Why do some cisgender people hate the term cisgender?

[Woylie]

A lot of cis people react badly to the term cis because they're not used to thinking of themselves as anything but "normal"

nevermind that calling cis people "normal" implies that being cis is the natural/right way of being, and being trans is "unnatural" or "abnormal" - it'd be no different than calling straight people "normal" (which certainly happened before gay people were more visible and the term straight became widespread)

it stems from a lack of respect for trans people, flat out. the people who feel this way think that it doesn't, but it's because they haven't had to grapple with their identity being named before, and having to re-contextualize their experience/identity from being "just normal" makes them uncomfortable and makes them unneccessarily lash out.

 

[Rotobit]

They're people who don't want to have benign descriptors applied to them while simultaneously wanting to maliciously apply the wrong labels to others.

As for why, they think it's an insult or think it overcomplicates their lives. The former is just misinformation trying to stoke a "culture war" while the latter makes no sense considering they've done already done all the mental footwork necessary just to get to the point they can complain about it.

 

[arcadepc]

They probably confuse biology with social constructs but at least cis gender does not include the word "sex", which has done a lot of damage already.

 

[Platy]

What I mean is if you are a trans woman and want to be referred to as a woman I'm not going to say no you are trans. I'm gonna say ok your a woman etc. I'm not going to add an extra identifier if you are cis or trans

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Calling someone a woman does not mean she is not a White woman or a Rich woman or Latin Woman. When color of the skin is a factor, you use white woman, when class is a factor you use rich woman and so on.

When reasons pertaining the gender assigned at birth or the chromossomes, you use cisgender woman

 

[Godfather]

I don't like the comfortable part. I'm far from comfortable in my own skin most of the time.

 

[smileyforall220]

I usually only hear cis as an insult when its used in a sentence. Regardless, call people what they want to be called. If someone tells me they want to be called a certain way, Ill respect their wishes. If they don't want to be called a certain label, I wont call them that. Just common decency

 

[KtotheRoc]

Because they view it as "othering" when they see themselves as "normal".

 

[Sesha]

Because they're used to being the default.

That said, I think for some it sounds like sissy and some see it being used as an insult, which makes them view it more negatively. However, LGBTQ+ people are called actual slurs all the time and even manage to own certain historically loaded terms, so cis people really have no excuse.

Call people what they want to be called. If they don't want to be called "cis", then don't call them that.

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That's fine for the n-word and other slurs. Objecting to being called cis is like objecting to being called straight.

 

[Llyrwenne]

Let people be whoever they want to be. We really don't need to label everything.

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In this case, yes we do. It's a useful and necessary term.

 

[Corporate Clown]

It's also just kind of a weird, uncommon word with no clear etymology for most people which heightens its sense of foreignness or otherness. I think there would be somewhat less friction against it if it came from a common root.

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I think this is where I'm at. It reminds me of Reservoir Dogs when then they were handing out names and Mr Pink and Mr Brown didn't like theirs. I have no issue with labelling it as it makes it easier to label and put on the spectrum. Obviously, "straight" or whatever else is hugely problematic, I just wish the term....was cooler? I dunno lol, I don't think about it really and I'm not gonna lose any sleep if people call me cis.

 

[HarryHengst]

Every time i see that term I'm struck by what an ugly word it is, both in how it looks and how it sounds. I'm not surprised a German dude coined it (I'm Dutch so I speak swamp German, I know all about ugly words).

 

[Platy]

I don't like the comfortable part. I'm far from comfortable in my own skin most of the time.

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there is no confortable part

you either identify with your assigned sex or you don't

Beauty stanrdards and how it makes you feel with your own body has nothing to do with it

 

[oledome]

I agree with HarryHengst it sounds kinda gross to me.

 

[Kayla]

I don't like being called that but I understand why so I won't try to stop anyone from using it.

 

[John Dunbar]

cisalpine gaul was always the coolest province so i'm cool with it

 

[Palette Swap]

What I mean is if you are a trans woman and want to be referred to as a woman I'm not going to say no you are trans. I'm gonna say ok your a woman etc. I'm not going to add an extra identifier if you are cis or trans

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This probably works in a vacuum, but in real life contexts, the cis qualifier only really comes up when discussing issues related to gender, so it seems more than fair to use it. It's not like we're bombarded with sentences like "yeah, that cis woman by the water cooler".

