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Thanks for saying so. I felt sooo shitty once when I accidentally deadnamed a colleague when running a mass email script at an old job. I even had it in mind as

Thanks for saying so. I felt sooo shitty once when I accidentally deadnamed a colleague when running a mass email script at an old job. I even had it in mind as I wrote the script and still messed it up. I apologized immediately and tried to do better from there on.

Aeolun 5y ago
Is a bit weird. If people get called by their old surname after marriage, nobody freaks out over that. Why freak out over calling someone by their old given name. It doesn’t seem like something that should have this level of shame attached to it.
- thelopa 5y ago
  Let me give my perspective. At this point, my deadname doesn’t carry the same weight it once did. I can joke about it now because it doesn’t feel like my name any more, but, when I started my transition, I had a very different relationship with it. Back then, hearing my deadname was a quick way to dig up all of the pain and dysphoria that had driven me to the brink of suicide. It represented a chapter of my life that I desperately wanted to close out. I needed to feel like I was free to redefine myself in a way that was independent from all of the pain of my pre-transition life, but my deadname felt like a ball and chain that was holding me back. In fact, looking back at the last 2 years of transition, I’d say changing my name and pronouns was the second most important step to escaping my depression. (The most important was starting hormone therapy.) This isn’t a uniquely trans feeling, either. I have friends who had very bad relationships with their parents — so bad that they changed their last names. Like me and my deadname, my friends said that hearing their old family name could dredge up a lot of unpleasant memories. Like me, they wanted to put some distance between themselves and their pasts. Yes, many people change their family name when they get married, and those people usually don’t freak out when they hear their original surname. However, that should not be considered representative of how everyone feels.
- germ 5y ago
  It really depends on the context and more importantly the intent. Make a mistake? Correct yourself and move on, try not to make a big deal of it. Intentionally misgender/deadname someone to hurt them? Not ok. And yes, there are people out there that will weaponise a deadname. Honest mistakes happen, and that's fine! It's simply a defense mechanism that gets thrown up rather quickly from hostile interactions
- nefitty 5y ago
  I've seen it used in a malicious way at that same company. I'm out of my element here but I'll add that I sense that it's an aspect of one's autonomy about their identity. "In the narrative of my life, I connect that name to a time when I felt that I was not myself." Taking a spouse's surname doesn't generally connote a rejection of an aspect of that time. I feel empathetic of people who are marginalized. I'm lucky. In my life Ive generally rolled maximal privilege. I think principally of these things from a frame of the critique of power. I tend to favor balances of power among individuals. If that requires a bit of extra consideration on my part in regards to my speech, that's ok. It's a negligible cost in the name of my held ethical ideal of egalitarianism.
- brokensegue 5y ago
  > Why freak out over calling someone by their old given name. It doesn’t seem like something that should have this level of shame attached to it. Because some people deadname people maliciously and so even if it was a mistake your action could be perceived as intentionally hurtful. People don't seem to maliciously use maiden names
azeirah 5y ago
Yeah. I'm trans too and while it does hurt, if you apologize there's no problem whatsoever.

Aeolun 5y ago

Is a bit weird. If people get called by their old surname after marriage, nobody freaks out over that. Why freak out over calling someone by their old given name. It doesn’t seem like something that should have this level of shame attached to it.

thelopa 5y ago
Let me give my perspective. At this point, my deadname doesn’t carry the same weight it once did. I can joke about it now because it doesn’t feel like my name any more, but, when I started my transition, I had a very different relationship with it. Back then, hearing my deadname was a quick way to dig up all of the pain and dysphoria that had driven me to the brink of suicide. It represented a chapter of my life that I desperately wanted to close out. I needed to feel like I was free to redefine myself in a way that was independent from all of the pain of my pre-transition life, but my deadname felt like a ball and chain that was holding me back. In fact, looking back at the last 2 years of transition, I’d say changing my name and pronouns was the second most important step to escaping my depression. (The most important was starting hormone therapy.) This isn’t a uniquely trans feeling, either. I have friends who had very bad relationships with their parents — so bad that they changed their last names. Like me and my deadname, my friends said that hearing their old family name could dredge up a lot of unpleasant memories. Like me, they wanted to put some distance between themselves and their pasts. Yes, many people change their family name when they get married, and those people usually don’t freak out when they hear their original surname. However, that should not be considered representative of how everyone feels.
germ 5y ago
It really depends on the context and more importantly the intent. Make a mistake? Correct yourself and move on, try not to make a big deal of it. Intentionally misgender/deadname someone to hurt them? Not ok. And yes, there are people out there that will weaponise a deadname. Honest mistakes happen, and that's fine! It's simply a defense mechanism that gets thrown up rather quickly from hostile interactions
nefitty 5y ago
I've seen it used in a malicious way at that same company. I'm out of my element here but I'll add that I sense that it's an aspect of one's autonomy about their identity. "In the narrative of my life, I connect that name to a time when I felt that I was not myself." Taking a spouse's surname doesn't generally connote a rejection of an aspect of that time. I feel empathetic of people who are marginalized. I'm lucky. In my life Ive generally rolled maximal privilege. I think principally of these things from a frame of the critique of power. I tend to favor balances of power among individuals. If that requires a bit of extra consideration on my part in regards to my speech, that's ok. It's a negligible cost in the name of my held ethical ideal of egalitarianism.
brokensegue 5y ago
> Why freak out over calling someone by their old given name. It doesn’t seem like something that should have this level of shame attached to it. Because some people deadname people maliciously and so even if it was a mistake your action could be perceived as intentionally hurtful. People don't seem to maliciously use maiden names

azeirah 5y ago

Yeah. I'm trans too and while it does hurt, if you apologize there's no problem whatsoever.