Talk:Sophie (musician)

The 2022 RfC "Neopronouns and the singular they"

Note [a] in the article reads "The subject is referred to without personal pronouns as a representative told Pitchfork that Sophie "preferred not to use gendered or non-binary pronouns".[8]” The entire article is written so that every time there would be a standard pronoun it uses a full name. This results in a disruptive, off-putting read.

Which Wikipedia policy or guideline is being used to literally proscribe the use of all pronouns? Isn't "Sophie" itself a neopronoun, if used in the exact same way as a pronoun, consistently, through the entirety of this article?

Since it is being used identically to a neopronoun, "Sophie" should be counted as a neopronoun and be replaced with singular they as per the 2022 RfC: Neopronouns and the singular they. MOS:Biography says "If a person exclusively goes by neopronouns such as ze/hir, then the singular they should generally be used instead of neopronouns when referring to that individual, though their requested pronouns should usually be mentioned in their biography (such as in prose or in a footnote)." JM2023 (talk) 19:54, 28 August 2023 (UTC)

I agree that the decision to omit pronouns affects readability, but it's a bit of a stretch to say that "no pronouns" counts as neopronoun (it is, by definition, the lack of pronouns). Or at least, I certainly wouldn't view that as an outcome of the RfC without further discussion. We're not using Sophie as a nounself pronoun, Sophie's name is literally just a proper noun.

Current consensus seems to be that this is the least bad way of handling articles about individuals with no unambiguously appropriate set of gender pronouns. A change in that consensus would also presumably affect Public Universal Friend, Marsha P. Johnson, Albert Cashier, Murder of Tessa Majors, so this might should be a centralized discussion at WT:MOSBIO.

The straightforward reading (for better or worse) of the Pitchfork source is that Sophie didn't want she or they to be used, so under MOS:GENDERID the article should respect this. Although much ink has been spilled speculating on how accurate that statement is to Sophie's personal life, for the article's purposes, it's all we have. –RoxySaunders 🏳️‍⚧️ (💬 • 📝) 20:44, 28 August 2023 (UTC)

One would hope that eventually (with discussion?) the RfC can be extended to apply the singular "they" in cases of ambiguous or absent gender identity. After all, "[singular "they"] typically occurs with an indeterminate antecedent" and was invented to do so, and if we're going to use singular "they" in place of neopronouns on Wikipedia, then we might as well use singular "they" in place of "nouns-in-place-of-pronouns" like Sophie, the Friend, Majors, etc as well, as it seems to be the same policy or an extension of it. Improves readability and consistency. I don't know how to make an RfC and I don't know if I have the privileges to do so, so I'll hold off on that. JM2023 (talk) 20:57, 28 August 2023 (UTC)

All editors are allowed to start an RfC, see Wikipedia:Requests for comment for more information on that. WP:RFCBEFORE, it's best to begin by thoroughly discussing the subject (to the point of exhaustion) prior to starting an RfC. I think I'm roughly in agreement that they/them is appropriate in these articles, but as always it's a matter to handle with care. I'd personally wait to and see what other editors have to say on this matter. You might also post a neutral notice of this discussion at WT:LGBT to attract attention. –RoxySaunders 🏳️‍⚧️ (💬 • 📝) 21:29, 28 August 2023 (UTC)

Dyktalk hook

The hook in the {{Dyktalk}} box here got edited at some point; the hook that actually ran was from before Sophie came out, so it used male pronouns. I've removed it since it incorrectly suggested that even before Sophie came out Wikipedia wasn't using pronouns in Sophie's article, but obviously I'm not eager to misgender Sophie. The original is available at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2014/October, but if anyone feels it's important to include here, I'd suggest bracketing any changes for something like ... that anonymous music producer Sophie chose [that] name because [Sophie] thought "it tastes good and it's like moisturizer"? hinnk (talk) 20:55, 20 January 2024 (UTC)

Source for identifying as a trans woman?

