Official Rax Pronouns 3.0 Release Notes

[rax]

This document describes the proper procedures for referring to rax using third-person pronouns. It supersedes all previous such documentation.

The correct pronoun for referring to rax is now "they." This is true whether you are referring to them as rax , Rax, Rachel, Rach, Kitty-Fox, or any other approved appellation. The pronoun "she" from pronoun release 2.0 is deprecated but still supported; there are not currenly plans to cease supporting this pronoun because the tech industry vertical maintains support for the 2.0 reference API as a requirement. Calls to the 2.0 system may occasionally produce warning messages encouraging you to update your pronoun usage, depending on the context of your statement. Use of the 1.0 pronoun API is explicitly unsupported and may lead to erratic and unexpected results; it is not recommended. If you find old documentation or legacy code that refers to rax with legacy pronouns, please inform them so that the situation may be remedied.

rax offers limited support for other gender-neutral pronoun calls; while "ey" and "xie" are not explicitly supported, these pronouns have been successful in limited field testing. If there is interest, a patch release may be offered in the future supporting these alternate pronoun sets. Please contact your sales representative for more information.

This change to the pronoun API does not constitute a change in the core rax gender identities module; no such changes are planned, although all things are possible. For more information about the core gender identities module, please contact Customer Support.

Comments

[chagrined]

This may be my favorite pronoun post ever.

[hebinekohime]

Congrats on a new step in the journey.

[picklish]

This post is so amazing.

It is unfortunate that supporting the 2.0 reference API continues to be a requirement for current clients of the API. There definitely exist clients that have freed themselves from such backwards compatibility dependencies, although using them with a newer API may have hidden performance costs that are hard to measure.

[rax]

I'm customer-facing; that makes things Complicated. It wouldn't necessarily be impossible, but I am not ready to take that step yet.

[tixagon]

Now that I've finished falling out of my chair and giggling away all of my breath...

Thank you for requesting "they" over "ey" and "xie"- I've never been fond of the latter two, and while the former is sometimes challenging to remember in casual conversation, at least it doesn't require a three hour lecture when using it around those Not In The Know™.

[sophie]

I've updated my codebase to use the 3.0 API, but if there turn out to be bugs in my update, please let me know so I can fix them! (I'll do my best to make sure they don't exist, though.)

[amadi]

Linked here via Twitter, but I just wanted to say that this is the most awesome, elegant, funny way of addressing this, and you rock. And congrats and best wishes on the "new release."

I Loled.

[rustycoon.livejournal.com]

This LJ post wins +10 internets.

Also: I've been insisting on the use of They/Them/Their as gender-neutral singular pronouns for about twenty years now... you know, before it was cool. *ducks*

o7

Re: I Loled.

[rax.livejournal.com]

Well aren't you a gender hipster! :)

[krinndnz.livejournal.com]

Update in progress.

Also one thing I like about 'they' pronouns over 'xie' and company - they rather force you to write and speak more clearly, to indicate with exactitude who it is that you're talking about. I am in favor of this, even though my marketer-brain says that "you can keep using your sloppy language habits just with a different word" is an adoption-rate advantage for xie/etc.

"Etc" would be a very difficult pronoun to live with.

[rax.livejournal.com]

Etc would in fact be very challenging. Although kind of awesome.

[bossgoji.livejournal.com]

I will admit 'they' sounds far less constructed and cutesy than 'xie', which has always struck me as trying way, way too hard.

[rax.livejournal.com]

It's a thing that sometimes requires a lot of effort, so I understand why folks try hard! But I have trouble with it, too.

[kelkyag]

What courtesy titles are approved for use with these pronoun selections?

[rax.livejournal.com]

Mx. is preferred! (pronounced "Mix") Ms. is... tolerable. "The" is also acceptable, as in:

The Rachel Dillon
100 E Street Name
Tucson, AZ 85716

Because that's awesome.

[anacoluthon.livejournal.com]

Good to know, thanks! =)

[redconverse.livejournal.com]

Brilliant pronoun-update post. Cheers!

I also love the use of "The" as an honorific (courtesy title). I always tell people "Nurse ::enterlastnamehere::" is just fine. HEY IF DOCTOR IS GOOD ENOUGH.

