And what's going to happen, regardless of you not intending this, is that you're going to put a burden on those women to try to figure out which you intend.
@NautArch Well, it's more subtle than that. They think they can "get away with it".
Like, they know that referring to a transwoman as being male is completely unacceptable and will get them called out, but if they just stick to using gender neutral pronouns, then they think they'll be able to avoid social repercussions without having to acknowledge a woman as being a woman.
The position of "gender has never been an issue before so I feel uncomfortable now that people are inserting gender into everything" strikes me as somewhat (previous) status quo and rather dependent on having the privilege of having never had to deal with gender issues.
@Xirema I mean, if they think 'getting away with it' is using the correct word...then i'm not sure why I don't want them using it. Ultimately, lesson bcomes learned. Like when I used to joke around with using regional terms and then they become part of my actual language.
@NautArch It's not common but there are people who will correct you that they want their name one way, or at least not specific other ways. Neither is it all that common someone will specifically want he/him or she/her instead of they/them, but it's still as much a matter of respect whether or not you do that or keep calling them what you were calling them before.
@GcL Well, sorry, you sometimes simply can't not have gender in a conversation.
@Xirema I might consider that meeting people where they are. I don't expect people to reverse direction on generations of indoctrination at the drop of a hat or decade. Is just not doing the obviously wrong thing and doing a socially acceptable thing a step in the right direction? Could objecting to that be a case of the good being the enemy of the perfect?
@doppelgreener About database design I should be able to avoid it.
@doppelgreener Oh, I know! I'm just saying that it was fairly easy to just give up on my correct last name pronunciation - it wasn't that big of a deal to me. Getting gender right is likely a more important issue.
but maybe it's not? I can't say as it's not something i've dealt with.
@GcL Sure. Good luck. But sometimes it'll come up. And, if I understand correctly, you and I are talking about whether there's something that's always safe to do all the time with anyone in any conversation as a one-size-fits-all omni-solution (the “safe default”) and the answer to whether there is one is no, there is not.
Inequality is, by definition, some people having more privilege than others. In this case, perhaps, being "not having to think about gender on a daily basis". Thus, reducing inequality means some people, by definition, will have to lose privilege in return for a commensurate gain for others.
@doppelgreener Heck I should be able to avoid it about color selection, even thought I know that individuals with a single X chromosome are far more likely to be color blind. I don't want their opinion discounted because if it.
right: there are people who do not want to be called by they/them, and will correct you and ask you to call them he/him or she/her. that makes calling them they/them even after that not okay. same energy as if i told you "the name's just bill, not billy, please", and you kept calling me billy.
@NautArch Yeps, that's a thing. There is a schoolteacher who was fired from a school in Virginia recently over using they/them to misgender. He had a single pupil who was a trans boy and refused to acknowledge the kid's trans identity as valid. Therefore, all pupils were he/him or she/her, except the trans boy, who was they/them. The teacher knew calling the boy she/her would be unacceptable, so they did this instead. It came from the same spirit and everyone knew it.
@Xirema Sure, I guess if someone has a problem with using a neutral term, you can use a non-neutral one. But that request also seems unnecessary. The accusation that using a general term (they) isn't good enough and that a specific (him/her) must be used seems kinda weird to me.
@doppelgreener Ah. THat makes sense. There's also the concern of tone, but in the case you present, they are still doing something 'different'. In the case of communication on the stack, utilizing a neutral across all cases seems...reasonable?
@NautArch Mostly, but if you bump into someone who says "no, please call me she/her" and you insist on using they/them, that's going to start being less reasonable
@NautArch That's then historically dependent on the speaker? So I can use "they" all the time, but someone else might not be able to because of their past pronoun usage?
@doppelgreener Well, yeah. Now you are purposefully going against someone's request. But if we're talking about stack usage, then I'm not sure I see a case where it would be reasonable for someone to always use they/them and be requested for a more specific unless the question/answer specifically calls for it.
I know a trans woman who did not have an easy transition and would put it something like this: “I didn't go through all this shit just to be merely 'they/them', god damn it. I'm a woman and I'll be addressed as such.”
@GcL I think we're dancing around the issue of when someone is doing this out of spite. Online, we're going ot miss the nuance and I'm fine with assuming the best and using the neutral at all times and not dinging anyone for it. Offline, tone becomes a clear indicator of intent.
