FINAL THOUGHT, April 28, 2025
Originally published April 28, 2025 for our End-of-Month Issue of Mindful Intelligence Advisor. Subscribe to get semi-monthly issues.
By Bill Collier, Publisher
“Free speech is my right to say what you don’t want to hear.” –George Orwell
“The right to free speech is more important than the content of the speech.” –Voltaire
“Freedom of speech doesn’t protect speech you like; it protects speech you don’t like.” –Larry Flynt
“If we do not believe in freedom of speech for those we despise we do not believe in it at all.” –Noam Chomsky
The pursuit of “alternative pronouns” may have begun, in part, as a pushback against intolerance, the intolerance of non-conformity to orthodox expectations regarding sex and gender, but it has since become another spearpoint aimed at the Bill of Rights.
Still, if we live out our Americanism, the idea that individuals can define their own happiness and pursuit of that happiness for themselves, should we YET THEN be tolerant and respectful of those who choose to express themselves through “alternative pronouns?”
The whole pronouns thing may seem wacko, and I can’t argue it can get strange; the positive in the movement is the idea of being your authentic self.
I might argue that changing your pronouns to fit your perception of your gender or for other reasons isn’t the path to authenticity, but I appreciate that it has become visible because I think it does, in part, affirm that people should be free to be their authentic selves and not be FORCED to follow “expected” social norms.
If using alt pronouns is what you need to do to be authentic to your true self as you see yourself, especially if this takes you to a place of seeing that this only scratches the surface, then so be it. I do not judge the heart; I do, however, have a right to my own morals and to define truth, justice, and authenticity according to my beliefs, values, and convictions.
Instead of being easily offended about pronouns, whether you use alt pronouns or choose not to participate, I believe it would be more consistent with our Americanism to have a more live and let live attitude.
You have no right to demand people recognize your gender as being a social construct; you also have no right to tell people they cannot express themselves in this manner.
Being true to your authentic self goes both ways.
Do you believe alt pronoun usage reflects your authentic self, or is part of that? So be it. Associate with people, or prefer people, who agree and will acknowledge that, but don’t become hostile to people who cannot agree on their own grounds (they do not owe anyone an explanation) and who feel strongly that gender is what you are born with, period.
While alt pronouns may be losing some popularity, mostly because some loud people are insufferable about demanding the world change to suit their preferences, I’m concerned the idea behind it, being your authentic self, may also suffer.
For some, using alt gender pronouns is a pathway to finding who they truly are. I think it’s a dead end to stay there, and I also think you can pursue and explore this idea of authenticity without resorting to alt pronouns usage.
I may not agree with the alt pronoun usage, but where the subject is finding your authentic self, we are, to that degree, the same. We just go about it differently.
I do not view using people’s alt pronouns, if they ask with respect (demanding me anything will get resistance!), as an agreement that sex or gender can be a social construct, but if I care for someone and this is their journey, even though I think this is objectively not an effective path to true authenticity, I will respect THEIR worldview and probably use whatever they want me to use.
It is hard to use they/them, however, because it is a total disruption of language, but sometimes I think those using such pronouns are symbolizing a resistance against the soft tyranny of FORCING societal norms, something I cannot not only understand but also agree with.
In other words, I agree with upsetting social norms that go against individual authenticity and that don’t benefit everyone the same, I just think alt pronouns are more surface and shallower and don’t get to the right conclusion in the end. They also disrupt far more than “social norms,” they disrupt efficient human value exchange, existentially, when forced on society as a whole.
It may be that someone using those alt pronouns is on a journey. They know (or think they know) that they do not fit the orthodox categories or roles society assigns them without their foreknowledge or consent.
This writer is also not naïve enough to see that some, especially the late joiners, are playing language games intended to disarm their opposition. They’re not pursuing authentic understanding; they’re using the divisive language of trans and non-binary to isolate, attack, and destroy their competition.
We have limited means to break the mold in terms of our work, how we make a living, and manage other factors in life where we are forced into roles and submission to rules that actually defy our own inner convictions.
I feel this pressure a lot. I also see how limiting and controlling most institutions in our society are today, and I understand why someone would perhaps even subconsciously resort to alt pronouns to try and take back some of their sovereignty.
I know that God has had a lot of grace on me for things I later realized were not His will or plan for my life, so I choose to show grace both because the wrong person may one day see the light and because the wrong person may be me (a general axiom it would be wise to follow).
Ultimately, I think, for many who use alt pronouns it is rebellion and reaction against the stultifying tendencies of societal norms that go beyond civility into outright control of your person, in violation of your individual sovereignty and authenticity.
Rebellion against top-down control like that can often be haphazard, inconsistent, reactionary, and weird, but one must look beyond the pathways people choose to understand a more common goal: the inherent rights of sovereign beings, us, being true to who we are in an authentic way, while being limited only by reasonable rules of civility and mutual tolerance and respect, outside of our preferred associations that follow the same way of life that we do.
Civility doesn’t mean people OWE YOU usage of your alt pronouns; some will simply use the standard norms of addressing you by your visible gender. You are out of the norm here, and if people break the norm for you, it is a privilege and not a right.
What people DO owe you is decency and respect as a human being. For example, they can be civil and kind despite not agreeing to use your pronouns because, for them, using alt pronouns isn’t perceptively being true to their authentic self.
Too often, however, people who believe in things that are harmless to society are treated as if they are a menace, perhaps because of the loud insufferables in their ranks but also due to the inherent tendency in humans towards bigotry.
If someone who is born a guy thinks they are a girl, and if they then choose to live as a girl in their own life and with their own people, they are no DIRECT threat to you. While you don’t owe them usage of alt pronouns, you owe them respect and decency, if not merely for the sake of preserving and advocating for Americanism (the right to self-stewardship, even when you’re “wrong”) as a civic standard.
For instance, you may just avoid pronouns with them as much as possible, and you may explain that you cannot in good conscience use alt pronouns, but you respect their humanity and treat them well regardless.
For me, when a loved one asked me to use they/them pronouns, despite my philosophical and religious beliefs about the permanence of gender from birth, I chose to use the alt pronouns to show them that no matter what “alternatives” from the “orthodox” they choose, even when I oppose it, my love for them will not end.
My usage of their terms is not an affirmation of those terms, but an affirmation of my love for them. To confirm a lie is not loving.
In closing, I suspect the reason the whole alt pronouns thing emerged was a rebellion against artificial societal norms that go beyond a peaceful and tolerant society to become a society that controls and limits the human spirit.
That probably happened because the non-binary “cause” was then picked up by authoritarian, anti-American social engineers who exploited the plea of the needy to trick people into surrendering “rights” for “protection.”
Not so surprisingly, though no less ironically, that “tolerance” has led to “intolerance” of countervailing views.