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Cake day: June 13th, 2023

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  • I’m not a native speaker, but I’ve studied Japanese for more than a decade. There are no singular, non-gendered third person pronouns, so there is no equivalent of a singular they. Although there is an equivalent of a plural they, it’s not completely gender neutral. The equivalent of him is kare, and the equivalent of her is kanojo. You can make them plural by ending “ra” on to the end of them. Kanojora is used only for groups of women/girls, and karera can be used for a group of men/boys, or a mixed-gender group. That makes the root meaning of karera male coded even if it’s used in a gender neutral manner, so non-binary people might prefer not to use that.

    This shouldn’t however be a major issue for Japanese speakers, as first person pronouns are the only ones that are in frequent use. Unlike English, where you use pronouns to avoid repitition, you can completely omit them in Japanese, so instead of asking “Has Asami done her homework?” in English, you would ask “Has Asami done homework?” It’s also preferable to use names instead of 2nd/3rd person pronouns. Instead of asking “How about you?”, you’d ask “How about (person’s name)?” It’s probably much easier for a non-binary person to ask that no pronouns be used for them




  • “Some people are weaponizing that language” is a VERY different statement than “anyone who uses that language is almost certainly weaponizing it”.

    I never said that. In fact, I ended my last reply with “Even when it isn’t being weaponized”. I said people who say things like “queer people are obsessed with labels” and “I’m not cis; I’m normal”, which are both disparaging comments, are more than likely doing so in response to encountering identities and experiences outside of cishetnormativity. It’s one thing to say that there are a lot of labels used, and you find some of them either dubious or unneccessary, and another to say that people are obsessed or making up labels for attention.

    Whenever people say that someone’s choice of labels is simply attention seeking or naive, how often are these people actually listening and engaging with the person’s reasoning for identifying with the said label, and show give actual evidence for said attention seeking? In my experience, the only argument I’ve seen being used against labels that people identify with is “I’ve never heard of it nor do I understand it, therefore it’s not real.” Claiming that “queer people are obsessed with labels” is a broad generalization that comes of as a knee jerk reaction.

    You’re alienating allies by accusing them if being enemies.

    All I’m asking is that people think whenever they feel the need to dismiss others and gatekeep identities from people. In my experience, this seems to be based more on people’s gut reactions rather than science, facts, or logic, like they claim it is.

    Whenever I’ve seen people disparage certain labels like non-binary or demisexual, they never seem to have actually listen to someone with said identity and engage with their reasoning. It’s far more common for them to decide that they’re attention seeking, deluded, or mentally ill.

    And if people are going to be allies, there are going to be times when they need to examine their behaviour. Any self-proclaimed ally who says that “I have nothing against queer people, but why are they so obsessed with labels?” needs to re-examine their arguments just like anyone who says “I have nothing against women, but why are they so emotional and sensitive?” or “I have nothing against black people, but why are they so violent?”.


  • It is being weaponized in that way too. For example, Matt Walsh and Ben Shapiro went on rants about asexuality recently, claiming that labels such as demisexual had no basis in reality and described experiences that are common to everyone. If you follow their argument, people become unable to use labels that communicate their preferences and experience.

    Even when it isn’t being weaponized, I don’t think you should claim certain labels are unnecessary unless you’ve engaged with the reasoning behind the people who use them and form a reasonable argument that isn’t “back in my day people didn’t have so many labels.”


  • The rhetoric I described is absolutely being weaponized against people. If you follow the reason behind the arugment that someone is “normal, not cis”, then you would then conclude that trans and nb people are not normal. Anyone who accepts that argument would likely conclude that not only are trans women not “normal women”, and trans men not “normal men”, but that they are not actually real women or men.

    As for gen z being infatuated with labels, I will admit I don’t understand many of them, but I’m fine with them if they help people communicate their identity better. I wouldn’t claim that any labels are redundant or just attention seeking without any actual evidence or reasoning behind it.








  • Kishida in February sacked an aide after he sparked outrage by saying that people would flee Japan if same-sex marriage was allowed and that he did not want to live next to lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender couples.

    That person must be seriously deluded. Japan is a very monolingual country, and Japanese isn’t widely spoken in other countries, so where exactly are people going to go? There are plenty of Japanese speakers in Taiwan, but they’re mostly over 80, and they’ve legalized same sex marriage, so I guess they can’t go there. The Phillippines is similar to Japan in terms of LGBT+ rights, but Japanese probably isn’t common enough there that someone could survive with no knowledge of the local languages.