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submitted 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) by Cat@ponder.cat to c/news@lemmy.world
  • The Center Square: Federal employees reportedly told to remove pronouns from email signatures.
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[-] Poem_for_your_sprog@lemmy.world 14 points 1 day ago
  • Name is Alex/Jordan/Leslie
  • Not allowed to clarify gender
[-] Pacattack57@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Wouldn’t the world be better off if no one knew each others gender? If you’re a cis man and find yourself attracted to another man? Congrats you’re gay now.

[-] GraniteM@lemmy.world 14 points 1 day ago

How does this hold up against a first amendment test?

[-] westyvw@lemm.ee 8 points 1 day ago

Well like any other employee, you can say whatever you like, but you might get fired for it.

I don't see how the first ammendment applies here.

That said, I think this is a stupid and mean spirited order. It is by design trying to continue the exodus of federal employees while also the tyrannical denial of being able to identify people however they find appropriate for themselves.

[-] JustARaccoon@lemmy.world 11 points 1 day ago

Well it's not a private entity hiring them, it's the actual govt. Usually the defense is that those are private companies and they can do what they want but that doesn't apply here

[-] westyvw@lemm.ee 2 points 1 day ago

Yes it does apply here. Why would you think it would be different?

There are always policies in government, just like anywhere else you have people working. Freedom of speech is not an excuse to break those policies.

[-] Maggoty@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago

Because their employer is the US Government. The very entity the 1st Amendment protects us from.

[-] westyvw@lemm.ee 3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Not how this works at all. Do you really believe that an employee can just do or say anything while on the job just because they work for the US government?

Lets take Email for example, because that is what we are talking about here. There are policies about structuring emails. An agency can say: Your name goes at the bottom of every email, followed by your position, and then the Logo of the Agency. If you choose to sign your emails with someone else's name, from "This is such bullshit department" and a logo you made up, you WILL get disciplined.

Your freedom of speech ends at the door. Outside of work feel free, not at work.

[-] Maggoty@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago

Most of that isn't political speech. You absolutely still have the right to political speech as a government employee. Even the military was forced to let soldiers have political speech. The dividing line is where it looks like the speech is from the government instead of from you. Personal pronouns are hardly going to be from the government.

In your assertion the government could simply remove the rights of civil servants by issuing a policy. And that's just not how rights work.

[-] HawlSera@lemm.ee 4 points 1 day ago

When "What Trump wants goes" is all the Supreme Meme Court cares about

It'll never have to

[-] superminerJG@lemmy.world 17 points 1 day ago
  • I → (the) speaker/writer
  • you → (the) listener/reader, pl. (the) audience
  • they → that person, pl. those people

The writer believes that such an idea is quite stupid. In fact, the writer believes that the audience will find this language extremely obtuse. These methods will only cause more pain to the federal employees in question.

[-] tiefling 7 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Don't forget pronouns like who, mine, and ours. In fact, here's a list of >100

Someone should write a script that completely replaces these with BS standins

I think we need a tool that automatically rewrites text to remove all pronouns, but I'm not even sure that is possible.

[-] nul42@lemmy.ca 6 points 1 day ago

nul42 would stop using pronouns completely and just use genderless nouns or proper names instead.

[-] socialmedia@lemmy.world 27 points 2 days ago

So is it alright to just assume trump is female? The email signature no longer states her preferred pronouns, so I think this is what she wants?

[-] Timecircleline@sh.itjust.works 12 points 1 day ago

She did sign that executive order designating everyone as female, too.

[-] prole 51 points 2 days ago

This is just begging for malicious compliance.

You want to eliminate an entire part of speech? Then good luck trying to understand what the fuck my email is trying to say.

In the article it specifies you to remove pronouns from your email signature. Definitely less fertile ground for malicious compliance, but it's still doable.

[-] tiefling 6 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

End every email body with "For your response, I am referred to using (feminine/masculine/any/whatever) pronouns"

[-] Maggoty@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Replace it with "[Insert Pronouns Here]". Make sure to have your desk already cleaned out though.

[-] Nalivai@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago

You

FUCKING PRONOUNCE turns red and screams

[-] humorlessrepost@lemmy.world 8 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Does the reader want to eliminate an entire part of speech? Then good luck trying to understand what the fuck the writer’s email is trying to say.

Could be fun. I bet ChatGPT could automate it.

[-] HawlSera@lemm.ee 2 points 1 day ago

DeepSeek can automate it

[-] btaf45@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago

Does the reader want to eliminate an entire part of speech?

Which one are they going to outlaw next? Verbs? Or Adjectives?

