Does the community consider the "coerced speech" complaint largely resolved?

Question

An objection to the original (now-deleted) pronoun-related FAQ was in regards to coerced speech. See for example Bye Stack Exchange, I'm done. Coerced speech is incompatible with freedom. From what I understand, the idea of coerced speech affected some moderators' decisions to step down, and other users' decisions to express disappointment: see Firing mods and forced relicensing: is Stack Exchange still interested in cooperating with the community?. But this was not the only reason.

The new FAQ has been comparatively well received.

My impression is that the community currently seems less concerned about coerced speech, and is more focused on Monica's situation, even attempting to settle this dispute. I just want to verify:

Question: Does the community consider the "coerced speech" complaint largely resolved?

Another question raises some other concerns, but answers some of them too.

Answer 1

No, not for me.

Houseman has done well in articulating why the issue is not realistically resolved, but I would posit that it's even technically not resolved.

Why?

Because based on what I have observed, the "technical" exclusions to compelled speech are in direct opposition to the actions taken against Monica. If what the new FAQ specifies is indeed what is expected of users, then Monica did not violate those expectations.

So, given the reasons Monica was dismissed, if those reasons are still considered valid, it necessarily means that our speech is compelled on this matter.

I would like to add some background on my experience, as well.

I have been silent publicly about many of the recent issues, as it has been highly stressful for me just to participate in the moderator chatroom discussion. But I would like you to know that I have been very thorough in my familiarization with this situation, having been following the discussion on pronouns for over a year and reading transcripts for discussions going even further back. Additionally, I am an ally to the Lavender community and a vocal proponent of preferred personal pronouns, even outside of Stack Exchange.

To be fully transparent, many moderators will agree with me when I say that I have not been a vocal advocate for Monica with regards to her dismissal, and at times I've been a vocal opponent for lack of a better word. I have not worked closely with her to develop any sort of fondness or friendship. I am not giving this answer because I'm yet another user that wants Monica reinstated. And I'm not doing this because I'm tied up with emotions. I'm writing this explanation, because I want you to believe and trust me when I say that there is a severe logic issue when you try to reconcile SE's actions with SE's words.

We have evidence, in the form of Monica's punishment, that compelled speech is a requirement and asking for clarification on that front is also punishable (despite the FAQs statement). I know that not all the evidence is available to all parties, and that I don't even have all the evidence, merely more than non-moderators. But the evidence I do have is sufficient.

Additionally, I have seen early drafts of the FAQ, and offered input into revisions of the FAQ as well as the preceding announcements and even the actual CoC update. What I have seen, in my opinion, is the staff at SE struggle to word these documents in a way that maintains their condemnations of Monica while also giving users the (illusionary) ability to disengage. This opinion is one that I can't point to clear evidence on, unfortunately, which is why I've asked for your trust. When moderators have asked for wording to be clarified to try to make sense of how Monica was dismissed versus what the policy says, there has been:

• Avoiding the question by saying they don't want to keep making it about Monica
• Offering comments in chat (or on meta posts) that seem to answer concerns, but then never editing them into posts and thereby giving them legitimacy
• Evolved their language use in documentation drafts and the FAQ that, effectively, hide the conflict between what they're saying Monica did wrong and what they now say is right. In some ways I feel guilty about this, for my pointed questions to staff about how a particular wording makes sense considering what actually happened

I think certain employees at SE realize that there is a logical issue with speech requirements they have laid out, and how following that logic would be incongruous with realities such as the existence of religious and non-English stacks. When moderators called out these issues in drafts, they ended up being additional FAQ entries that avoid the underlying problem. I think the underlying problem with the confusion around compelled speech and what we are allowed to not say or must say stems from the impossibility of balancing what they say they want to accomplish, who they want to offer exceptions to so that whole stacks don't die, and maintaining the stance that Monica's actions would not considered OK under the current rules. They wanted to draw a hard line in the sand, but they have dusted over the parts of the line after realizing how large the line needed to be.

So no, the compelled speech problem is not resolved. I feel at risk as a moderator. I feel at risk as a user. I am confused by the rules and the claims of how issues and violations will be handled. And while I have no issues with the particular speech I would be compelled to use, I do not believe that if I felt otherwise that I would not summarily be subjected to the new moderator removal process.

Answer 2

According to the letter of the law, it seems like speech is still compelled. However, there's a loophole.

