Words Are Made Up. Dignity Isn’t.
In 2025, the battle over pronouns is not about grammar. It’s about power, dignity, and whether society can summon the courage to evolve its language in ways that honor those long pushed to the margins. And make no mistake, trans lives matter, not just in protests, but in the words we choose, the structures we build, and the respect we institutionalize.
Across workplaces, school systems, and other institutions, inclusive language is being written into policy. Critics decry it as an infringement on free speech. But here’s the truth: this isn’t censorship, it’s a long-overdue expansion of cultural empathy. It’s an invitation for society to speak with more care, creativity, and consciousness.
Language Is a Social Contract—And It’s Always Been Flexible
Let’s start with something fundamental: all words are made up. Every last one. From “he” and “she” to “they,” “ze,” “per,” and “ey”—these are not sacred relics handed down from the heavens. They are cultural tools, shaped by power, habit, and collective agreement. The idea that some pronouns are “real” while others are artificial is, frankly, linguistic mythology. There is no divine spark in “male” or “female” that makes them truer than “nonbinary” or “genderfluid.” The word “chromosome” itself is a human invention. Even the letters X and Y are no more natural than the phonemes in “zie” or “xe.”
We do not have an inbuilt language of meaning, only a shared capacity to create it. So when trans and nonbinary individuals ask to be named on their own terms, they are not distorting language. They are participating in the very process that gave language life in the first place.
Opponents of inclusive pronoun use often lean on the First Amendment like a crutch. “Government,” they insist, “has no business mandating language.” But we’ve always regulated language when it causes harm. You can’t yell “fire” in a crowded theater. You can’t spew racial or homophobic slurs in the workplace without facing consequences. And no, your freedom of speech doesn’t protect your right to publicly defame your ex. That’s libel.
Much of our modern legal system around speech is built to protect people from harm, especially in workplaces and institutions. If an NBA coach hurled a racial slur on live TV, they’d be fired immediately, and rightly so. That’s not tyranny. That’s accountability. Why, then, should it be any different when someone refuses to recognize the humanity of a transgender coworker or student?
There is a legitimate and growing need for a singular, gender-neutral third-person pronoun. Whether addressing a nonbinary teen, a trans elder, a robot, a sexless fictional character, or even the God of certain monotheistic traditions, gendered language often falls short. Using affirming pronouns is not about being trendy or “politically correct”—it’s about upholding a basic civil right to dignity and inclusion.
Critics like Jordan Peterson frame pronoun inclusion as a step toward linguistic totalitarianism, where people are forced to speak a government-approved language. He and others warn that accommodating diverse identities will lead to chaos, confusion, and a loss of “stabilizing traditions.” But these arguments rely heavily on the fallacy of the slippery slope.
We’ve heard this logic before. White Americans once fretted that addressing Black citizens as “sir” or “ma’am” threatened the natural order. They framed such basic respect as tyranny. They weren’t defending liberty; they were defending supremacy. Today, similar rhetoric is deployed to resist trans recognition. It’s the same old fear of the center losing its exclusive claim to meaning, repackaged for the culture wars of the 21st century.
The fight over pronouns isn’t a niche debate. It’s a cultural reckoning. Language is one of the oldest mirrors of power we possess. When we allow that mirror to reflect a broader, more inclusive vision of humanity, we are not “censoring” anyone, we are choosing compassion over cruelty, precision over prejudice, community over comfort.
To acknowledge someone’s pronouns isn’t to submit to tyranny. It’s to participate in a society where everyone has the right to be named, known, and respected.
Words are made up. Dignity isn’t.
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