Yes, you do have pronouns. Whether you like it or not.

I consume a lot of YouTube. From how to put the plow on my ATV (actual search) and other instructional content to self-proclaimed slop tubers The Vanguard (Is that an ambulance I hear?) and all the history, current events, and politics inbetween (like The Red Nation, Heather Cox Richardson, Majority Report), I am one of the growing number of people who watch YouTube regularly, especially on TV.

Skip the context; I just want the info. Or take me to the sources.

And yes, I watch debate content. I’ll admit to starting with Parker and Dean (because they are tough to avoid, believe me, I’ve since tried) before finding my way to Santana and Polypolitics, and happening into science debates and reaction content with Dr. Blitz, Planet Peterson, and Modern Day Debates. And then a funny thing happened: I started watching religious debates. 

How does someone who doesn’t give (organized Western) religion a second thought find themselves entrenched in these debates? Well, turns out if you watch even the slightest bit of science debate content, the topic of evolution comes up a lot. And don’t get me started on the flat-earthers, holy shit. So science debates led me to Deconstruction Zone (#RHFD, #SWFS), The Line, and Allegedly Ian. In fairness, I’ve been a fan of Dan McClellan from the start, but the atheist vs. theist debate content was new and gave me the dopamine hit I needed to stick around.

If you’ve not watched debate content on YouTube, there’s usually a host who allows call-ins on YouTube or requests from audience members on TikTok to get on their livestream and respond to a question or prompt. There’s often a series of questions the caller must answer before being allowed up, such as how old they are (to comply with TikTok's TOS), where they’re calling from, how they identify politically or religiously, that sort of thing. And if you’re Parker or Dean, this is used to weed out the approximately 93% of callers who are either screaming 13-year-old girls or 16-year-old boys trying out racial slurs. 

But this post is about pronouns.

Jovan Bradley, The Bible Guy, and The Line are among those whose preliminary questions include the dreaded, “What are your pronouns?” Some can answer this simple question easily, while callers of a certain ilk (I’ll let you guess who) have a bit more trouble and usually respond in one of three ways. 

Responses to “What are your pronouns?”

(Feigning) ignorance

These are folks who pretend not to understand the question. It’s usually harmless, and they back down pretty quickly when pressed. It’s similar to when someone asks me about Charlie Kirk and I say, “Who?” just to see what they’ll say. But sometimes these callers don’t actually understand, and when it’s explained to them, they’ll answer. So whether feigning ignorance or truly ignorant, they often get a pass. 

Belligerence

These are the willfully ignorant who expect hosts to “use their common sense” because “clearly” the caller is a man, as if we can tell by a voice. If you’ve ever heard a woman who’s smoked much of her life speak, you’ll know that someone’s voice is not always indicative of their gender. These folks know what they’re doing and push back a bit, but will usually come around with threats of being kicked off the live.  

The crash out 

These are classic. If you’ve seen one, you know what I mean, and if you haven’t, check out Jovan Bradley’s clips of the best pronoun crashouts. These folks lose their shit when you ask them their pronouns because clearly this is all a leftist conspiracy by the deep state to wipe out straight people or some stupid shit. These are the shameless bigots, Christian Nationalists, or mediocre closeted white men with anger issues. In all seriousness, these are often folks who feel threatened by changes they don't understand. They project their confusion and fear onto others whom they've been conditioned to dislike. More on this later.

In watching these replies to the pronoun question, I found myself getting so annoyed by the ignorance of it all. (I think you’ll hear me say this a lot.) So here we are! I know it can be confusing and scary to some folks, but never fear, I am here to explain basic pronoun use, personal pronouns, and why you should use the ones folks want you to use.

Pronouns 101 

What are pronouns?

According to Merriam-Webster, a pronoun is “any of a small set of words in a language that are used as substitutes for nouns or noun phrases and whose referents are names or understood in the context.” We use pronouns to provide clarity and context, increase efficiency, and avoid repetition.

For example, instead of saying, “The tree is tall. The tree is very old.” I can say, “The tree is tall. It is very old.” So, in this example, “it” is the pronoun that stands for the tree, which is the referent (also called the antecedent), or the thing that’s being referred to.

Another example: “My dog is wild! Today, she had the zoomies for 10 whole minutes.” Here, “she” is a pronoun referring to my dog, and “my” is a pronoun standing in for the speaker (me in this case), which is inferred since I am the one talking. Even in that last sentence, just look at all the pronouns!  

Other pronoun basics:

• Pronouns are one of the eight parts of speech in the English language; the others are nouns, verbs, adverbs, etc. 
• There are a bunch of different types of pronouns (reflexive, possessive, demonstrative, and more).
• Hundreds of years ago, speakers of Old English used pronouns. They’ve evolved a lot throughout history, from the mixing of languages through migration to people seeking generic or gender-neutral pronouns.
• From the time we begin to talk, we use pronouns, and we continue to use them every day, whether we realize it or not. In fact, you’d be hard-pressed to speak more than a sentence without using one.

In my experience, what freaks people out the most about pronouns is their relatively recent affiliation with the LGBTQ+ community, and especially trans folks, which is funny because, as I said above, there are lots of different pronouns that we all use every day, and only a select few used in select circumstances come under fire. I won’t get too into the weeds here about all of the pronouns, but instead I’ll focus on the scariest ones: the personal pronouns.