Honestly, as a cis dude, it's no skin off my back, and if it allows for conversations that don't erase the struggle of other people, who the fuck am I to complain.

 

[Arzak]

I dont think it has anything to do with being seen as the default, cis people are the overwhelming majority in terms of population.

Mostly I think "cisgender" is used in an exclusionary (whether just or unjustly) context where cis people opinions and experiences have less value. Thats where the reaction comes from.

Of course you also just have straight up transphobes, but thats not really a mystery to anyone.

 

[PlatStrat]

"Cis" sounds too much like "Cyst". No one wants to be associated with cysts

 

[Deleted member 19844]

I think this is where I'm at. It reminds me of Reservoir Dogs when then they were handing out names and Mr Pink and Mr Brown didn't like theirs. I have no issue with labelling it as it makes it easier to label and put on the spectrum. Obviously, "straight" or whatever else is hugely problematic, I just wish the term....was cooler? I dunno lol, I don't think about it really and I'm not gonna lose any sleep if people call me cis.

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yeah, a lot of people in this thread are jumping to transphobia whin it's more along these lines for many people, in addition to the fact that it is new.

 

[Watchtower]

Lot of people hitting the same nail really - that there's this idea of a "normal person" stuck in people's heads, and things like race/ethnicity, sexuality, gender, physical and mental disabilities, etc. all contribute to making people "not normal". And society's trained generations of people to go "Hey, that's weird, right? Isn't it weird? Why would you want to be that? You don't want to be weird, right? You're normal."

So throwing the label "straight" or "cisgender" at a "normal" person, lot of them their first instinct is to balk at it. To them they're not one thing or another, they're just normal.

 

[Neece]

I've added cis to my vocabulary and I use it to describe myself, so any issue I have is superficial and doesn't actually impact my day to day. But I don't like the way the word sounds. It's ugly. I wish there was a different term that we could use to label cis people. But whatever.

 

[Brinbe]

asking privileged people to do anything different and act/think outside of themselves is asking for the moon.

 

[TaySan]

Because they don't want to labeled just accepted as the "default".

 

[Godfather]

there is no confortable part

you either identify with your assigned sex or you don't

Beauty stanrdards and how it makes you feel with your own body has nothing to do with it

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Doesn't it mean Comfortable in Skin? Am I just completely ignorant of the what the literal acronym has meant all this time?

 

[Finale Fireworker]

I usually only hear cis as an insult when its used in a sentence. Regardless, call people what they want to be called. If someone tells me they want to be called a certain way, Ill respect their wishes. If they don't want to be called a certain label, I wont call them that. Just common decency

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The refusal of something as benign as cisgender — a neutral term which simply indicates you are not transgender — is to reject actual reality. It is not a self-identifying label. To demand your existence be treated as so immutably standard that no word even exist in recognition of you is preposterous.

To take this position is untenable. This is not common decency. It should not be accommodated. Cis people rejecting cis is transphobia.

 

[The Deleter]

I try to be as inclusive as possible with my terminology and even I hate the term cisgender. It's accurate, but being used to define other people's sexuality and identity, it doesn't feel right at all. Ace, pan, aromatic, gay, lesbian, etc all sound like names chosen by the communities as something to be proud of, but cis is... just an acronym, and a pretty gross sounding one at that, phonetically. (nevermind, apparently I'm dumb and it is a prefix, whoops) Sounds like piss lol. Not to mention the amount of times it's used in disgust makes it feel more like a label from another party than a self-imposed term to be equally proud about as a part of yourself.

Cis people probably don't care in the slightest because it doesn't really apply to them, but for those that actually make an effort to be an ally of LGBTQ rights/communities, it kinda feels like a slap in the face lol

 

[Poimandres]

It's only problematic to me if it's used to totally define a group of people. It can be used as an identifier, sure, but labels in general make it easy to dismiss entire groups of people without thinking about individuals.

I've seen people say they hate cisgender people in the same way that many are openly transphobic or homophobic. I just don't like defining people like that. It sucks that this is how things are, but it's what minorities of all kinds have faced pretty much forever.