Can you avoid pronouns? Yes. Well, actually, only if it's your natural writing style. Otherwise no.

Because if you "conspicuously" change your writing style, or do it in an "obviously unnatural way" then you're just doing it to avoid using pronouns you find uncomfortable, which is disrespectful.

So it seems that in certain situations, where:

1. You normally use pronouns in your style of writing.
2. And someone corrects you
3. You must use their pronouns.

This would be compelled speech. But there's a loophole:

You might be able to silently disengage if you can do it without getting caught. Technically, this would be against the rules. Thankfully, the mods can't read minds, so as long as they don't know why you disengaged, they can't do anything about it.

You would have to declare your intention to disengage because you don't like neopronouns, or have a habit of suddenly disappearing whenever someone corrects you during a conversation, revealing a consistent pattern of behavior. Other than that, you won't be punished for it.

So as long as you either:

1. Change your writing style to avoid using pronouns altogether (is this compelled speech?)

or

2. Silently disengage without tipping the mods off as to why you're doing it.

One's speech would not be compelled. So technically, yes. Realistically, no.

So is it resolved? I'm not completely satisfied. Clearly, the letter of the law is trying to compel my speech, it's just not that good at it.

See also my answer here

Answer 3

To the extent that the Code of Conduct and its official FAQ are still trying to effect language change by requiring that we must alter our idiolect (or our personal mental grammar) to add new words to the closed class of pronouns in order to converse with or about anyone who requests so-called neopronouns, I don't think the coerced speech complaint has been resolved. Pronouns are a very stable part of a language's grammar, changing on the timespan of centuries. Despite non-binary or third gender people being accepted in various societies around the world for thousands of years I'm not aware of any languages which have incorporated even a single neopronoun for non-binary people into their grammars, let alone dozens. (If you do know of examples, please share, I and many others would be fascinated to see them!) What SE is trying to effect here is likely truly unprecedented in history. Will it succeed? We'll have to wait and see.

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Now if part of the non-binary community coalesced around a new pronoun, I think it would be appropriate to ask the SE community to learn that new pronoun. But it doesn't appear that way, and instead there are over a dozen neopronouns seeing some limited use, and the option is available to anyone to create new bespoke pronouns.

Don't underestimate the friction of using neopronouns that are not part of your idiolect - it's much more than just using new words. Not only do we need to know four new words, the parallels for he, him, his, himself (in English, other languages could have fewer or even more). We also need to know which patterns in the language they fit. Do they fit the pattern of 'he' and 'she', or of 'they', or of something else? Do we say "Ke runs" or "Ke run"? Do we say "Ke is happy" or "Ke are happy"? "Ke has to ..." or "Ke have to ..."? Saying your pronouns are "xe/xir" is not enough. Unfortunately pages like the LGBTA wiki page linked in the FAQ does not make all of this clear. And even if you do over time incorporate a neopronoun into your idiolect, for the next one you'd have to start largely from scratch, because each of these patterns could be different. If someone wants us to use their bespoke neopronoun, I think they need to be willing to explain all of these language patterns.

Answer 4

My impression is that the community currently seems less concerned about coerced speech, and is more focused on Monica's situation

A moderator was forcibly removed for merely voicing serious (and reasonable) concerns about a policy that, from what we know, one manager took as a reason to remove her.

So forget the rules, just disagreeing with the proposal of a single manager can get you removed from SE.

And, even worse, SE Inc. made a public attack on the named moderator. So they will apparently try and ruin your public reputation if you even disagree with their suggestions (not even established policy, but just the suggestions).

If that can happen a respected moderator it can happen any ordinary member.

All of that is, by any reasonable definition, a way of coercing speech.

And it seems to be the intent of those SE managers.

Until real justice is seen to be done, this will, at best, be a festering wound waiting to explode again and again.

Answer 5

Note that none of this answer is about what's right or wrong, or how things ought to be in society. Most people are oblivious to the needs of the trans community and view the CoC in terms of "how does this impact me?" This answer is the common perception of that.

I think the issue is clearest if you focus on the example of neopronouns.

In the real world, there are recognized rules of polite society. You grow up learning the exisiting social norms, and applying them second nature.

People forgive accidental mistakes in using standard pronouns. Purposely using the wrong standard pronoun after being corrected is recognized as rude.

Neopronouns are not a standard part of the English language in common usage. Relatively few people know they even exist. Almost nobody knows what they are or how to use them. Most people encountering them wouldn't be sure what a sentence containing them means.

