How do you refer to trans people in the past? Like, Elliot was Ellen back when he did those movies, do you still call him he even though he was a she when he did the thing? I think I’m confusing myself now
The general wisdom is to use the person’s current identification and project it into the past. He was always Elliot. We didn’t know then, but we know that now.
Some individuals will have a different understanding of their personal journey. (I was a boy then, but now I’m a woman)
Personally I struggle with referring to child me as a girl. I didn’t look like a girl or act like a stereotypical girl, and certainly wasn’t treated as a girl. But I don’t think I was really a boy either.
I do prefer for people to use my name now about past me, not my name then.
In the absence of particular knowledge about an individual’s preferences or conception of their transition, my default assumption would be to refer to them with their current preferred terminology, even if that wasn’t how they presented at that time. Or, rather, I wouldn’t think of it as “he was a she when he did the thing”, instead it’s closer to “he was always a he, even if he didn’t know he wasn’t a she at the time”.
However, I’m a cis male, so maybe don’t accept my default behaviors as gospel truth in this arena lol. If I were to transition, it’s how I’d think of the process. However, a gal I used to bartend with absolutely divides her life into her Chad phase and then her Callie phase. For whatever reason, that’s what works for her, and I’ll work within that context if it comes up.
As a general rule, I would always use current preferred pronouns. If context is really needed for some reason I’d say something like "In Juno, before he transitioned, he was…’
I stick with current pronouns usually but I think both are okay, he identified as a girl when he was in that movie and played the role of a girl, so I think calling at least the character “she” is perfectly legit… when talking about the actor I go with “he”, but I dunno. Yeah I guess it’s up to the person I’m talking about‘s opinion?
How do you refer to trans people in the past? Like, Elliot was Ellen back when he did those movies, do you still call him he even though he was a she when he did the thing? I think I’m confusing myself now
The general wisdom is to use the person’s current identification and project it into the past. He was always Elliot. We didn’t know then, but we know that now.
Some individuals will have a different understanding of their personal journey. (I was a boy then, but now I’m a woman)
Personally I struggle with referring to child me as a girl. I didn’t look like a girl or act like a stereotypical girl, and certainly wasn’t treated as a girl. But I don’t think I was really a boy either.
I do prefer for people to use my name now about past me, not my name then.
In the absence of particular knowledge about an individual’s preferences or conception of their transition, my default assumption would be to refer to them with their current preferred terminology, even if that wasn’t how they presented at that time. Or, rather, I wouldn’t think of it as “he was a she when he did the thing”, instead it’s closer to “he was always a he, even if he didn’t know he wasn’t a she at the time”.
However, I’m a cis male, so maybe don’t accept my default behaviors as gospel truth in this arena lol. If I were to transition, it’s how I’d think of the process. However, a gal I used to bartend with absolutely divides her life into her Chad phase and then her Callie phase. For whatever reason, that’s what works for her, and I’ll work within that context if it comes up.
As a general rule, I would always use current preferred pronouns. If context is really needed for some reason I’d say something like "In Juno, before he transitioned, he was…’
I stick with current pronouns usually but I think both are okay, he identified as a girl when he was in that movie and played the role of a girl, so I think calling at least the character “she” is perfectly legit… when talking about the actor I go with “he”, but I dunno. Yeah I guess it’s up to the person I’m talking about‘s opinion?
The character is certainly a she. Juno is a girl. Men can play women and women can play men.
Elliot was a young man playing a girl, even if we didn’t know that at the time.