In none of the sources cited for Sophie identifying as a trans woman does it actually mention the term, only transgender. Is there another source for this or should the mention of woman be deleted? 87.92.111.76 (talk) 23:10, 30 March 2024 (UTC)

Resolved

. --MikutoH ^talk! 01:39, 1 June 2024 (UTC)

Hansford, Amelia (2022-09-17). "How SOPHIE's legacy of trans liberation lives on after her untimely death". PinkNews. Retrieved 2024-06-01.

It wasn’t until 2017’s “It’s Okay to Cry” that SOPHIE included her own voice, and image, in a release. It wasn’t a coming out – that she was certain of – but it was the first time the public got to know SOPHIE as a person, as a trans woman.

–RoxySaunders 🏳️‍⚧️ (💬 • 📝) 03:14, 1 June 2024 (UTC)

Quoting a posthumous statement does not clarify that Sophie said this by oneself. In an interview for Jezebel, Sophie even expressed disinterest in the trans label and tied one's transness with transhumanism. --MikutoH ^talk! 23:12, 3 June 2024 (UTC)

Pronouns again

With Sophie in the news with the announcement of her upcoming posthumous album release, I'd really like to revisit the decision to use no pronouns in the article, because I think it's kind of embarrassing to the project at this point. Wikipedia follows reliable secondary sources, apportioning due weight when they differ. In this case, the overwhelming majority of RS, before and after Sophie's death use she/her pronouns. She is also referred to in this way by her friends, collaborators, and family, as quoted in reliable sources. For example, here are a few recent articles about the upcoming album:

• Pitchfork: "According to a press release, SOPHIE was nearly finished with SOPHIE before she died."
• Rolling Stone: "On Monday, the producer’s family announced they will be releasing some of the late, avant-pop artist’s unreleased music on an album named Sophie, out Sept. 27, more than three years after her tragic death. "
  • This article also quotes a statement issued by her family: “When we, Sophie’s family, took our first steps towards bringing this project to fruition we contacted the dear friends with whom she envisioned the album,”
• Stereogum: "SOPHIE’s stature and influence, already significant during her lifetime, has only grown in the years since her 2021 death."
• Out: "Pioneering Grammy-nominated hyperpop producer SOPHIE sadly passed away at the young age of 34 in January of 2021, but her legacy is living on through a new self-titled second album, set to be posthumously released this September."

These aren't cherrypicked, they're just the first articles that came up in a Google News search. The avoidance of pronouns in our article is embarrassingly out of step with the overwhelming preponderance of sources, as well as making the prose awkward. The "no pronouns" concept is based on the statement of a single unnamed "representative" which was issued to Pitchfork shortly after Sophie's death. Pitchfork and a few other sources followed this in their reporting in the immediate aftermath, but outside of this brief window of time, sources have consistently used she/her (including Pitchfork itself, as quoted above). Frankly it just defies common sense to square the idea that Sophie didn't want to be referred to by pronouns with the fact that her family and other loved ones all refer to her as "she". Colin M (talk) 21:12, 24 June 2024 (UTC)

Agreed. AlexandraAVX (talk) 04:20, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

Agree with all arguments GLORIOUSEXISTENCE (talk) 07:54, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

Fully agree. — ser! ^{(chat to me - see my edits)} 10:50, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

I've looked back and re-read the original discussion on the use of pronouns in this article, and I think at that time they only had one reliable source indicating SOPHIE's preference for no pronouns, and one against. That was not a lot of material one way or another to make a major decision.

The second major discussion on the topic of pronouns (October 2022), if anything, seemed to come to the conclusion that it was appropriate to use She/Her pronouns, but this was not subsequently followed through on.

Now in our third major discussion on this topic, OP has shown a clear trend by new reliable secondary sources using She/Her pronouns. As per Wikipedia guidelines, we must always defer to reliable, secondary sources.