Seems like we need to make a neopronoun that is inclusive of all pronounse that are not members of themselves. (And jokes aside, it would be a nice thing, but I believe that just like the Ms. wars show, we can't have nice things.)
But if someone is asking a non-gender related question on a stack site and a user answers with neutrals, I don't see any reason to correct them. If they use gendered, then I do see a reason to correct because that's bringing in assumptions.
@NautArch I can't tell for certain if someone is doing something out of spite, and they might not be able to either. They might think it's spite and come to find that it was a completely different reason all along.
@GcL Right, but the context of that particular situation will or won't be clear outside of that situation. I think it's fine to assume that the person is not coming from spite unless it's clear that they are. Healthier probably, too.
Well honestly the trans community was trying to do that when it came up with xey/xem and such. Trans people: "Use singular they for me please." Society: "That's wrong! English doesn't work that way! Come up with something else!" Trans people: "Ok, what about xey/xem or --" Society: "That's wrong! English doesn't work that way! Just use singular they!" Trans people: "..."
Trolls will try to take advantage of any situation. If you suspect someone is not acting in good faith, flag for a moderator with any relevant details and we'll look into it and try to keep an eye on thigns. In the meantime it really takes very little effort to capitulate to a request to use/not use a certain pronoun.
Since we're fond of spinning hypotheticals, how about this one: someone asks about technical aspects of some code, someone else comments something, you comment "they (the asker) probably mean this", and the asker responds with "I would like to be referred to as 'she'". What happens now?
@doppelgreener See, this is what makes the issue such a minefield. There's no consensus on how the language works, since there's no Academie anglais nor any sort of statewide standard (such as the final school dictation that is then evaluated by unified rules across all of England/USA/Australia).
@vicky_molokh And we come up with new words all the time. But adding new pronouns can be very difficult for people. Not that we can't/shouldn't, but if there's an easier path to everyone's mental well being, we should try and take it.
@Rubiksmoose My point is that from the perspective of the person who made the mistake, I don't consider it to have changed the "technical discussion" to any degree if I just proceed to refer to her by the pronoun she requested.
@Yuuki But that's the thing right? It's not about the technical discussion only. We are humans (and moose) talking to each other. Sometimes the human element is important and sometimes to one member of the discussion more than others.
@Yuuki The consequence there can be people don't read the full context of the thread, or later in a different thread, and someone is being called out as a she. To a third party observer, it will not be apparent that was the explicitly desired state of affairs.
@Yuuki Which is find for that person. But coming into a thread or wiki or whatever just looking for a solution or where a document lives and seeing someone calling out one person with a gendered pronoun does not reflect well on the writer.... even though it's what was desired.
If you want to deal with sexism, the solution to that is not necessarily to refuse to acknowledge gender. That perpetuates a masculine bias and prevents opportunities to combat sexism in the field through contradiction of expectations.
@GcL Well that's something that writer has considered. Maybe you should stop trying to fight her battles for her when she's chosen the battles that she wants to fight.
Which now makes me wonder... were those engineers being misogynists, or did the subject previous explicitly as to be referred to as she?
@Yuuki No... it would be on me for using a gendered pronoun. The concern would be that the writer is injecting gender into a thread where it should be irrelevant.
@doppelgreener But when there are so many terms for various genders, defaulting to a neutral seems like a viable option - especially if the question isn't gendered.
It's a bit patronizing to say "I think you should avoid bringing up gender in technical discussions because I want to protect you from people making assumptions about you when you bring up gender issues".
The perception could be that the writer that puts in "she" is part of an "old boys club" and is calling out a "she" so the opinion is treated differently.
@NautArch sure. As a default. But once someone's brought up their pronouns, refusing to acknowledge them is not great. And it won't feel great to them. Erasure is not fun.
@GcL Well, it could be useful as a point of reference, once the asker specifies a preferred gender pronoun. What would have no bearing would be a response to it, such as an apology or debate or snark.
@NautArch So what you're saying is in that hypothetical scenario, the asker should have never commented "I would like to be referred to as 'she'" in the first place?
@Yuuki That would be a bit out of place, but nothing to raise an eyebrow. My assumption was it is someone who read it and was trying to make a helpful or useful clarification.
@GcL Eh, maybe? If the asker considers it worth including, then it's worth including. Everyone's got their own interaction formalities and rules. When in Rome.
