Read on TwitterIn general, I agree these terms aren’t slurs, they’re descriptions.
I don’t think things are as simple as “yes it is” or “no it isn’t” either. I’m open to discussion tho, so please lemme know your thoughts.
Trolls will be blocked. So will bigots. 1/
There are times when “cis” & “straight” are used in derogatory ways & meant to imply lower status, used as a separation of us vs them, or to make assumptions about people. Humans can use any word in a derogatory way & we innately know insulting ppls identities hits them hard. 2/
It’s easy to do & we all do it at some point. I’ve probably done it to straights in particular. It’s easy to feel frustration & use these labels in putting the other group down. But that’s just fighting oppression w their same tools. It doesn’t fix the script, it just flips it 3/
It’s entirely possible that someone has been insulted w “cis” & therefore doesn’t want to be called it, even in benign contexts. I’ve been insulted & abused w “clumsy” so I don’t want anyone calling me that bc it fucks w my head. 4/
Regardless of what it is, we should respect anyone’s boundaries of what they don’t want to be called. That’s the whole point of “trans women are women” & other such campaigns. If someone doesn’t want to be called cis bc it’s been used against them, then we should respect that. 5/
Especially when there’s a difference between someone asking to not refer to THEM as a label, such as what Shatner has done here, vs a blanket statement of “cis is a slur and should never be used”. Don’t call me clumsy, but I don’t speak for the general use of the word. 6/
There IS ALSO a phenomenon of getting defensive w/o insult present, & I think this may be in part due to feeling the loss of being the “normal” category. Until recently, cis & straight were considered the norm. They weren’t usually discussed directly bc they were the default. 7/
In normalizing other gender & sexual identities, we’ve now essentially taken away that “norm” status & applied labels that reflect what’s used for “not normal” identities. I’d guess this is a basis for defensiveness. They were normal & now, in a way, aren’t bc the norm is gone 8/
Ppl all the sudden feel they’re being given labels that they don’t identify with, bc they’ve never had to articulate their identities. We’ve changed the norm, & this leaves them feeling detached from the security they felt in being norm & challenges them to think differently 9/
The changes in labels could also make them feel “othered” which has been negative in the past due to that secure, false norm. They’re just getting a small taste of the vulnerable exposure of being outside that norm that the rest of us have always felt burdened by. 10/
Now this isn’t an excuse for blanket “cis is a slur” comments or the unreasonable defensiveness. Simply a thought into WHY it might exist, what the underlying emotions are. In communication, understanding emotions is key to reaching someone. 11/
As usual, there’s nuance in this language, the way we use it & the way it evolves. This nuance could have big psychological effects on ppl uprooting their norms, which is difficult to process. We need to allow for the nuance, & an individual’s right to identify how they want. /12
