Thread by @VABVOX

Wherein @Peggynoonannyc likens being respectful of other people's pronoun choices to *checks notes* the Terror that followed the French Revolution in which thousands were guillotined.

I only wish I were joking.
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1/ wsj.com/articles/what-…

Noonan is in a state of abject rage at the prospect of using "they" in singular which she asserts (not having checked her etymology nor even Shakespeare, first) is grammatically incorrect.
But here's the thing: Why do you care, Peggy? Why does the changing culture offend you?
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Noonan prides herself on being one of those fierce defenders of civility, yet here she has come undone over people requesting civility and likens that request to being rounded up in a cart and having one's head chopped off with a dull blade in the public square.
My goodness.
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Folks on here--mostly men, as this is a misogynist trope-- are forever shortening my name to something else. I block them. My name is clearly visible. You have no right to change it for space or because you want to demean me.
amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/…
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No harm is done to society--certainly no violence--by being polite to someone who has fought for her/his/their identity. If Noonan were repeatedly referenced as male when she is not, I guarantee it would wear on her and she would spend a lot of her energy correcting people.
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There are certainly larger questions to be asked about gender norms and how we are defined in a largely gender binary & gender biased society. But Noonan doesn't raise that discourse at all: she moves straight from the guillotine to the HR department of workplace and college.
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Noonan claims historical usage as her foundational argument. 100 years ago black people were uniformly referred to by the n word. Does she think that historical precedent or others like it should be adhered to?
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Language is in fact living, breathing, ever-changing. It is how we communicate in the world. Thousands of new words are added each year and we incorporate them as a means to best communicate in the world. As. We. Should.
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Intransigence over respecting the personhood of others isn't some higher calling in defense of linguistic history--it's just, at best, mean-spirited, at worst phobic and harmful. It's saying you cannot accept that not everyone is like you. Which is the definition of bigotry.
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It's far past time that Noonan ceased behaving like that crazy aunt who gets invited to family get togethers but who everyone prays won't show up. This column isn't clever. It's just old school bigotry & bias that gives people of like mind the cover of Noonan's Pulitzer. Ugh.
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