I bit ago I made a post detailing the Egg prime directive in Egg irl. To be clear that was a policy post but it also helped outline the concept in a way that many people don’t do. Most descriptions of the Egg prime directive are either incomplete or, purposefully uncharitable. So it’s good to clarify it.
This is a different kind of post, unlike that one it’s not a policy post in regards to community enforcement, it’s more meant to address the issue in a general sense.
Today I’m going to talk about why the Egg Prime Directive is important, and also more importantly, why people disagreeing with it or not following it isn’t acceptable.
First why does it matter? Well I discussed it heavily in my other post but the gist of it is that it is important to respect the way a person identifies themselves, the pronouns they use, the label they call themselves. Regardless of how they look or present themselves. It seems like a pretty fundamental concept that there shouldn’t be any issue with, yet somehow many people seem to have an issue with it and don’t do it. When a person’s identity isn’t respected it can be deeply hurtful and is ultimately deeply disrespectful to them.
Why ‘disagreement’ with the egg is problematic at best? Well the thing is, because the Egg Prime Directive is solely about respecting the way a person identifies themselves and their autonomy to identify themselves in a way that they see fit, to argue against it is to argue against people’s validity to self-identification. It’s not much different from arguing against certain aspects of trans rights. Ultimately many instances where people break the Egg Prime Directive are targeting individuals who are Gender-Nonconforming or even NonBinary.
Some people argue that they should be able to break it to fight cisnormativity. However this is a very poor justification to try and make it seem okay to violate someone else’s gender identification and ultimately isn’t being done for their benefit, it is going against their right to identify as any gender or use any label they feel like. To be clear, they have that right, all the time. The idea that someone doesn’t have the right to identify as their preferred gender or label in certain circumstances is downright dystopian.
Bottom line, there is no such thing as respectful disagreement with this concept, going against the Egg Prime Directive is solely an act of going against another person’s identification. It isn’t respectful to them as a person. It’s very similar to “respectful transmedicalism” or “respectful transphobia” in this regard. It is a harmful behavior made out as if it’s respectful or good.
Oh and By the way. Before someone tries to argue that Egging is “politely explaining what trans means to someone” this subject has been covered in the last post and respectful support and education is NOT Egging, and is freely allowed by the Egg prime directive, if not explicitly encouraged, trying to argue as if it somehow isn’t is disingenuous, and frankly seems extremely uncharitable.
I’ve definitely heard of it happening offline, but it is true that most people only ever talk about the Egg prime directive online. Likely because most violations occur online.
I’m just going to share this because I think it illustrates how assumptions about someone’s relationship to identity can go wrong.
There’s a lot of overlap and while there are things outside of the center region that align with one but not the other, there are a lot on the middle. In real life these boundaries are way more fuzzy. So I’m not saying you’re necessarily wrong but there is a lot of nuance and fuzziness that makes it much less concrete in real life.
I’m not trying to say that trans people enforce gender stereotypes, I apologize if I came off as trying to say that but I’m not. I am saying that Egging as a behavior, especially the aggressive variety does. I have edited the original to clarify what I mean and I apologize for any miscommunication.
Again you speak about it like it is concrete, when it is only an assumption. That is the core root of problems in egg culture. Assumptions that could be correct, but also could just as easily be wrong. Since at the end of the day other people don’t know us the way we know ourselves.
It is a very big problem that largely goes unnoticed unfortunately. Speaking about your concern, the Egg Prime Directive in its charitable form is significantly different than what you describe. Since under that being supportive and educating people on the existence of gender identities and making them feel safe is allowed and even encouraged. It is not the same as sitting back and doing nothing. It is supporting them, making them aware but not taking away their autonomy.
Except it isn’t an argument in the other direction, it is by in large an argument to allow people to have autonomy over their identities and identification, and to support them by giving them as much information as possible to help them discover themselves on their own. It does not mean ignoring them or keeping them in the dark. Not in the slightest. Maybe many incomplete or uncharitable interpretations have said or implied that, but it is far from the intention of having something like this. The intention is to make people feel comfortable and safe, and not like someone else is trying to arbitrate their identity for them.
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Ok I hope you feel better, things can be hard but hopefully in the future things can get better. I’m still holding out hope they will eventually. I’m sorry you didn’t have a good day, hopefully your day tomorrow is better