 

[Platy]

Doesn't it mean Comfortable in Skin? Am I just completely ignorant of the what the literal acronym has meant all this time?

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cisgender comes from the latin cis that means "in the same side as" . It is opposed to trans which means "in the other side as". the terms are mostly used for isomery on chemistry

Isomer - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

so basically it means "your gender aligns with your sex"
it does not mean "your gender aligns with what society expects from your sex" which is also a common way terfs are a pain in the ass about

the comfortable is an embelishment that some people use to make their texts prettier

 

[Deleted member 36054]

What I mean is if you are a trans woman and want to be referred to as a woman I'm not going to say no you are trans. I'm gonna say ok your a woman etc. I'm not going to add an extra identifier if you are cis or trans

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This is the same bad logic as being color blind. In concept it's ideally how the world should work, but that's not reality.

 

[Finale Fireworker]

Doesn't it mean Comfortable in Skin? Am I just completely ignorant of the what the literal acronym has meant all this time?

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Not sure where you got that from, but that is incorrect. Cis is a Latin prefix.

Cisgender - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Cisgender has its origin in the Latin-derived prefix cis-, meaning "on this side of", which is the opposite of trans-, meaning "across from" or "on the other side of".

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[Morrigan]

This is like asking why the term heterosexual needs to exist.

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Pretty much.

Cis people probably don't care in the slightest because it doesn't really apply to them, but for those that actually make an effort to be an ally of LGBTQ rights/communities, it kinda feels like a slap in the face lol

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lol? No? Not even a little bit.

 

[Weltall Zero]

What I mean is if you are a trans woman and want to be referred to as a woman I'm not going to say no you are trans. I'm gonna say ok your a woman etc. I'm not going to add an extra identifier if you are cis or trans

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This is literally the exact same "I don't see color" bullshit that's used to erase POC's experiences and shut up conversation on institutionalized racism. We need words for "trans" and "cis" to have any kind of meaningful discourse.

This would incidentally be a mighty fine moment to:

take 30 seconds to learn something new, process it, and implement it for the betterment of others.

Click to shrink...

 

[Godfather]

cisgender comes from the latin cis that means "in the same side as" . It is opposed to trans which means "in the other side as". the terms are mostly used for isomery on chemistry

Isomer - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

so basically it means "your gender aligns with your sex"
it does not mean "your gender aligns with what society expects from your sex" which is also a common way terfs are a pain in the ass about

the comfortable is an embelishment that some people use to make their texts prettier

Click to shrink...

Not sure where you got that from, but that is incorrect. Cis is a Latin prefix.