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[-] SpikesOtherDog@ani.social 47 points 2 days ago

Think it is important for people to remove all pronouns from documents. Without, people will be more free to interpret what these messages mean to. This type of malicious compliance will only go so far, sadly.

[-] turbowafflz@lemmy.world 38 points 2 days ago

Comment used it, these, and this. Please remove offensive pronouns, children may be present and children must not learn the english language

[-] user224@lemmy.sdf.org 18 points 2 days ago

children must not learn the english language

Reminds me of...

The purpose of Newspeak was not only to provide a medium of expression for the world-view and mental habits proper to the devotees of Ingsoc, but to make all other modes of thought impossible. It was intended that when Newspeak had been adopted once and for all and Oldspeak forgotten, a heretical thought—that is, a thought diverging from the principles of Ingsoc—should be literally unthinkable, at least so far as thought is dependent on words. Its vocabulary was so constructed as to give exact and often very subtle expression to every meaning that a Party member could properly wish to express, while excluding all other meanings and also the possibility of arriving at them by indirect methods. This was done partly by the invention of new words, but chiefly by eliminating undesirable words and by stripping such words as remained of unorthodox meanings, and so far as possible of all secondary meanings whatever. To give a single example. The word free still existed in Newspeak, but it could only be used in such statements as “This dog is free from lice” or “This field is free from weeds.” It could not be used in its old sense of “politically free” or “intellectually free” since political and intellectual freedom no longer existed even as concepts, and were therefore of necessity nameless. Quite apart from the suppression of definitely heretical words, reduction of vocabulary was regarded as an end in itself, and no word that could be dispensed with was allowed to survive. Newspeak was designed not to extend but to diminish the range of thought, and this purpose was indirectly assisted by cutting the choice of words down to a minimum.

[-] prole 17 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I've said it before, I remember reading this novel as a teen and finding the parts about language to be boring and far-fetched.

Looking back, it was probably one of the most important things that Orwell discussed. That shit is incredibly powerful, and it fundamentally shapes how we think and view the world without us even realizing it.

[-] pdxfed@lemmy.world 11 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I remember reading Thomas Paine in high school and most of the students couldn't even understand it. That stuff was printed for the average bloke 200 years ago. The stuff that helped light the American populace to take up arms and overthrow tyrannical rule isn't even comprehendable to our poorly educated populace now. Being a genius isn't required to foment revolution, but common language is, literally and figuratively.

If you haven't learned vocabulary, your brain struggles to conceive, identify and of course use it in course of thought. One of the reasons right wing news and cable so often misuses and deliberately butchers important words like traitor, fascist, etc. is they want to strip them of their very important meaning so they aren't notable when used.

[-] MutilationWave@lemmy.world 6 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

21% of adult Americans are considered to have low English literacy. Two thirds of these people were born in the US. This basically means they can read the words in a paragraph, but not understand the meaning of the paragraph. A further 4% are functionally illiterate.

This is disgusting.

Fuck "No Child Left Behind". Kids shouldn't pass elementary school without being able to deduce the meaning of a paragraph unless they have a mental disability. I don't care if they have to repeat 5th grade three times. And of course any non passing student should be offered tutoring for free long before they get to the point of being held back.

[-] HawlSera@lemm.ee 3 points 1 day ago

The demonization of pronouns is a subtle way to get that illiteracy rate higher.

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[-] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 9 points 2 days ago

They should replace all pronouns with [redacted].

But why would a pronoun be in a signature? Something like Her Majesty, Patricia Jones, Dept. of Health?

[-] BradleyUffner@lemmy.world 11 points 1 day ago

So people know how you would like to be addressed.

[-] Maggoty@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago
  • Parker Smith

  • She/Her

  • Department of Defense Black Budget Coordinator

  • 867-5309 ext. 1

Questions?

[-] FundMECFSResearch 17 points 2 days ago

my new bio: (masculine neutral/masculine possessive)

[-] superminerJG@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago

but they banned mentioning gender, change it to (identifying with the societal archetype of the sex producing the small reproductive cell)

[-] TheRealKuni@lemmy.world 8 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

my new bio: (masculine neutral/masculine possessive)

Isn’t it nominative/objective?

I don’t see “he/his” or “they/their,” I see “he/him” and “they/them.”

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[-] user224@lemmy.sdf.org 16 points 2 days ago

I guess Trump doesn't want to be referred to as He/Him

https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-appears-accidentally-declared-every-174749266.html
Hmmm, I see...

[-] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 11 points 2 days ago

Hope you're not named Elle.

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this post was submitted on 01 Feb 2025
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