When strangers interact, there is no expectation that one person has an entitlement to have the other person refer to them using neopronouns. If one person requested it of the other, the person might try to comply, but there would be no expectation under normal social rules that the person must. Failure to comply would not be considered rude. Rather, asking a stranger to use neopronouns would likely be considered unreasonable and inappropriate; demanding it might be considered obnoxious. If someone wants to use neopronouns in the real world, they do it outside the support of existing social norms.

SE has created an environment disparate from the real world. Here, neopronouns are required if requested. Failure to comply is predefined as rude and disrespectful, and potentially carries sanctions. The rules are inconsistent with what is familiar to most people.

Is the language "compelled"? Nobody can force anybody to say something; compelled speech is always a matter of comply or deal with the penalties. Here, the penalty is removal.

There are now two loopholes: change how you write so as to avoid pronouns in all cases, or disengage, as long as you do it subtlely. This isn't saying that it's completely acceptable; it's unacceptable, just don't get caught.

By any definition, it's still compelled speech. Comply or don't post here. It's all dressed up with pretty words, and explanation of why it's important to do this. But the company is adamant that the fundamental starting position is that it is mandatory. It might be a little easier to avoid sanctions under the revised guidelines, but the bottom line hasn't changed.

Some people will accept the explanation and decide that the terms won't be an issue for them. Some people will have the same issues they had before, and will have to decide whether it is acceptable to rely on the loopholes to participate. For them, compelled speech is still very real

Some people just want an environment where they don't have to tiptoe around or learn a new set of social rules. Under the new CoC, people can no longer assume that the normal, familiar rules of polite society are enough to participate respectfully. For them, just the fact that speech is compelled may be irksome, but the more direct consequence may be that this no longer feels like a comfortable place to be.

Answer 6

Semantically speaking, it wouldn't be compelled speech if the CoC said simply to not misgender someone. But the fact that the CoC specifically states that writing your communications to a person who uses controversial pronouns in a way that avoids the pronoun issue altogether is also not allowed, even the semantics argument is invalid.

Normally rules regarding pronouns simply forbid the use of the wrong ones. There is no part that states you HAVE to use them when asked to. Thus you can avoid breaking the rule by simply not using any pronouns when communicating with someone.

This is basically a loophole. But this loophole makes the rule not compelled speech since you technically have a choice to not use them.

However, since the SE rule specifically plugs this loophole, now it becomes the very definition of compelled speech. As in, you are to speak a specific way to and about someone or be punished. You have no other choice.

As it stands written, if a user reveals their preferred pronouns, this user can effectively compel other users to use them or face punishment.

If you were to remove the part of the rule that plugs the refraining loophole, then things would likely be settled on this front.

EDIT: A user on another question pointed out another possible loophole that could resolve the compelled speech problem. There is nothing in the CoC that says you cannot just ignore a user who reveals controversial preferred pronouns. You know, the Silent Treatment.

NOTE: The compelled speech problem is only resolved by these loopholes if being a "Rules Lawyer" is permitted in this case. If being a “Rules Lawyer” is not allowed, then we are back to square one.

Answer 7

There has been a lot of handwaving about how people largely aren't affected by the change and "if you don't adopt neopronouns you're disrespectful to LGBT" (which is a false dichotomy, BTW) and whatnot, but seeing how the CoC change has not been reverted or amended in any way I certainly do not consider this resolved in any way.

What seems to be happening here is a pattern that nowadays can be observed with an alarming frequency in politics: when people get up in arms about a decision that goes against their best interest, the response tends to be "oh, we probably didn't explain that well enough to you" rather than listening to the concerns of the people and admitting a mistake, followed by a lot of smoke and mirrors while waiting for the storm to blow over. And unfortunately that tactic seems to work most of the time.

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With that said, for everyone who believes this CoC change won't have an effect on them or be the last move in the direction of social justice politics, let me add a small data point for you:

I had posted my stance on the CoC change as an answer to the original (now deleted) FAQ where it was deleted by CesarM right away. The wording was certainly confrontational, but I disagree that it was "rude" or "highly offensive" like some people claim. I then posted that text (with some minor changes) in the "about me" section of my profiles because I want to make my position known, just in case anyone cares. The general consensus (at least to my knowledge) is that we're free to post in the "about me" section whatever we want unless it "is likely to be truly offensive to large groups of seemingly reasonable people."