I also do prefer "they" as a whole; although of course I will use spivaks, et al, with those what prefer them and all.

[rax.livejournal.com]

Thanks :)

I may seriously start recommending "The." It's less constructed-feeling than Mx.

[identityfail.livejournal.com]

:)

[bluedaisy.livejournal.com]

(1) Brilliant. I love the way you write. The Rax is a rock star.

(2) Although you would still be a rock star if you had, thank you for not choosing "it" as your pronoun of choice. I can get past my indoctrination that one should use gender-specific pronouns, but I really can't get past the idea that "it" is dehumanizing. I try, but I end up simply avoiding pronouns for the friend who prefers "it", and the situation becomes linguistically stressful.

[rax.livejournal.com]

It's difficult! I know a couple of its and it has taken me a long time to get mostly used to using preferred pronouns --- partially because "it" shows up in all sorts of other contexts too, as demonstrated. Then again, so does they. "It" has gotten easier for me as I start to think of dehumanizing as not an (only) bad thing --- that the label of human may not necessarily always be a productive one, and that choosing to expressly challenge one's own humanity in certain places may be a productive move.

I would still not prefer "it" for myself. But it helps me be more comfortable with other folks for whom that is their preference.

[sovay]

If there is interest, a patch release may be offered in the future supporting these alternate pronoun sets. Please contact your sales representative for more information.

You do win the internet, or at least the intelligent part of it. Also, so noted.

[sabotabby]

Excellent.

[eponis.livejournal.com]

This is the most amazing thing I have read on the internet today.

I have a lot of people on my Twitter feed interested in gender stuff and pronoun stuff; I know this post is public, but do you mind if I link it?

[rax.livejournal.com]

You are welcome to link it, thank you!

breadcrumbed here from eponis

[etana.livejournal.com]

This is amazeballs. Amaze.Balls.

<3

Re: breadcrumbed here from eponis

[rax.livejournal.com]

That's... good, right? ;)

[mmsword.livejournal.com]

Already release 3.0 compatible, sweet!

[yakshaver.livejournal.com]

Duly noted. Actually, I suspect my brain's API will wedge itself far less over this upgrade than it did over the Rax Pronoun 1.0 —> 2.0 upgrade.

(Also, I have long advocated they over one or it (let alone any neologisms or portmanteau words) for those contexts where I was brought up to pretend that he was gender-neutral. So I also think this is a step in the right direction for the language in general. Go Rax!)

[ocean-state.livejournal.com]

I'm a big fan of the singular they and I approve of this post. :)

"They" is also my preferred pronoun, although I deal with it when called other pronouns irl or online. Just as the other comments have noted, "they" sounds natural and has a rich history in the English language. English speakers from all walks of life use the genderless they without thinking about it (e.g. "and when you find a staff member, tell them that we need to speak to a manager")

[coffeekitty.livejournal.com]

why does the sound of "Mx." make me want to promote "nyan" to an honorific?

[rathdei.livejournal.com]

We're not sure that ScotOS 1.0 is completely compliant with your new updated structure. Please bear with us while we upgrade our servers, there may be hiccups now and then where your preferred pronoun may not be implemented properly.

As regular users of Rax x.0 software, we here at ScotOS do appreciate your proper documentation of the latest release notes in version 3.0 - Please notify the customer service team of our mention of continued improved performance and personal contact with the staff of the Rax software family and the ScotOS family and its affiliates.

Error Messages

[(Anonymous)]

Hey The Rax,

I hope you feel free to send me error messages if I fuck it up.

<3,

Lisa

[http://users.livejournal.com/unnecessary_/]

How offended do you feel if someone calls you "she" now?

[rax.livejournal.com]

I don't really feel offended at all at this point. If it's someone who I'm close to, I feel a little disappointed, but for the most part I expect it to take time for people to get used to, especially since I'm not making any physical changes at the same time. (Well, I changed my wardrobe slightly but I think it's largely invisible to people who haven't known me for years.) This change is a project as opposed to a survival thing like the first pronoun change was; someone calling me "he" gets bared fangs and someone calling me "she" gets, like, a raised index finger maybe.