• sp3ctr4l@lemmy.zip
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    39
    arrow-down
    2
    ·
    edit-2
    5 days ago

    For those not familiar with DragonFucker/Rider/Drag:

    Dragon uses the pronoun “drag” in place of “I”, “drag’s” in place of “my”.

    They wouldn’t say:

    I like cheese. Blueberry isn’t my favorite. I know what my heart wants.

    They would say:

    Drag likes cheese. Blueberry isn’t drag’s favorite. Drag knows what drag’s heart wants.

    Beyond whether or not they literally think they are a dragon, going to marry a dragon, beyond even using ‘drag’ as a custom neopronoun that normally replaces 3rd person pronouns…

    They are using what they call their own custom first person pronouns, but this reads to basically every English speaker as constantly referring to themselves in the 3rd person by using their own nickname, akin to the royal ‘we’.

    Dragon has told me that they don’t see “drag” as a nickname, but as a pronoun.

    … I don’t think they are trolling, in the sense of just doing something annoying to get a rise out of people, a voluntary activity one choses to do consciously.

    Their grammatical behavior is consistent across all their posts, they don’t only engage in it from time to time.

    I’ve even had a few conversations with Dragon where I’ve attempted to explain that half of the hate they get and arguments they get into stem from people misunderstanding what they are saying, because of their extremely niche way of using pronouns.

    They’ve told me, directly, that my understanding of how their pronouns work is correct, and that this proves that their pronoun/grammar style is thus not confusing, and that eventually everyone will just adapt and understand them.

    …Despite the fact that I told them I had to do like an hour worth of research to figure out how this all actually works, which Dragon … intially chastized me for, saying it was all clearly evident from their profile (it wasn’t), and that I did not need to do that much research…

    …even though I seem to be the only person I am aware of explaining Dragon’s grammar/pronoun style in every thread we both happen to be in where most other people are just misunderstanding them and that leading to arguments.

    Anyway, I’ve never heard of anyone using custom pronouns for “I” and “my” until Dragon.

    Ever.

    I myself am queer, have run in many circles with many lgbtqia folks, and I’ve even dated a queer person legitimately diagnosed with DID, and not even they would use their own custom first person pronouns for their alters, or the collective system of alters as a whole…

    • tb_@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      2 days ago

      They would say:

      Drag likes cheese. Blueberry isn’t drag’s favorite. Drag knows what drag’s heart wants.

      If it is indeed a custom first person pronoun, they are using the wrong third person version of the verb.

      Which is odd, but also, like, whatever. I don’t have a horse in this race.

      • sp3ctr4l@lemmy.zip
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        2 days ago

        If it is indeed a custom first person pronoun, they are using the wrong third person version of the verb.

        Correct.

        Dragon says they’re using ‘drag’ as a pronoun, but they actually are not.

        They are using it as a nickname whereby they constantly refer to themself in the third person.

        They don’t believe this is what they are doing, but it is what they are doing.

        Its not actually a coherent neopronoun structure that works within the grammatical rules of English.

        Further, I should add that Dragon states that their preffered ‘drag’ pronoun also operates in second person, on their profile.

        Meaning that if you were talking directly to Dragon and said:

        You like blueberries, right?’

        …they would presumably view the use of ‘You’ as not respecting their preferred pronouns, which should instead be ‘Drag’.

    • Jumuta@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      7
      ·
      edit-2
      4 days ago

      I wonder if their point is basically to stress test the pronouns system we have,
      e.g. make people think about why we use them and why we need them

      basically doing something to an extreme to show the issues/benefits it entails

    • Annoyed_🦀 @monyet.cc
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      11
      ·
      edit-2
      5 days ago

      I’ve seen some people refering themselves with their own name, though all of them is online and haven’t met one irl.

      Also if people watch We Bare Bears, Ice Bear always refering himself as “Ice Bear” and never “I”. No one watching the show seems to hate him, however.

      Personally i don’t really care, not sure what’s the fuss around Drag using it tbh.

      Edit: it seems there’s more to this story i’m not aware of after reading all the comment, if that’s the case i might’ve mistaken the situation :/

      Also now i do remember meeting someone that refer to herself in 3rd person.

    • Kayday@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      6
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      edit-2
      3 days ago

      I respect drag’s pronouns. Correct me if I’m wrong, but referring to drag with “they” is not right?

      They wouldn’t say:
      I like cheese.

      They would say:
      Drag likes cheese.

      Not trying to pull a gotcha or anything, it just confuses me because I keep seeing comments defending drag’s pronouns while also using they/them.

      • sp3ctr4l@lemmy.zip
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        edit-2
        2 days ago

        I don’t use Dragon’s pronoun structure in my own speech because it is extremely confusing…as I attempted to explain.

        ‘They/them’ is significantly less confusing, and is widely accepted as a gender non-specific pronoun.

        Sure, Dragon would likely prefer I use ‘Drag’ where I used ‘They’ but the whole problem here is that doing so is confusing.

        So I am using the commonly accepted gender non determinative pronoun, which is understandable to everyone, or just avoid pronouns and use Dragon as their name… because the second part of their name has changed, and a lot of people know them by a different second part…

        Anyway…

        Dragon claims to use ‘drag’ as a ‘person independent pronoun’ in ‘first second and third person’ which is functionally indistinguishable from constantly referring to yourself in the third person with a nickname, and preferring that others refer to you with a custom pronoun in both second and third person.

        Here’s my best attempt at constructing the whole pronoun chart.

        Subj // Obj // Pssv Adj // Pssv Prn // Rflx

        First Person (Used by Dragon):

        I // Me // My // Mine // Myself

        Drag // Drag // Drag’s // Drag’s // Dragself

        Second Person (Preffered use when referring to Dragon):

        You // You // Your // Yours // Yourself

        Drag // Drag // Drag’s // Drag’s // Dragself

        Third Person (Preffered use when referring to Dragon)

        They // Them // Their // Theirs // Themself He // Him // His // His // Himself She // Her // Her // Hers // Herself

        Drag // Drag // Drag’s // Drag’s // Dragself

        This is not the same as every other neopronoun structure I have ever heard of.

        It is inherently more confusing to most than even the standard neopronoun structure’s I’ve seen, because it replaces first and second person pronouns, which I’ve never seen any other neopronoun structure do.

        I’ve never seen a neopronoun user throw away I Me My and prefer others not use You Yours Yourself when referring directly to them, but Dragon does.

        To top it off, it is all even more confusing because the ‘pronouns’ are all the same across first second and third person.

        Dragon says ‘drag’ is not a nickname… even though it is a concatenation of their name.

        Only difference is that they don’t capitalize it in the middle of a sentence… but it reads as just constantly referring to yourself in the third person with a nickname.

        … That’s a long way of saying that I’m not going to use Dragon’s ‘pronoun’ structure because it isn’t actually a pronoun structure.

        It is a preference for a third person only refferent, made by a person who denies that that is what it is.

        Can you show me any other neopronoun structure where the neopronouns include apostrophes?

        Where the neopronouns are identical across first/second/third person?

        Where the neopronouns sometimes demand modification of the verb tense accompanying them to 3rd person, regardless of the tense of the neopronoun?

    • cows_are_underrated
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      5
      ·
      4 days ago

      First of all, thanks for your explanation. That made everything clear. Secondly:

      and I’ve even dated a queer person legitimately diagnosed with DID

      What does DID mean?