However, at some point the larger part of the text was silently deleted (from all of my profile pages), without any notification or warning. Hence I raised a question about who had deleted the text and why, and flagged that for moderator attention. That was 4 days ago (at the time of this writing), and I have yet to receive any response from The Powers That Be.

I believe it was CesarM who posted a (now deleted) comment saying something about how being called by specific pronouns is a human right and they will defend it. Only to have some moderator or company employee go ahead and censor someone's free speech (which is an actual human right, BTW). So, good job there. What was it the CoC said? No bigotry?

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Edit: The flag has now been declined with a canned response ("doesn't require moderator intervention"), so I contacted support as the next step.

Edit: Two weeks later: still no response.

Answer 8

I think "the coerced speech complaint" is resolved for users, who:

• Needn't talk about each other (in the third person) at all
• Are probably allowed to use whatever phraseology they choose, if they're inoffensive and do not deliberately "mis-gender"

For users the situation is the same as before, IMO -- being "nice" means you're allowed to say nothing, and/or to be polite in your own words -- there's prohibited speech (including "mis-gendering" now) but not coerced speech.

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For moderators the new FAQ says "Yes", in reply to the question, "So do I really have to use pronouns I find uncomfortable?".

I suppose that is intended to clarify, be explicit, that they find intolerable a moderator's not being willing to.

I think this is coercing the form of a moderator's expression, and is unprecendented -- formerly, just as it was for users, some speech was prohibited, but not coerced.

Its being an ex post facto justification for censuring Monica and demoting her from being a moderator, if it's doing so, doesn't make me welcome it.

It's also not how I would have ruled or arbitrated that dispute -- not where where I would have "drawn the line", between parties who disagree on the subject (i.e. if someone doesn't want to use someone else's pronoun). So, with respect I disagree with it for that reason too.

But I gather that The Powers That Be have made up their mind and moved on, and that their temperament is to be personally disinclined to second-guess their past decisions, so my take on the subject is immaterial.

I take it that the wording -- "Yes, moderators do really have to" -- is now cast in stone.

That isn't "nice", in my opinion -- to moderators who disagree -- and is therefore (in my opinion still) anathema. But being "nice" to them was apparently not the intention -- perhaps the opposite.

Answer 9

I can't say I'm satisfied, and it's for a different reason than most.

I'm not satisfied as to why the "compelled speech" argument is being used at all.

There's a lot of important context here - that argument is used a lot with regards to this issue, and it often comes from the mouths of less...kind...people than have generally used it in these discussions, and so it becomes a red flag. But there's a larger issue, and that is the general philosophy behind it.

When you participate on Stack Exchange (or, really, interact with anyone), you enter into an implied social contract. It basically says, hey, you can do and say what you want, but what you say and do will have consequences. This is just how life works: when a kid holds the door for somebody, people think better of that person; when a kid decides to bully another kid, that's a problem.

So on Stack Exchange, the way it works is - you can say and do what you want, but if you say something that's offensive - you use a slur, for example - you get suspended.

It used to be that if something wasn't Nice, that's how the 'boundary' for this sort of contract was set, and the boundary lines were set by moderator interpretation, which makes sense for a lot of things!

The pronoun issue is slightly different, and here's why: there have been a lot of well-meaning folks who just don't get it. I can't count the number of people who have said in the past couple weeks, "wow, I didn't understand this before" or "I need to learn more about the lavender/LGBT+ community". With that lack of understanding, Be Nice becomes harder to interpret and follow. How do you know how to Be Nice when you don't understand the situation well?

It becomes more complicated when you realize that there are groups out there who hide behind that misunderstanding as a shield for their intentionally offensive behavior. This mixture of fake misunderstanding and sincere misunderstanding begins to grate: you don't know if the person you're explaining to is sincere, and at some point you just want to throw your hands into the air and give up.

So Stack Exchange in general came up with a pretty darn good idea: elaborate on the Be Nice policy to explain exactly what that meant, especially for more marginalized groups like the trans community. And where do you start with that? Pronouns.

You see where this is going.

I can't say Stack Exchange has handled this well (unfortunately their actions have mixed up the Code of Conduct change with what they did to Monica, and my thoughts on that are quite clear), but the base change they made to the Code of Conduct? I can fully get behind that, because it's not compelled speech.