@NautArch If someone's going to be referred to by pronouns, they may request specific ones. And this may happen in any conversation with more than two people present.
@MikeQ Yeah, and there are a lot of places where using gendered pronouns is the norm, so when you're not one of the 100 "he"s in the forum, it stands out. That shouldn't matter, but it does for a lot of professional work.
@GcL Data point of one but even if I knew someone's correct pronouns, I wouldn't make a clarification on their behalf when they're talking to someone else. They can make that clarification at their own discretion. Let people choose where they want to stand.
@Yuuki Sure. Likely it was someone who was doing it for themselves, or assumed they were the only person being referred to not thinking that the document might outlive their tenure in the position.
@G.Moylan It's not gendering in they/them that's the issue, it's the non-acknowledgement of gender by using a gender neutral pronoun that is inherently nongendered
@doppelgreener I could see that being very reasonable for interpersonal comms between friends. And would expect the friend to very like be understanding as the use of "they" in that context matches the common use.
@doppelgreener I guess I may be inappropriately saying that interacting 1:1 with someone on chat is different than answer a question on a mainsite.
But in my mind, one of these is interacting with someone on an interpersonal basis. The other is answering a question about a non-gender based situation. While I am dealing with a human, that is supplemental and generally an unnecessary part of a situation question (until it is about human interaction, then everything is on the table.)
@NautArch I don't understand why we're talking about 1:1 conversations or chat or mainsite. All i said was any space in which three people are talking.
Maybe think about it this way: from one perspective, this was a discussion with no gender issues until the asker made a request for correct pronouns. But from the asker's perspective, gender was introduced when someone used "they" to refer to her.
@NautArch On the other hand, you're talking to humans, asking to be treated as human is always on the table.
For example, as far as moderation goes, I don't want to see people arguing that someone has brought up their pronoun in an inappropriate/wrong/not relevant place unless it truly is (eg a misunderstanding/misreading).
And even then, better to just let it be. If it isn't relevant and won't come up again just leave it. It is easy enough to substitute one word for another if you're already using pronouns so that is preferable.
@doppelgreener That's very fair, everything is a conversation and treating people appropriately is always a good thing. I guess the case I'm trying to make is for when there is a question that has nothing to do with gender. It's answered using gender neutral words. Sure, if someone feels like they want to correct for a gendered pronoun, they can do that - but I'm asking why they feel the need to do so. How does it help the question or the answer?
Or is just helping the asker (which is a fine reason, but it's not quite as useful as a correction that improves the Q&A for others.)
@MikeQ If it's important for answering the question, I feel like it should be included in asking the question. Otherwise, it's just as relevant as religion, skin color, etc (which is to say, it's not.)
Again, I see no problems in making an adjustment when requested to do so. I'm just questioning when one should do so.
So I did see one valid observation in the Meta, which was that SE probably should offer an official way for us to put our pronouns, if we choose to share them, next to our user ids.
Because what happens right now is people put them in their question, and while I'm hesitant to just default to what the existing rules say about reducing clutter in posts (because maybe those rules need to be reexamined?) the direct statements of the admins is that they're not sure how to handle those cases yet, which do technically violate the "reduce clutter" rules for the network.
@MikeQ Absolutely. And again, I am not advocating not changing. I am advocating for someone to determine if it's necessary to ask. If it is, it is. I used the likely not equivalent situation of someone mispronouncing my name. At this point, I'll correct if someone is announcing me to others in a professional setting, but if I'm just talking to someone random, I'm not going to correct.
So a way to just put them in our profiles and let them be displayed next to our usernames (voluntarily) would solve that problem with minimal effort by the users.
@MikeQ I think the case under discussion is gender not specified and someone uses neutral terms accordingly but is then asked to use a gendered term instead.
@NautArch I mean, sure, you want me to correct when I misspelled your name. But why do you feel you need to do so? The question isn't about names. How does that help the question or asker?
On a related note, have you ever come across the trope of someone who gets called "Mr. So-and-so" and who responds "Dr So-and-so, please. I didn't go through medical school for just Mr."?
@doppelgreener This is why I didn't really feel like it was equivalent. But the idea that my name is part of my sense of self. When someone mispronounces it does hurt. It's frustrating. THey don't ask how to do it, they just do it. That's the semi-equivalence I see.
