Re: This title needs to go
Note that I am advocating that Haily's rank, and only Haily's rank at this time, be changed. She wanted the rank itself changed for everyone, and I do not think this is reasonable until or unless we get a bunch of different people upset that they're being misgendered. If other people have no problem being called playboys, regardless of their gender, that's cool for them, but clearly Haily does have an issue with it.
Whatever you folks may think of the issue is actually kind of irrelevant in my opinion. You are not trans, and are not ostensibly going through gender transition issues. You aren't being deliberately called by a deadname (ahem, yeah, guys, that's a thing, now fucking cut it out, and yes, that does mean all of you who are doing it and don't seem to have fully gotten the message yet). Since you don't have this experience, your opinions about how easy it is to deal with aren't really germain to this discussion, so please stop trying to hammer them home. Whether one of you, four of you or forty of you say "jesus, Haily, get over it", all it's really doing is making you look like jerks. If you haven't gone through transition issues, you don't know what it is like to have an essential part of your identity being challenged, even in this admittedly small way.
The reality of the situation, as I understand it, goes like this. One of these sorts of microaggressions is really not that big a deal on its own. It's more annoying early on, when you're still wrestling with identity and trying to get folks to use your proper name and gender...but yeah, on its own, it's not a huge, earth-shattering deal. But it can add up with other things, and it can be compounded when folks dogpile you, precisely as some of you have done in this topic. You have, in fact, made the problem worse, all because you think Haily should just get over it and learn to live with it.
If you think she doesn't already know that she's in for a lot of stuff she will just have to toughen up and deal with, I think you're giving her far too little credit. I suspect that she knows better than many that there are a bunch of things that we can't change, so we'll just have to find a way to live with. Hell, I suspect we all know that, to one extent or another, and it's probably this attitude that is informing a lot of the posts in here.
But my reason for defending the request, at least to some extent, is because this change could be made to impact only Haily, and could be made very, very easily. I'd do it myself and save everyone else the headache of dealing with it. Frankly, the only reason I haven't done it yet is because Carter is clearly in disagreement with me here, and I'm not just gonna pull the trigger and override someone when I know their position opposes mine. If this change required a whole lot of legwork, or if it truly disadvantaged someone else, then I'd probably tell Haily that she'd have to find a way to work around the issue. Sometimes, change is not worth the effort; if it ain't broke for most people, don't fix it. Since it doesn't, I really don't see a problem in honouring it for Haily specifically.
So, in summary, I do accept that sometimes we just have to deal with stuff. Microaggressions happen every day to damn near everyone, and we can't go getting outraged at every little thing. But at the same time, I think folks in minorities get awfully tired of being told what is and is not a worthy cause for concern, so I wish you people would, as I said before, stop it and, if nothing else, just stay out of the way. Whether it gets done or not will have no impact on you personally.
Oh, and to address the "I have an ex named Sarah" thing. Again, Sarah is not part of your identity. I can accept that someone named Sarah might have traumatized you, and you may not like being part of Sarah's social circle, but asking for the rank to be changed wouldn't be all that reasonable in that situation IMO, unless, for instance, Sarah did you so much harm that you're legitimately triggered by it. Again, some of you are gonna roll your eyes at this, and there's something to be said for learning how to deal with stuff we don't like, but given that fixes of this nature are really quick and easy, and don't hurt anyone, I see no reason not to at least keep the door open for them.
I find it interesting that most of you are operating from a position where you imply that we should have to provide compelling evidence as to why we should change something, when that change hurts no one (remember, I'm talking about changing Haily's rank only, not the rank overall). I tend, by contrast, to operate from precisely the other end of the spectrum. I need someone to give me a good reason why we should not honour at least part of Haily's request.
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