The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee gender pronoun guide includes “fae,” “ae,” “e” and “ey” on its list of gender pronouns that people need to respect or else they’re “oppressive.”
The UWM Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender Resource Center features an image showing various newly invented gender pronouns that people can choose to refer to themselves as demand others use:
(Image source: UWM Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual Transgender Resource Center)
According to the guide, refusing to use “e” or “ey” can cause people to feel “disrespected, invalidated, dismissed, alienated, or dysphoric (or, often, all of the above.)”
In the instance someone doesn’t remember a trans person actually goes by “fae” instead of “she,” for example, the guide suggests apologizing— but not profusely, because that could also make the trans person feel uncomfortable.
Apologizing repeatedly is apparently “inappropriate and makes the person who was mis-gendered feel awkward and responsible for comforting you, which is absolutely not their job.”
The guide instead asserts, “It is your job to remember people’s PGPs [personal or preferred gender pronouns].”
The guide also claims that people who look like the gender they identify as—or the sex they were born—have “privilege,” since they don’t “have to worry about which pronoun someone is going to use for you based on how they perceive your gender.” These people are allegedly “oppressive” if they don’t use gender-neutral pronouns like “xe”:
It is a privilege to not have to worry about which pronoun someone is going to use for you based on how they perceive your gender. If you have this privilege, yet fail to respect someone else’s gender identity, it is not only disrespectful and hurtful, but also oppressive.
The UWM claims to be “one of the nation’s top campuses for LGBT+ students and is also ranked as a 5-star campus on the LGBT-friendly Campus Climate Index.”
UWM also boasts about how it’s “proud to be the first university in the University of Wisconsin System to offer Inclusive Housing.”