But I also understand the issues regarding gender are NOT equivalent.
Well, gender is part of a person's sense of self. (See how it's not okay to call a man a woman or vice versa.) For trans people it matters too. It may matter enough they want accurate pronoun usage sometimes.
Boiling it down to issues with sense of self kindasorta works, but ultimately starts to fall apart and that's why I was wary of using it - but it also presents my thoughts on when to ask through the lens of sense of self.
@Gwideon i'm sorry if i'm being frustrating. I honestly want to learn and do the right thing, but I tend to ask a lot of questions while figuring that out.
Here's the thing, this policy was not created to enhance Q&As themselves, it was created to include/protect people and make this a more welcoming place.
Which in turn should have a positive effect on our Q&As in general.
@NautArch It could be disrespectful, if someone has asked for non-neutral terms. Although it could also be due to forgetfulness, or the person doesn't speak English natively, or for other reasons. We can't know intent.
@MikeQ Fair enough. I guess my point is that if someone didn't request them up front as part of the question, I don't see the need to interject them later.
If someone felt that it was important, then they should add that to their question so that answers come in appropriately for them.
@NautArch Well that's a pretty big can of worms itself. Many people don't agree that adding pronoun info to questions is a great thing for the site. I'm kind of divided on it. It's not a great solution.
@Rubiksmoose Sure, but that goes back to my point in that if the question in gender neutral, keeping answers gender neutral should be optimal. It avoids the issue when the issue isn't part of the question.
@Rubiksmoose But the asker did mention it, so it warrants mentioning somewhere as a point of reference. Since comments are temporary, why not put it in the question?
@NautArch It only avoids the issue from one perspective: the perspective of someone who is ok using whatever pronoun is being used. It doesn't avoid the issue from the perspective of anybody for whom that pronoun is not acceptable.
Well, gender neutral are acceptable in all cases. That's kinda the point. Someone can absolutely prefer to be labelled specifically, but neutral terms are inclusive. It still applies to them, just not specifically to them.
To me, "they" is neutral. It applies to all equally. SOmeone may prefer a gendered over a neutral because of their choice, but I still see 'they' as all potential genders.
@NautArch Yeps, that's a thing. There is a schoolteacher who was fired from a school in Virginia recently over using they/them to misgender. He had a single pupil who was a trans boy and refused to acknowledge the kid's trans identity as valid. Therefore, all pupils were he/him or she/her, except the trans boy, who was they/them. The teacher knew calling the boy she/her would be unacceptable, so they did this instead. It came from the same spirit and everyone knew it.
I know a trans woman who did not have an easy transition and would put it something like this: “I didn't go through all this shit just to be merely 'they/them', god damn it. I'm a woman and I'll be addressed as such.”
@Rubiksmoose This one is more applicable. But at the end, 'they' is corrct if it's being used for everyone and not just a specific person. If 'they' is the equalizer and used at all times, then it isn't about that person.
Those are both cases where the use of 'they' is directed at them and at them only.
Which means it isn't being used in general neutral sense, but is being used as a differentiator.
@NautArch If we go by name analogy, people don't choose their true names, they are given them by parents at or before birth, or reassigned them by the government. Or they get nicknames given by peers. Teddy Roosevelt didn't choose to be Teddy. At most a person can choose a pseudonym (like Robert Galbraith) or ask the society/state permission for a different name (or be told to - like the Foreign Legion). But the matter of social genders in West-derived culture seems to be the opposite of that.
(Continued.) And to me that is a big reason why the name analogy falls flat. Names belong to their users more than their targets, because the users decide how to name someone/something. Yet people appeal to name-corrections.
I realise I'm probably explaining something poorly or missing some point, and I'm learning all these things and making mistakes as well.
@NautArch Then what case are we talking about? Because if someone has asked you not to use "they" then it is likely because "they" is harmful/not correct to refer to them right?
I feel like we keep talking past each other and I apologize for that.
@Rubiksmoose I think i'm going to say something controversial and I'm unsure. But it is something I currently believe.
And I've been dancing around it. If it offends, please say so and allow me to remove it or a mod can delete it. And I can work on shifting my perspective.
But when there are major societal sea change going on, there are more impactful times than others to make a stand. Making a stand on any and all instances can minimize rather than maximize the chance of making real change.