I think this is a very straight forward Agree for me. If another editor was able to show more reliable sources supporting the idea that SOPHIE did not wish for this, I would be perfectly willing to change my mind, but that has to happen first. CeltBrowne (talk) 15:07, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

To nitpick, the relevant guideline specifically states that we gender people based on most recent expressed self-identification ... even if it does not match what is most common in sources, so a clear trend would not typically be sufficient. On principal, we do not care how sources gender a person, only how that person prefers to be gendered. A source reported that such a preference existed, and others repeat it as fact,[1][2][3] so the guidelines-as-written would be to stick to no-pronouns even if it puts us out of step with other sources.

There is a case for WP:IAR here, but I'm not sure if there's a strong justification to assume that other people using their own words are more reliable than a representative claiming to speak for the artist. I would not bank on the assumption that a trans person would never be misgendered by the press or her family. "Anonymous SOPHIE spokesperson to Pitchfork" is certainly questionable evidence, but their word is the currently the only meaningful thing which current Wikipedia guidelines say to base decisions on. –RoxySaunders 🏳️‍⚧️ (💬 • 📝) 16:31, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

In the aims of writing sensitively about a recently deceased trans person with a clearly nuanced relationship to gender identity, I would urge strongly against basing pronoun-related arguments on common sense, what is embarassing to the project, or readability. –RoxySaunders 🏳️‍⚧️ (💬 • 📝) 16:46, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

Agree. Almost every source close to SOPHIE uses she/her pronouns to refer to her, and while as other users have pointed out there's definitely valid concerns about her family and the press misgendering her, her friends have also referred to her this way (example: this Charli XCX interview). These are people that verifiably knew SOPHIE (as opposed to a vague representative), but also people SOPHIE chose to be around and who have shown so much respect towards her so I find it very unlikely that they would all be misgendering her publicly. With this, I'm concerned that the lack of pronouns in the article ends up inadvertently "degendering" SOPHIE in a way that could be harmful (not sure how well known that term is, basically "degendering" is when someone describes a trans person who uses gendered terms and identifiers with non-gendered ones). It's definitely not intentional, and obviously wouldn't be a problem if that was how she identified, but with so few RS about it and the overwhelming majority implying that she did use feminine descriptors, it's a factor I would like to acknowledge as a part of the broader discussion. Overall, I think this is a strong case for WP:IAR at the very least. Thedualcitizen (talk) 21:16, 25 June 2024 (UTC)

Agree Applying MOS:GENDERID here, it's hard to establish a lack of third-person pronouns as "the person's most recent expressed self-identification as reported in the most recent reliable sources". Several publications adopted that standard immediately after Sophie's death, apparently based on the statement made to Pitchfork, but it hasn't borne out over time. The statement to Pitchfork doesn't indicate when Sophie would have made such a request, so it's a leap for us to assume that it was more recent than the she/her identification stated by contemporaries, family, etc. To me, the fact that the publication that was the source of that statement has revised its own style based on later statements is an indication that we shouldn't be treating no pronouns as definitive.

I appreciate RoxySaunders's comment about sticking close to the guidelines on this. Gonna post this discussion to the LGBT WikiProject so we can get some more eyes on this from people familiar with the relevant issues. hinnk (talk) 01:20, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Agree with use of she/her per sources provided by Colin M, CeltBrowne's summary of past discussions, hinnk's application of MOS:GENDERID. Wracking ^talk! 04:05, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

At a previous discussion at Talk:Sophie_(musician)/Archive_2#pronouns_again the best I could come up with was that there was a single source, quoted in a couple of other sources, that seemed to indicate SOPHIE (the stage persona) used no pronouns, but that it was abundantly clear everyone close to Sophie (the person) used she/her. We've been cautious about this, but I believe we should be using she/her when referring to the person and no pronouns when referring to the stage persona. Valereee (talk) 11:58, 26 June 2024 (UTC)

