Jameela Jamil attends Marvel Studios “She-Hulk: Attorney At Law” Los Angeles Premiere. (Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/FilmMagic)
Jameela Jamil has been slammed on social media for “giving instructions to trans people on how to stop being misgendered”.
On Friday (2 September), the presenter and actor accidentally described a non-binary social media user as a “woman” during a Twitter spat.
But, rather than simply apologising and correcting herself, she laid out some guidelines for trans folk on how to avoid being misgendered.
She tweeted: “I instantly corrected myself but NOBODY reads your bios people.
“PLEASE include your pronouns in your name on here to prevent misunderstandings/ offence if it’s important to you.
OBVIOUSLY sorry for making this innocent mistake. But if we don’t do more to prevent this mistake it will likely keep happening, which is bad for everyone. Put pronouns in your names. I’ve just done that with mine. It took two seconds.
— Jameela Jamil 🌈 she/her (@jameelajamil) September 2, 2022
“OBVIOUSLY sorry for making this innocent mistake. But if we don’t do more to prevent this mistake it will likely keep happening, which is bad for everyone.
“Put pronouns in your names. I’ve just done that with mine. It took two seconds.”
Dear trans people: Jameela Jamil has issued a decree on how not to be misgendered. Let us all now obey our cisgender ally overlord.
— annoying poof (@itsjacksonbbz) September 2, 2022
Jamil, who came out as queer in 2020, was quickly told by many of her followers that trans people should not be responsible for stopping others misgendering them.
One follower told Jamil: “Jameela I’m a big fan (and I do have pronouns in my name) but respectfully it’s not really OK to blame the person you misgendered for misgendering them. It takes two seconds before any interaction to just check the bio.”
“You’re putting the blame on the person you misgendered by saying they aren’t presenting the information in a way that works best for you,” said another. “If you want to be an ally, then own the blame fully yourself and take an extra second to check the bio.”
If you’re not sure, either check and/or use gender neutral pronouns like they/them.
Don’t blame the person you misgendered for your error, and then encourage people to make their profile names less accessible.
— Felix Bi+ Pride Fern (@Felix_F_Fern) September 2, 2022
Activist Felix Fern told her: “I adore you, but this is not it.”
On top of telling trans folk to take responsibility for being misgendered, Fern explained that by adding extra words and emojis to her Twitter profile name, Jamil was making life “more complicated for screen readers”.
They continued: “You’re telling people to do the work for you, when it takes two seconds to check a bio before assuming a pronoun.
“If you’re not sure, either check and/or use gender neutral pronouns like they/them.
“Don’t blame the person you misgendered for your error, and then encourage people to make their profile names less accessible.”