But there is also personal change and realization of establishing identity, and this may be part of that. I'm not trying to say never stand up, but stand up when it makes sense to. As a jew, there have been times where it made sense to comment and request change about something antisemitic. But there have also been times where it just wasn't necessary and I didn't.
If we're still talking about the thing where someone wants their gender pronouns corrected, I'm talking about a theoretical situation in which someone has made a point of requesting that.
@NautArch Sure, and that is your choice to make right? How would you feel if someone told you that it wasn't the right time to assert that when you thought it was?
@Rubiksmoose Honestly? I'd think about it. I wouldn't just stand and say it's always appropriate. I've chosen not to die on some hills because it didn't make sense to do so.
@NautArch And in general discourse, that might be fine and dandy. Doing that here in the comments would come across poorly and lead to noise and arguing.
@Rubiksmoose No, the case I'm talking about it is prior to the comment. When someone feels like they need to correct someone for using a neutral term in order to be most inclusive.
@Rubiksmoose For me? The answer is that if a specific gender isn't really helpful to the question or answer, then I don't think asking someone to change their answer so that it specifically addresses a gender is helpful.
I think you may be missing some aspect of why misgendering is hard. From what I've heard from Trans/NB people here I think some of these would be realistic things to consider when thinking about whether to correct or not: Here's several of many reasonings just off the top of my head "Is this comment/reference hurting me/upsetting me/making me less likely to use this site/likely to cause me to harbor bad feelings against this person/make it difficult to interact with this person."
@NautArch Note that this would only be applicable if the answer was using pronouns for the user already and they want them corrected to the proper ones. We aren't going to force users to use pronouns when they otherwise wouldn't.
@NautArch What makes you think that they already aren't doing that?
So let's take the case of Doppel's friend. Let's say she asks a site question about coding. An answer comes in saying "They asked us X, but really the question is about Y and here is the answer." Now, in this case, the answerer is using a neutral time to not make any assumptions about gender and keep it universal. Doppel's friend doesn't like when she is referred to as 'they', but in this case, the they really is just about not making assumptions and using a neutral because it wasn't clear.
yes, she could ask for it to be changed. But it doesn't make a better answer, it doesn't have anything to do with the question, and it's an easy fix.
So why not?
THere is no reason why not, but there is a reason to make a decision if it was really necessary to ask in the first place. THis isn't a case where she's being specifically addressed as a 'they' because of gender assumptions. It's a case where a neutral is used to be neutral.
NB/trans people have to live their lives fighting society to get recognition. It is highly likely that they are put into situations like this all the time.
@NautArch I'm not personally offended, but I just want to be clear: assuming that trans people don't consider these things already and just correct people without thinking things through is probably not the best assumption. For one thing, standing out and making yourself vulnerable is hard and it takes trust.
I guess personally, there are many times where I've been upset but have chosen not to make an issue out of something because of the specific situation and I don't think that's a bad set of steps to consider.
@Rubiksmoose That may be true. And that I'm taking this discussion as a there is a line vs there isn't a line. But that's likely not correct. I just think one needs to be careful about drawing their lines to be impactful about what the line is.
Insofar as it's impossible to prove a negative, you can't know of the multitudes of previous instances where no one provided pronoun corrections because maybe they didn't want to bring it up. At the end of the day, I don't think it's right to be concerned about the appropriateness of bringing up someone's correct pronouns.
To make an (probably bad and dubiously helpful) analogy it would be like if I saw you booked a trip to Japan and I said, "Are you sure you've thought through that? It's really expensive and I'm not sure your budget can handle it." Like I'm sure you have thought through that, and it's a bit presumptuous to think that you didn't and that I know better how to handle your budget then you do.
(assuming here that I have no context for what you are actually thinking or what your budget actually is)
@Rubiksmoose yeah, probably not the best analogy, but I get it. ALthough often times an outside party does see things you didn't. Like when G.Moylan put up their ideas on planning a one-shot and I raised concerns they didn't think of.
@NautArch Generally deeply personal things like money, mental health, etc are only polite to broach if you have a very close personal tie or are asked though.
Anyways, probably will take us further abreast of the actual issue. Appologies.
I just want the sea change to happen. I want folks to feel inclusive and included in a wider community. I don't want to lose ground because everything becomes a potential issue and we can't actually move forward because there is always a case against.
