I've been moving all week and missed the Chelsea Manning wars here.

[Ms. Toad]

24. I encourage you to look carefully at where the heat has been.

Nearly all of the heat has been directed to people who deliberately, in discussion about the transition, insist that they will continue to use male pronouns until some magic point at which she passes some standard of their own devising to become "legitimately" female.

I have seen virtually none of it directed at people who weren't aware of the request, and most of those asking sincere questions have been responded to with the same tone.

But you do also have to remember that when you post online, you can always read your post before you hit the button - so online "slips" are not in the same category as face-to-face slips. In unrelated Manning threads, slips are more understandable - because you could be posting in those threads not having seen the news. But in threads expressly discussing Manning's transition it stretches belief to think they are inadvertent.