Respectfully Disagree, pursuant to points made by RoxySaunders above. Taking secondary sources over the words of the individual undercuts Sophie's agency, something we should be especially conscious of given that Sophie is no longer alive. In reading the article I don't think the repetitive use of Sophie affects reading comprehension, even if it feels unusual compared to how we usually write about people. Even knowing that people close to Sophie used she/her pronouns, we as editors have a fundamentally different relationship to Sophie and should not assume that Sophie's preferences for day-to-day pronoun use with family would be the same as Sophie's preferences for press/publications/public use. I echo all of Roxy's assertions, especially when they "urge strongly against basing pronoun-related arguments on common sense, what is embarrassing to the project, or readability." Violetstork (talk) 16:28, 28 June 2024 (UTC)

But, @Violetstork, where did Sophie ever say Sophie (the person) used no pronouns? The best I can find is who preferred not to use gendered or nonbinary pronouns, according to one representative, a rep who was never even named. This isn't a statement by Sophie. It's not a case of most recent expressed self-identification. Sophie never said this. An unnamed rep did, after Sophie's death. Valereee (talk) 00:33, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

Agree with using she/her. While the person's preferences are important, this has to be balanced with the need to write this version of Wikipedia in Standard English. This is why the guidelines state that someone who prefers a non-standard neopronoun should be referred to as they. No pronouns at all is also non-standard, and I agree that it results in Sophie effectively operating as a neopronoun. By default that would mean using they, but we have reliable sources referring to Sophie as she and quoting close friends and relatives doing likewise. Finally, I've never heard of a trans woman taking offense to being called she. Perhaps there's a trans woman out there who does — stranger things have happened. But the main purpose of the MOS:GENDERID guidelines as it concerns trans women is to protect them from being referred to as he. Anywikiuser (talk) 21:16, 29 June 2024 (UTC)

Avoiding pronouns is a Standard English handling for someone whose pronouns are in question. While the gender neutral singular they pronoun is excellent, excluding third person pronouns entirely is a stronger form of avoiding grammatical gender in the English language and entirely proper, arguably it's more formal. Also your characterisation of the purpose of MOS:GENDERID is strange to me. MOS:GENDERID exists to lay down a baseline approach to gender identifiers used in an article, and it's explicit that that baseline should begin with the stated preference of the individual. Of course said preference must manifest through some form of source, as all information on wikipedia must. Any argument around which pronouns to use for Sophie should revolve around assessment of sourced statements of preference of gender identifier, not speculative assessments. Antisymmetricnoise (talk) 03:36, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Sophie's father would play cassettes of electronic music in the car and take Sophie to raves as a very young child, and Sophie quickly became enamoured of the music is pretty awkward. Valereee (talk) 11:52, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Complex and repetitive-sounding sentences can be fixed with judicious editing (e.g. by splitting each clauses into its own sentence). I don't think prosaic flow or grammatical awkwardness should be considered an overriding concern to MOS:IDENTITY. This would have troubling implications for the those who earnestly insist that the singular they or lowercase names are ungrammatical.

After my edit here, the article reads Sophie said in an interview published by Lenny Letter, "[My dad] had brilliant instincts, taking me to raves when I was very young. He bought me the rave cassette tapes before I went to the events and would play them in the car and be like, 'This is going to be important for you.' [...] As soon as I’d heard electronic music, I spent all my time listening to those cassette tapes. I’d steal them from the car." –RoxySaunders 🏳️‍⚧️ (💬 • 📝) 18:03, 1 July 2024 (UTC)

Great improvement. We still use Sophie ~100 times in this article. And we don't actually have much evidence Sophie (the person) didn't take she/her pronouns. I agree that flow and awkwardness isn't the primary concern. But this person's closest loved ones, including this person's girlfriend, referred to this person as she/her. Valereee (talk) 00:12, 2 July 2024 (UTC)

I wouldn't stop someone from carefully replacing some instances of Sophie with the artist (etc.) and otherwise tinkering with sentence structure, but I don't see this as a substantial problem outside that particular example, and this replacement shouldn't be overdone; see Wikipedia:The problem with elegant variation. –RoxySaunders 🏳️‍⚧️ (💬 • 📝) 05:45, 2 July 2024 (UTC)