It's part of a social contract you entered into when you signed up. It's part of Be Nice. It's just elaborated upon.

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EDIT: A lot of people in general are talking about the difference between a negative command and a positive command. To them I say this (quoted from some comments I wrote on another answer):

if you had a friend who preferred the nickname "Steve" instead of Stephen, but you restructured every sentence to avoid using that nickname because you found it problematic, and even continually stated you found that nickname problematic, that would be really uncomfortable for Steve, right? He wouldn't feel welcome.

Except we're talking about pronouns, not nicknames. Turns out, those often feel even more important to a person than nicknames, so the pain is even more deep.

Answer 10

There's some ambiguity as to what's meant by "conspicuous avoidance" in the FAQ. If it's "conspicuous to the reader of a post, comment thread, or chat conversation", that's one thing (& to my mind simply asking people to show some tact at least, out of basic courtesy); if it's "conspicuous to an analyst of the entire corpus of a user's writing on SE", that's quite another thing. Some comments on the FAQ clarification post appear to suggest the former interpretation; some the latter.

For example (https://meta.stackexchange.com/a/336380/225179), a Community Manager writes:—

If someone prefers to omit pronouns entirely, they’re welcome to do so, as long as it’s not used in an obviously unnatural way. For example, you can change "The OP wrote in his question" to "the OP wrote in the question" this is a non-obvious rephrasing. If you're writing "The OP wrote in the OP's question" for a user who asked you to refer to them with a neopronoun, that is more clearly discriminatory unless this is your default way of writing.

Of course.

Yet (https://meta.stackexchange.com/a/336381/225179), in response to the question:—

[...] if the style of writing under the old CoC used pronouns for a group of people, and then the writing style under the new CoC avoids the use of pronouns, is it possible for this to be interpreted as conspicuously refusing to recognize someone's identity, and thus a violation of the new CoC?

the same CM replies:—

[...] I would say if you stop using pronouns for everyone altogether and consistently do not, that's fine. Even if you did before. It'll become a new pattern in time, and that's okay.

This answer is implicitly accepting the premise that unless you know now that you'll be willing in future to refer to any user by any pronoun they may prefer, it's incumbent on you to henceforward eschew the use of gendered pronouns for all users. That's quite an imposition.

It does seem that SE want to run with the hare & hunt with the hounds; unless they intend to allow each site's moderators to interpret the CoC's requirements as they see fit, they owe it to everyone to be clearer.

Answer 11

For me, there wasn't an issue to begin with.

I am mostly interacting with anonymous, ungendered usernames on this site. While I sometimes amuse myself with guessing the gender, ethnicity, or other traits of the person behind a username, this has little effect on my interaction with that person, as the focus of that interaction is usually elsewhere (e.g. answering a programming question).

Because I don't know the gender, nationality, religious beliefs, and so on of the other person, and because they don't know these things about me, I don't make much of misattributions. If someone calls me "he" or "she" or "they" and that is not how I see myself – why do I care? All I care about is that people are "nice" in the sense that they aren't explicitly unfriendly. Beyond that, I prefer to assume the best intentions and allow for idiosyncracies.

It makes life much more pleasant not to feel attacked by every wrong pronoun.

Answer 12

The posting activity in the respective threads has gone down while at the same time asking and answering activity in the exchanges has continued more or less on a stable level. That probably means that the community has moved on by now (1-2 months later).

The company did change course somewhat. The community received the changed course a bit more positively. My impression is that the majority opinion about it is still not very positive, but much less negative than it was initially.

However, in the course of the whole thing, a lot of trust on all sides has been lost, and has not won back yet, at least that's my impression.

All in all it seemed to have brought out a bit of the worst in us all, not only of those who had a negative view of the whole thing but also proponents and even professionals (apologies that could be more convincing or renaming Nancy to Alice and so forth). We all seem to have the same tendency (some more, some less) for immature behavior if the situation gets a bit more tough than usual. Maybe we should think more about that.

As a summary: people have drawn their own conclusions and either arranged themselves with the new CoC or stopped or reduced significantly their partaking. The positions are clear and there is not much more need for discussions. Maybe in a few months, the issue could be revisited, if there is still desire for it then.

Answer 13

Yes. The specific issue of compelled speech is resolved for me. The entire CoC is coerced/compelled speech. It is a document that states “speak and act this way or you are not allowed to use the service.” Requiring certain speech to use a service is both legal and commonplace.

