Diary of Paracelsus’s Rose on Nostr: Some myths about deadnames and deadnaming - “it’s just a trans thing”: cis ...

Some myths about deadnames and deadnaming

- “it’s just a trans thing”: cis people can have deadnames too, for many many reasons. It’s not just a special concern of trans people. One common reason is that a name can be connected to an abusive family member, and they may be powerless to change it formally and publicly. Another is the adoption of a name for oneself as a rite of passage.

- “all former/assigned-at-birth names of trans people are deadnames”: not all trans people have deadnames. Practices about names vary widely across cultures, languages and groups. For example I don’t consider my “wallet name” dead, and it isn’t a gendered name and doesn’t make gender dysphoria worse. Meanwhile I choose to not use it day to day because many people have trouble pronouncing it (or recognizing it as a name!)

I think the rejection of deadnaming shouldn’t be understood as a dogmatic issue but as a practice of care, about caring of the real other.