Do any militaries actually deal well with non-binary folks? If so, what do they use as a replacement for “sir” or “ma’am” when addressing an enby superior?
(Current WIP has a NB protagonist, in a nod to the AFGNCAAP thing from back in the day.)
1 Like
I don;t know if this source is trustful:
Years ago the regs already had this covered - Sir is always correct, regardless of gender.
Or rank (Gender Neutral Sir/Ma'am - #6 by Intruder - Adult Staff - Air Cadet Central) ?
Refer to them by rank, like you normally would.
My research says “sir” or “ma’am” is only for officers.
I always thought that that was incorrect and perpetuated by media (especially Star Trek, apparently?) and “ma’am” is used for women.
Manon’s second source also said that “Squadron Leader” is used as an alternative.
Doesn’t it differ between militaries?
Probably but that’s what I’ve heard/read.
let’s clear a minor point: we’re discussing US or UK military ? I note that Hidnook quote from Manon an UK (RAF) rank (Squadron Leader, major in USAF)…
Best regards from Italy,
dott. Piergiorgio.
1 Like
Yes. This is a pastiche of optimistic starship exploration boldly going where angels fear to tread, and my enby PC is the captain.
1 Like
Then can’t you use “yes, Captain”, etc.?
1 Like
The German military (Bundeswehr) claims to deal well with all sorts of different people. In the (English) text I found they list lots of people, but don’t mention non-binary people. My personal opinion/impression is they don’t deal well with such people (yet), they just wish they would do so.
I don’t know how they name NB people, but we normally don’t use “Sir” or “Ma’am” here. They had a solution they would call a soldier of any gender “soldier” (Soldat) and instead of adding the female suffix “in” they would call them “soldier, male” and “soldier, female”. Still no mention of divers people but they could call them “soldier, divers”
Addition: Superiors are even different. Don’t know how they would address them.
Manon’s second source (the UK cadets source) seems to suggest that there’s no official written rule, and the “just use rank” solution is an unofficial path-of-least-resistance solution. Saying “we already solved this, just use Sir like on Star Trek (but also, in practice, I’m probably going to continue calling women Ma’am)” feels like another response in the path-of-least-resistance, I-dont-really-want-to-think-about-it-that-much genre.
TBH, being treated as an exception/afterthought is pretty core to the nonbinary experience currently, and I kinda don’t know how to feel about the style of representation that ignores this (and the feeling of being in conflict with gender categorization more broadly) and instead depicts a universally recognized “third gender” with a parallel set of gender norms.
4 Likes
I have difficulties understanding your opinion here: Do you mean third gender with its own norms would be bad?
1 Like
Kinda, yeah. I mean, obvious caveats out of the way first: nonbinary is a broad label encompassing a lot of different experiences, I can only speak for myself, some nonbinary people do want to be recognized as a third gender with parallel gender norms, etc.
But there are a lot of people who just feel like discretized gender labels are not useful for understanding/expressing their experiences/identity/behaviour/sexuality/etc, and who want to be free from the practice of mandatory gender classification rather than forced into a new gender category.
When asked what my gender is, I should be able to say “none of your business,” or “I don’t think that’s a useful question to ask about someone like me.” The catch-all nonbinary category is often just a compromise necessary to function in a society that’s really, really insistent that a person not belonging to a gender category is a problem that needs to be solved.
To be clear, there is a problem to be solved, but the problem is the existence of norms that require you to categorize people according to gender regardless of whether that act of categorization is actually possible or useful. This is not a problem that can be fixed by improving the categorization system itself; in particular, the creation of a catchall “nonbinary” category doesn’t work, because it fails to provide the things that the traditional gender categories supposedly provide (e.g. information about bodies, sexuality, behaviour, etc and the assumed correlations between them); and note that those are exactly the things that supposedly justify the existence of the norms in the first place.
11 Likes
Oh, I see now. I saw somewhere a form (digital? paper? I don’t remember) where you could cross out one of four gender options:
Male, Female, Diverse, I don’t want to say.
That seems good. But from what you said, I think most forms to be filled out should not ask for gender at all. Of course there are cases where asking makes sense. But in many cases not.
2 Likes
The way I comprehend it, what one has in their pants is ultimately no body’s business except for one’s lovers and doctors, and the latter only if the doctor’s visit is related to matters of the urogenital tract.
Everything else tied up in the ill-defined concept we call gender is mostly about perpetuating a false dichotomy of prescribed behavior and people suffering when they don’t fit into either of the boxes those who perpetuate this false dichotomy try to shove everyone into.
Replacing a false dichotomy with a false trichotomy is hardly any better, and even calling something a spectrum is often making an assumption that something fits neatly on a straight line between two extremes.
As such, I lean towards abolishing the notion of gender norms if not the concept of gender itself and simply recognizing that “People are different and that’s okay.” and ending these ridiculous attempts to put people in different boxes for no good reason.
I say this as someone born anatomically male who is quite happy with his factory equipment but who has no inclination to make any attempt to adhere to his homeland’s notion of masculinity, enjoys quite a lot of media targetted at a female audience, largely prefers clothing marketed to women, likes the colors purple and pink, and who is pissed off by people who assume that, just because I’m somewhat effeminate and like girly things, I must secretly be either gay or trans. PLus, I have several eccentricities unrelated to gender non-conformity that I wish people were less judgmental about.
5 Likes
Yeah, I hate that, too. I think about myself in a traditional role-image. But I think I should be more open to things about me, which I assign to women normally. In the end, I do love strongly-coloured/colourful things. Like some African and Indian clothings. And Bollywood movies! Where I haven’t a problem is accepting others, I put stricter restrictions on myself than on others. Don’t know why.
1 Like
The fear of being judged by others can be a hard one to overcome and being one’s self in public can be far scarier than letting everyone else be themselves.
Also, forgot to mention this, but I like how -san, the default honorific in Japanese is completely gender neutral, unlike it’s equivalents in English(which aren’t only gendered, but dependanted on marital status for one gender).
3 Likes
There are lots of languages that are way better than English on the gender neutrality front (but also lots that are worse, tbf).
3 Likes
I feel this way about the “X” marker on IDs like passports and driver’s licenses. Like I don’t want my gender to be referred to as “X”, I want my gender not to be referred to at all – at least by the government or other institutions! Plus it makes it way more dangerous to interact with bigots in positions of power.
5 Likes