A Quick Guide to Gender Neutral Greetings
This guide is written with intention to help newcomers of The Hermetic House of Life; however, I hope to write it in a way that is broadly applicable!
Having been born in the 1990s, I was left with the impression most of my life that greetings like "hey dudes!" or "what's up guys?" are inclusive. It was only when I got older that I learned that a lot of people who identify as femme or women are not fans! Part of this has to do with historical assumption that the default human is male, which is also why many older texts and grimoires address the reader and magician as such. This has kept women and non-binary people as secondary in English-speaking society and impeded progress toward gender equality. As an example, if you were a cis man and out to lunch with a group of cis women and the server said, "Hey ladies!" everyone would probably think that was pretty weird. However, if the server said, "Hey guys!" many people wouldn't think much of it.
People who are transitioning their gender presentation to feminine notice these patterns, however. It is more painful for them to be referred to in masculine terms because that is the side of gender they are trying to move away from. So in order to prevent causing them harm, it is kind, helpful, and important to acknowledge them individually as the gender they identify as well as greet groups with them mindfully included.
Here is a quick chart of suggestions on how you can acknowledge groups in gender neutral ways:
If you make a mistake and misgender someone, that's okay! The best thing to do is follow these steps:
- Apologize
- Rephrase with gender neutral nouns
- Move on in the conversation
To clarify how to refer to an individual person, you can ask with questions such as "What are your pronouns?" Or in the cases of pronouns you are unfamiliar with, "How do you use those?" Those pronouns are most likely what's called "neo-pronouns." An example of neo-pronouns is one of my preferred sets zey/zem/zer as in "Zey took zem to zer store." (Like the more commonly used, "They took them to their store.")
Additionally, if you are curious, you can also ask people about their gender as long as you do it politely, such as "I would like to know more about your gender!" Just make sure to ask first if you want to have the conversation via direct messages!
Welcome to HHoL, happy chatting!
