Simply putting your pronouns in your social media bios can help create a safe space for transgender people

Image from Unsplash @Lenabalk. The Transgender Flag

The Oxford dictionary states that transgender means 'describing or relating to people whose sense of gender identity does not match their biological sex or does not easily fit in with the usual division between male and female.' 

It’s terrifying that even in 2021, discrimination against the transgender community is ongoing. Stonewall, who gather research on the LGBTQ community, discovered from a 2017 report carried out with YouGov, that 51% of transgender people have hidden their identity at work because they fear discrimination.

I don’t understand why people have such a problem with people expressing who they are. With more people coming out as transgender every day, I think that people need to educate themselves and learn about the umbrella terms which fall under transgender. People should be able to express themselves and feel comfortable with who they are without being scared to do so.

You may have noticed that people have started putting their pronouns in their social media bios. Someone who identifies as a male may put ‘he/him’ in their bio. Someone who identifies as non-binary (neither completely identifying as male nor female) may have ‘they/them’ in their bio. This is because you can’t always see the gender that someone may identify as. Some people may not physically transition or haven’t yet transitioned. Putting pronouns in bios is a simple way of making transgender people feel safer and helps avoid misgendering them.

As a cisgender female (meaning I identify as the gender I was biologically born as) I have the pronouns ‘she/her’ in my twitter bio. It’s something that cisgender people are starting to do more often to normalise using different pronouns. As someone who knows transgender people and looks up to some transgender celebrities, it hurts me to think that some people don’t respect them.

I don’t think that everyone on social media needs to put their pronouns in their bios, but if you haven’t, it could be something for you to consider. Putting pronouns in your bio is a simple way of creating a safe space and showing support towards the transgender community.