Name

[azurelunatic]

Because of reasons, the following line is in my emergency medical information:

Medical personnel looking to gain my attention, trust, and cooperation should address me as "Azz". Medical personnel retaining a belief that the birth name is a "true name" with power should be aware that I wasn't "[birth certificate name]" until age 6, and then only at school; non-family attempting to gain family privilege by birth nickname get bitten.

Comments

[kaberett]

Now that I have a dedicated top-up-meds bag I carry with me, I should probably print out/laminate some medical info to stick in it. This would be a good thing to include; thank you. (Well, obviously not "Azz", but. ;)

[azurelunatic]

Yes indeed. Names are complicated things that are important to get right.

[vass]

I visited a friend in hospital last month, and I was pleased to notice the whiteboard next to his bed, which had the following written out - the prompts in permanent marker, the answers in whiteboard marker:

Preferred Name: $name
Goal for stay: to rest up and let the staff look after me and my friends and family all show me how much they love me, and to let $friendwhofilleditout steal lots of chocolate
Questions: - is it meant to look like that? - explosions?

I hope the medical staff in that hospital did look at the whiteboard when they came in. In his case it wouldn't have mattered so much [except to reassure him that the surgery site was not going to explode] because he goes by the only obvious nickname of his extremely common given name, so if they just assumed in his case then they'd still be right.

But I would like to think that if you were in that bed, they would call you Azz because that was on the whiteboard, not whatever name was on your chart. [Dubious tone because I'd like to believe nurses and doctors also checked allergy wristbands, and I know damn well they don't do that.]

[azurelunatic]

I would like to think so too.

The precipitating incident was a nasty little transphobic byplay to a tragic auto/pedestrian collision, with the result that -- well, if they would do that to her, and I believe that she'd gone through a legal name change, I wanted to make it crystal clear that the name on my ID is the name I should be called if you want to make me feel alienated, angry, lost, and afraid; claiming that you should call me that because it's my "real name" holds zeeeero water.

[silveradept]

That is an excellent line, and those who do not heed deserve to be bit, I'm guessing.

[azurelunatic]

If someone knowingly calls me the wrong name when I'm too incoherent to insist on the right name, I am not fully responsible for the consequences.

[trixieleitz]

This reminds me of the quiet⁰ simmering I do every time I encounter a news story about Lorde, because it inevitably includes a fragment along the lines of "whose real name is [whatever it says on her birth certificate]". Like that's even relevant.

0: "quiet" because I have no knowledge of her own feelings on the subject, and those are the feelings that actually count.

[azurelunatic]

That is a thing for a matter-of-fact "Lorde (born [birth certificate name], date, details) is a vocal artist ..." in wikipedia. Not a fun fact for every article!

[trixieleitz]

Quite so. And then there's the implication that her professional name is somehow not real, despite it being probably the widest-known label for her :|