The times they are a changin'

I've known several people throughout my life who automatically refer to dogs as "he" and cats as "she," regardless of the individual animal's actual gender.  To me, it makes a difference, so if I know the correct pronoun, I tend to correct those people....  When I was little, I would gently remind my grandma that our family dog was a girl and therefore most definitely not a "he."  Last summer, when an officious, obnoxious man intruded on my meeting with a male cat at a shelter and was repeatedly corrected by the shelter employee as to the cat's gender, he obstinately continued to refer to the male cat as "she" and was dismissive of the employee's and my corrections.  The man insisted on calling the male cat "she" because, he said, "it's all the same."  So I asked if that meant he was cool with me and everyone else in the shelter calling him "ma'am."  He chuckled and good naturedly agreed with my point before walking away.  And if someone is referring to an animal as an "it," I try to introduce the use of the correct gender pronoun into conversation myself.  I refuse to ever refer to an animal as "it," because no matter the species, no animal is just an "it."

So whenever talking to anyone about their pet, I ask the gender of the animal before continuing the conversation or asking questions, so that I don't ask, "how old is he?" when he is actually a she.

But today I was thrown.  Today an acquaintance mentioned a behavior his cat does, and, wanting to ask a question about the behavior, I stopped my sentence when I reached the pronoun and asked, "he or she?"

Totally serious, sounding more than a trifle condescending, and with what can only be described as a sneer, he informed me that the cat has chosen to self identify as both a male and a female and is therefore a "they" but prefers the gender pronoun "he" if I must use one of them.

I resisted the urge to ask how the cat expressed his or her gender neutrality/fluidity choice and pronoun preference or if the human thought perhaps there was a chance he might be projecting onto the cat.

To be clear, I completely respect this issue as it relates to humans.  But... this is a cat.

And I still don't know if the cat is actually a he or a she.