Today, I encountered a meme that caught my attention. It brought into focus something I’ve encountered a few times, but never really known how to feel about it: supportive friends/family members who act like misgendering/deadnaming me is some carnal sin.
Now, this post calls into question whether the person doing the misgendering is actually supportive… but in general, it will depend on the person whether the errant misgendering or deadnaming is a sign of someone trying to invalidate your identity or an accident; but either way, it’s bound to sting.
But that’s not the main problem the post highlighted to me… for me, the point that it made was this: as a trans person, I realize when you’ve misgendered or deadnamed me just as much as you did; but the way you respond to that realization can change how it affects me.
An example of how it can be made worse
In the image above I think it’s pretty clear what was handled poorly, but I’d like to take a moment to highlight it: the person who did the misgendering proceeded to draw a large amount of attention to it, which is generally only going to make it stand out more.
“How does that make it worse?” I’ve heard some allies ask, after all they’re just apologizing and trying to help… right? Well, it makes it worse in the a similar way that running over and freaking out when a child falls: they know they fell and they know how much it hurt, but anxiety triggers more anxiety in response and turning a tiny scrape or bruise into a full-scale medical emergency only makes things worse.
But that doesn’t seem right… I should apologize right?
Maybe you should, that will depend on the person you’re interacting with and how they handle it. But the action to “correct” the mistake should match the reaction to the mistake. If the person is having a bad day and suddenly starts freaking out because that was the last straw that broke their anxiety, then yeah maybe you should calmly apologize and state it was an accident. But if the person is fine, and barely even acknowledges the mistake, then simply correcting it but using the proper noun/pronoun or name is likely enough with maybe just a quick “sorry” thrown in.
Ultimately, you know your friends and family well enough to recognize their responses. And if you’re not sure how to respond: talk with them, ask them if they should be apologizing or just correcting it and moving on.
A note on “over apologizing”
Generally speaking, people tend to think that there’s no harm in apologizing… but when it comes to misgendering and deadnaming, there can be. As a trans woman, I have to deal with large and vocal groups that insist that I’m a man and always will be. And a common theme among these groups tends to be that when they can’t get away with misgendering or deadnaming us, they intentionally “slip up” and apologize very enthusiastically to draw attention to it and seem supportive. In that case, it’s a trick to bait the neutral members of the social setting into thinking that they’ve just made an honest mistake and we’re being unreasonable.
It might not be fair, but this mentality and hyper-vigilance can follow us into our every social interaction, and make even innocent and sincere apologies seem insincere and hurtful if they’re overenthusiastic.
Parting words
So, the simplest advice that I can give is to just communicate honestly with your trans friends and family about how they want it to be handled, because we’re all individuals and handle these stressors differently. It’s an awkward conversation to have, but it could stop miscommunication later.