Cisgender - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

```Cisgender has its origin in the Latin-derived prefix cis-, meaning "on this side of", which is the opposite of trans-, meaning "across from" or "on the other side of". ```

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Well fuck me. I have no idea where I picked up that CIS stood for comfortable in skin, but it made sense in the context so I've NEVER second guessed it until now. Thanks for correcting me.

 

[neon/drifter]

I like to identify as she, check my pronouns, yet I keep getting referred to as a male on this site so personally I don't give a fuck anymore lol.

We're all chaos anyways.

But I agree with the takes that some people see themselves as default and don't want themselves "labelled"

 

[smileyforall220]

The refusal of something as benign as cisgender — a neutral term which simply indicates you are not transgender — is to reject actual reality. It is not a self-identifying label. To demand your existence be treated as so immutably standard that no word even exist in recognition of you is preposterous.

To take this position is untenable. This is not common decency. It should not be accommodated. Cis people rejecting cis is transphobia.

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I disagree. If someone doesn't want me to call them something, be it gendered, ethnicity based, or some sort of identifier than I will respect those wishes. To do otherwise is just unneccesarily hostile unless its literally a conversation about gendered/non-gendered indentites

 

[Deleted member 19844]

This is literally the exact same "I don't see color" bullshit that's used to erase POC's experiences and shut up conversation on institutionalized racism. We need words for "trans" and "cis" to have any kind of meaningful discourse.

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Wait, how is that the same? In the scenario you are responding to, it would be like a person of color asking to not be referred to as _____-American, but rather just American. And so in that individual instance, you would honor their request. No?

 

[Fonst]

When I first heard it, I was ignorant to what it meant and sort of took it as a insult that I wasn't "normal" anymore. I've learned the error of my ways but they've grown up all their lives one way and then hear it is a different way, some people can't handle that reality.

 

[Weltall Zero]

This is like asking why the term heterosexual needs to exist.

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I would not be surprised if conservatives fought the use of "heterosexual" back then, too.

 

[Platy]

Well fuck me. I have no idea where I picked up that CIS stood for comfortable in skin, but it made sense in the context so I've NEVER second guessed it until now. Thanks for correcting me.

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people use it as a "noob friendly" way to explain like "born in the wrong body" or "for this exercise, pretend there is no friction"

 

[Trigonometrize]

I think being called something you've never been called before just for being you will be understandably met with skepticism under any circumstances. That's just unavoidable.

 

[Fridaynightcatlady]

What I mean is if you are a trans woman and want to be referred to as a woman I'm not going to say no you are trans. I'm gonna say ok your a woman etc. I'm not going to add an extra identifier if you are cis or trans

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But you should also take into account that trans non binary people exist as well. The term cis also allows us to expand on the notion of two genders and to talk about gender identity.

 

[Platy]

Wait, how is that the same? In the scenario you are responding to, it would be like a person of color asking to not be referred to as _____-American, but rather just American. And so in that individual instance, you would honor their request. No?

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for that individual, yes

but how do you talk about the systemic racism that makes ______ Americans be incarcerated in a rated much larger than ...not ______ americans ? =P
you use stuff like african american and white american because that is what matters to the discussion at hand. Because shittyness of the world requires you to.

if you are on a regular talk, you call the individual person a woman.
if you are talking abour the specifics experiences of trans people, you use trans women and cis women.

 

[Richietto]

Because people would rather be stubborn for a lifetime than take 30 seconds to learn something new, process it, and implement it for the betterment of others.

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Pretty much. It's like damn it takes a few moments to adjust to something like that but they choose to be dumb.

 

[mikeys_legendary]

I don't like it out of context.

In the context of a discussion about trans-rights, or speaking about the struggles trans-people have to go through I don't mind at all.

 

[Khezu]

When people first started using it, it always made me think of Cysts, so was not a fan.

 

[Paroni]

Lots of cisgendered people don't ever specifically think about their gender in their lives. Therefore all the terminology about gender discourse is considered either just being polite to others or an inconvenience, because thinking of gender identity at all is alien to them.

 

[Ultima_5]

I usually only hear cis as an insult when its used in a sentence. Regardless, call people what they want to be called. If someone tells me they want to be called a certain way, Ill respect their wishes. If they don't want to be called a certain label, I wont call them that. Just common decency

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First point is pretty valid. Other than hearing someone defining it, it seems mostly just used to talk down to people online. i dont think i've seen it in any other context.

 

[Weltall Zero]

Wait, how is that the same? In the scenario you are responding to, it would be like a person of color call asking to not be referred to as _____-American, but rather just American. And so in that individual instance, you would honor their request. No?

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The scenario I'm responding to is a carefully and disingenuously picked one that doesn't even begin to encompass the breadth of discourse that transgender identity and struggles merit. How often has that specific scenario played out in your own experience, vs any other discussion of race you've participated in? Does the potential existence of that one hypothetic scenario mean that the words "black" and "white" to refer to people are now unnecesary? Because it follows that e.g. any discussion of race inequality is also unnecessary, and indeed, impossible, exactly as the erasure of of "trans" and "cis" does for trans discrimination.

If someone specifically tells you "I'm a trans woman" and you say "OK, you're a woman, I don't care that you're trans", it may come from a well-intentioned place, but you're erasing and ignoring a part of that person's experience that they chose to share with you.

 

[Tuorom]

Wait, how is that the same? In the scenario you are responding to, it would be like a person of color asking to not be referred to as _____-American, but rather just American. And so in that individual instance, you would honor their request. No?

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Is your gender identity important to you?

Is your race important to your identity?

 

[Davey Cakes]

I'm a cisgender white male but I don't find that to be a particularly important identifier. It captures nothing about who I am as a person.

I don't find it uncomfortable or offensive. I'm just not big into labels. I'm a "people are people" kind of guy.