And maybe i'm wrong on this, but being part of a larger community does mean sacrificing some individuality.
Inequality, by definition, means that some have more power/rights than others. Thus, equality, through removal of inequality, necessarily means that some must lose power/rights for others to gain.
And I think we should be promoting terms that are more inclusive so as not to make assumptions on inclusivity. Asking someone to use a gendered term in some ways undoes that.
@NautArch If someone's asked for a term to be used, then there's no assumption though, other than the assumption that the person thought it was worth mentioning
@MikeQ Definitely not supposed to! I'm not advocating that at all though I believe that is largely the way people outside of the group feel that they are labeled as even when "anon".
@MikeQ Sure, but then we're back to not using neutral terms. Or always starting neutral, bu then correcting for gender each time. It seems like utilizing more inclusive language is a positive for everyone.
@MikeQ if someone is clearly using a non-inclusive 'they', then there is a problem. If that isn't clear, why assume the worst? WHy not just go with the positive neutral use of inclusivity?
@Rubiksmoose Gender neutral, not perception neutral.
@Rubiksmoose Well, you look at context. If they are simply using 'they' when describing an actor in the situation, then it's most likely they're doing so to keep it gender neutral.
If they are using it in a way that suggests being a bad actor, then call them out and flag it.
@NautArch I would say that much of the time "they" is used to refer to people here, it would be extremely hard to tell which way they were using it from context.
But I think we as a society need to try and move forward with people wanting to make positive changes and language to support that. If there's no reason to believe bad intent, don't prescribe it.
@Rubiksmoose I think it's fairly clear when someone is doing it out with bad intent. It's unclear when it's unclear, but in those cases, I think it's still better (and healthier) to assume someone is trying to be helpful.
Heck, even if they're not, the mere act of doing so may change them.
Maybe my frustration is as a CIS white hetero male trying to be inclusive but then getting dinged for it and requested to be gender specific. I just think that there are times when it matters to make the request and times where it really doesn't except to make someone feel better. And making someone feel good about themselves is always a win, i just don't want it to be a pyrrhic victory.
@NautArch So there are inclusive "they"s - plural, or unknown - and there are noninclusive "they"s - neuter, or other
Once an individual requests to be addressed by particular pronoun, the inclusive "they"s no longer apply. Hence the ding, or at least, some form of disagreement.
@NautArch Do you really think that you are getting "dinged" for it? Most people are ecstatic if you simply are kind and respond to the request with respect and care. The fact that you acted to correct it means way more than the fact that you needed to correct it in the first place. And especially if there was no way for you to know.
@Rubiksmoose In some ways, yes I do. That I'm trying to adjust my world view to be inclusive. But then I'm being asked to not be inclusive and use a specific gender. Yeah, it's an easy fix and it makes someone feel good, which is why I'd do it and with a smile. But I'm asking was it really necessary to ask just to make you feel better? You get a gender-neutral question with a gender-neutral answer - isn't that a good thing?
@NautArch It may not seem necessary to you, but it was (sufficiently) necessary for them.
When interacting with various people, it could be important to them that you use their preferred pronouns, or maintain eye contact, or avoid eye contact, or call them "your majesty the queen", or wear pants, even if the conversation is unrelated to any of those things
Okay, that's fair. I think I've said my point and it's been countered with "yes, that's considered and when pointed out it was believed to be necessary". I'll run with that just like I run with the general assumption that folks aren't bad actors unless they present other reasons to believe they are.
@NautArch Humans are weird and I'm not here to understand their motives. They know their feelings better than I do. If they expect a particular pronoun, or title, or adherence to monarchy, or other interaction rules, so be it.
It's literally no skin off my teeth to type out 'she', 'he', 'your oldliness', etc. Partially because, to my knowledge, there is no skin on my teeth to take off.
@MikeQ Odds are, they don't know their feelings. Humans aren't generally good at that. That's why I was not saying "don't do it", but to be introspectful about why and when you do want to do it. In general, I don't like answers of "because I felt like it", that's usually not a good way to get a positive response or change in others. But there are many many other GOOD reasons for doing it that I'm not ignoring when I say the above.
I think another question is this: do you trust your mod team to know you are acting in good faith when you are acting in good faith? Because yes, big policy changes coming from the top levels of SE do seem scary, but I trust my mods to know who I am and to implement this policy fairly for me.
