SE Dustup

[Ackbach]

There's quite a dustup over on Stack Exchange. Apparently, SE has some new rules coming in (not even there yet!), which a respected member of the community, Monica Cellio on Judaism.SE, had some questions about, upon which she got fired from her moderator positions. The new rules have to do with using pronouns that people want to be used (such as transgender pronouns).

My reaction: SE was, and is, quite simply wrong, and for precisely the same reasons that the Canadian government was wrong to insist on the same thing, and why Jordan Peterson fought back. Whether someone is willing to use those pronouns or not simply isn't the issue. The issue is whether someone can be made to use those pronouns. And that I flatly deny for the government. It's only a tad less clear for SE, which admittedly is a private company, though I would certainly say it's a very bad move. Anything like that level of censorship is not going to go over well at all, except for people on the radical left. You can see the list of resignations! SE has been measurably impoverished already for their stupidity. I know some of those names, and there are some great people there.

My respect for SE has certainly diminished, here, both for the new rules which simply cow-tow to the radical left, and especially for the disgraceful manner in which they dismissed a respected moderator.

May the like never happen at CH!

 

[psalms 91]

Sad, all I can say with not knowing what the site is about or why they did this. As far as language goes this is a Christian site and I dont think anything like that would happen here.

 

[Lamb]

Yikes!

I think it's too hard to moderate pronouns and be objective because I have no idea who any of you are behind your usernames with the exception of friends I know in person or have spoken to.

On one hand we want to be respectful of others so if they have a female icon but to consistently call that person Sir with no reason to do so doesn't make sense. On the other hand if a man switches his icon and insists that we call him HER then there will NOT be a rule demanding that we conform on CH.

 

[tango]

There's quite a dustup over on Stack Exchange. Apparently, SE has some new rules coming in (not even there yet!), which a respected member of the community, Monica Cellio on Judaism.SE, had some questions about, upon which she got fired from her moderator positions. The new rules have to do with using pronouns that people want to be used (such as transgender pronouns).

My reaction: SE was, and is, quite simply wrong, and for precisely the same reasons that the Canadian government was wrong to insist on the same thing, and why Jordan Peterson fought back. Whether someone is willing to use those pronouns or not simply isn't the issue. The issue is whether someone can be made to use those pronouns. And that I flatly deny for the government. It's only a tad less clear for SE, which admittedly is a private company, though I would certainly say it's a very bad move. Anything like that level of censorship is not going to go over well at all, except for people on the radical left. You can see the list of resignations! SE has been measurably impoverished already for their stupidity. I know some of those names, and there are some great people there.

My respect for SE has certainly diminished, here, both for the new rules which simply cow-tow to the radical left, and especially for the disgraceful manner in which they dismissed a respected moderator.

May the like never happen at CH!

The way this whole "preferred pronouns" silliness is going I'm sometimes tempted to say my preferred pronouns are "they, his, her" so people have the maximum chance of getting it wrong and getting shouted at for their heinous crime.

It's one thing to be respectful of the transgendered but there comes a point at which turning an honest mistake into a high crime is just absurd, particularly in the context of someone familiar. If you've referred to someone as "he" for decades it's not necessarily a trivial process to get used to calling them "she" overnight even if you 100% support their transition.

 

[Josiah]

I'm completely lost.... Not a clue.... BUT....

It's GREAT seeing you back, Ackbach