calling me a weirdo. They even tried to accuse me of flipping them off when I merely looked back at them in church and said, "God bless you." Whatever.

I get something out of going to church, and that's why I go. So, I stood there as they were singing, saying a silent prayer to God to just give me the strength to stay there and pull through what had bothered me. A lot of my trans sisters would have just walked away at that point, and I can't say I'd blame them for that.

It's not that hard to honor somebody when you know their pronouns. Really, if somebody's presenting as female, she and her should not be an ordeal. You shouldn't look at them and judge whether they are passable or not. It should be how they are presenting. That's my opinion of the matter. Or, just call me by my name. It's that simple. 

If you have an issue with my pronouns and you know my name is Candice, don't use pronouns. Call me by my name. When you're not using my preferred pronouns, you're telling me who I am in your mind. You're judging me, and it's really not nice to do that. 

I know some people will read this column and call me woke, and I really don't care. Woke is a cop out. I know very well what the difference between being awake and woke is, but that's not the point. 

Respecting people for who they are isn't something that is woke. It's just common decency. Respecting pronouns is not you pushing an agenda, but somebody refusing to do so is hurtful. 

These days we deal with those trying to invalidate and eradicate the trans community because they disagree with our existance. It's much worse than woke. It can quickly take us down the path of genocide if we aren't careful. But, that's a whole other different column.