You can disagree because you think this is activism that shouldn’t be done on SO.

You can disagree because you think this puts a mental burden on people and chill participation.

You can disagree because you think SO shouldn’t make this kind of change without prior approval by the volunteers who make the site worthwhile.

You can disagree because you disagree with neoprouns as a concept.

You can disagree because of the way the situation with Monica is handled.

I don’t understand how you can disagree solely because of the concept of compelled speech assuming you agreed to the idea of a CoC previously.

Answer 14

In my opinion, even as a new user, I think that this issue is mainly resolved because not a lot of people are sending in complaints on the issue.

Answer 15

I know this might not really be an answer, but I would like to offer another way of seeing things here.

Please note that I'm French and that, for me, the definition of "free speech" is really different than the one most USA people have.

_{Also, I'm not a lawyer, so I might say things that are overly generalization and/or not completely true. But this is what I learn from growing up in France.}

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In France, free speech is mostly here so that you can criticize the government/power in place without being afraid of retaliation from such power in place.

However, it doesn't mean that you can say anything about anyone. For example, defamation or racial slurs/insulting someone is strictly forbidden.

So, in that regard, I don't think there was ever an issue with "coerced speech" regarding this new CoC (at least, not more than there was before).

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Another way to look at the situation is to consider that a website is not a public place.

SE Inc. is the entity that is paying for this place. So, SE Inc. is the owner of the place.

Whenever you go to someone else place (house), you have to follow their rule. For example:

• No shoes inside the house.

• No slurring in front of the children.

• Saying please and thank you when asking for the salt.

• Etc..

This is not really "coerced speech". It just people asserting their right to impose their own rules in their own house. If people don't like it, they are free to leave and if the host doesn't like the behavior of their guest, they are free to kick them out.

So, then again, for this point of view. There wasn't any "coerced speech" issue with this new code of conduct. It's just the owners of the place asserting their right to have their own private set of rules followed.

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Edit:

Regarding the fact that "coerce speech" is about telling people what they must say.

In my opinion, SE Inc is not telling you what you must say. SE Inc is just telling you that you shouldn't misgender people (and that you shouldn't assume their gender).

Answer 16

Even before any changes to the CoC, if I posted anything ableist or ageist for example, people would get offended and they would have the right to flag my posts/comments, edit out my vitriol, and punish me in whatever other ways. I know because I made some really ugly mistakes many times.

In and out of SE, conversations would sometimes go like this:

me: You have to be either [expletive] lazy or sick in the head to be unable to use a simple keyboard shortcut.
OP: I am developing this for disabled people who have lost most of their hand movements, and tetraplegic people who use the PC by operating a mouthpiece.
me: OMG I am truly sorry! Please, let me help you, for real!

Or

me: [expletive] college youths these days don't want to do their homework.
OP: I am actually 50, I'm just learning programming to see if I can get a good job.
me: I apologize. Don't give up. I'll post an answer.

Had I taken the suspensions that I properly deserved for those, would SE be accused of coerced speech?

We have a lot of negativity in ourselves and many feel the need to vent it out upon someone else. We usually spare the people we sympathise with, but anyone else is a target. We should not be like that. We should strive to respect everyone else unconditionally and without assuming that only our point of view is right.

Now all the objections that I've seen against preferred pronouns fit into these four buckets:

• "I'm disabled" (a la Roy Trenneman)

As someone in the spectrum, I am truly offended by this. It's not like posting in SE is a social situation in a room, filled with actual people, with all the awkwardness of their gazes and stares and the pressure to reply to what someone said in a context which is hard to grasp. It's just one tiny word in a non-real-time medium where we are largely disconnected from the audience we are communicating with. From the start, this whole thing seems like bigots using other people as a shield.

• "I'm disgusted"

Tough luck. You agreed to terms when you came here though.

• "My religion forbids me"

My religion requires me to engage in an argument with people who pull the religion card until they give up. Seems like we are stuck together.

• But the law...

SE is private property. Imagine that I stood on your lawn holding a sign with a message you don't like (e.g.: "Meat is murder, go vegan!"). Under US law you would have the right to remove me and my sign from your property. Depending on where in the US I wouldn't have a successful case against you even if I got shot. My right to free speech wouldn't have been violated because I can always go preach about what people should have the right to eat on someone else's lawn, as long as the property owner let me be.