Annamaria Alfieri (she, her, hers)

Annamaria on Monday

At Bouchercon, many people’s badges gave only their names.  Mine gave my name and my pronouns.  When registering for the conference, it was optional to list pronouns.  I make no judgments about people who declined to list theirs.

 

During the conference, a few people looked at mine and shook their heads. I imagine, to some, displaying my pronouns labeled me as an extreme leftest.  I plead guilty to the leftist label, but I wouldn’t ordinarily call myself extremist.  Perhaps on this subject, tttyou might think I am. I’ll let you decide for yourself.  

 

 Here are my thoughts about gender.

The first thing anyone ever said about the vast majority of us was “It’s a boy.”  Or “It’s a girl.”   Almost invariably, those designation came with a set of expectations about how we would live our lives.  Until quite recently, those predictions were very different for people  designated as “boys" or as “girls.”  What clothes we would wear.  What personality traits would be fostered in us.  What games we would be encouraged to play.  What roles we would fulfill as adults.  How much schooling (if any) would be offered to us.  What sorts of work we would spend our days engaged in.

In “developed” countries,  over the past few decades, women’s choices in these regards have begun to broaden.  In much of the world, they are still extremely limited.

 And, then there is the matter of what gender we feel we belong in.  And who attracts us sexually. 

 

Some people do not align comfortably with the expectations that came with their gender designation.  They chafe at having to wear what is thought of as the proper clothing for people in their assigned pigeon hole.  Also, for some, their libidos do not respond only to those of the opposite sex.

 

In Western "Civilization,"  for millennia such people have been considered unacceptable.  Laws have been passed criminalizing as “unnatural” behavior that comes naturally to them  Their own parents have rejected them.  They have been vilified by their neighbors and condemned from the pulpits in their houses of worship.  They have had to hide when they followed the dictates of their natures.  Many have been forced into painful and disgusting “cures.”

 

There are also some people whose gender is not clear at birth.  They have been forced into one gender or the other.  Typically, their parents were forced to declare what gender would be put on their birth certificates.  Until very recently, and still in MANY places, there have been only two choices when it comes to gender.  

 

But what of the those people whose genetics do not conform?  And what of those whose innate nature is not heterosexual? 

Must they be declared unacceptable.

 

Finally, there is strong movement against punishing people for needing to be what they naturally are.   To help along this  eventuality, some of us declare our pronouns publicly as a signal to remind us all, ourselves included, that a human being is a human being.  That we all belong to the same species and that we all deserve to be full fledged members of society.