What is Respecting Trans People's Pronouns?

It is a two-panel Pink News cartoon, also called THEY Said, in which one friend corrects another after they misgender their nonbinary friend James. It turned into an exploitable image macro where the setup line is rewritten but the 'They said' correction stays intact.

Where did Respecting Trans People's Pronouns come from?

Pink News posted the original cartoon to its Twitter account on August 10, 2020, with a caption about respecting pronouns even when the person is not around. The remix format came out of a Tumblr post by user sir-franz-of-the-grape in early October 2020.

What does Respecting Trans People's Pronouns mean?

In the original it is a sincere plea to correct pronoun slips in private conversation. In the exploitable form the joke is that the second character ignores an outrageous confession about James and only cares about fixing the pronoun.

How do you use Respecting Trans People's Pronouns?

Edits typically rewrite the green-haired character's speech bubble with a wild or incriminating statement about James, often naming a real person like Chris-Chan or Ezra Miller, and leave the Black character's 'They said' reply unchanged.

Is Respecting Trans People's Pronouns still popular?

Its peak activity ran from late 2020 through mid-2022, with notable posts on Twitter and r/PoliticalCompassMemes during that window. The Ezra Miller version in June 2022 was the last major remix documented in the source record.

Respecting Trans People's Pronouns

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Published October 21, 2026

Pink News published a two-panel cartoon in August 2020 showing a friend being gently corrected after misgendering their nonbinary friend James, and the earnest infographic became an exploitable image macro within weeks. By October 2020, Tumblr users were rewriting the green-haired character's dialogue to make James the butt of offensive confessions, turning a pronoun lesson into a punchline template.

lgbtq memes exploitable templates dialogue edit memes two panel memes gender discourse memes

Overview

Respecting Trans People's Pronouns, also known as THEY Said, is a two-panel cartoon drawn by LGBTQ+ outlet Pink News showing a white, green-haired character chatting with a Black feminine character about their trans friend James, who uses they/them pronouns1. In the original, the green-haired character slips up and refers to James as 'he,' and the other character calmly replies 'They said' to correct the pronoun1. Remixers kept the correction punchline intact and rewrote the first speech bubble so that the green-haired character confesses something increasingly absurd, offensive or incriminating about James, making the pronoun fix the only thing the second character cares about3.

The humor sits in the mismatch between a dark or outrageous setup and the mild, surgical correction that follows, which some viewers read as satire of performative allyship and others as sincere celebration of pronoun discipline3. Edits circulated across iFunny, Tumblr, Twitter, Reddit and Discord servers, with the James character standing in for real figures like Chris-Chan5 and actor Ezra Miller7.

Gallery

Origin & Background

Platform

Twitter (Pink News) / Tumblr (viral remix)

Creator

Pink News

Date

2020

On August 10, 2020, the Twitter account of LGBTQ+ news outlet Pink News posted the cartoon with the caption 'Respecting trans people's pronouns, even when they're not around, makes a huge difference'2. Over roughly two years the tweet gathered more than 360 likes, a modest tally that gave little indication of what the image would become once remixers got hold of it3.

The infographic was reposted to iFunny soon after the original appeared1. The exploitable turn came in early October 2020, when Tumblr user sir-franz-of-the-grape, whose blog has since been deleted, rewrote the green-haired character's line to make James a racist while leaving the 'They said' correction in place3. That version was mirrored on Kiwi Farms on October 11, 2020, which is the earliest archived copy of the remix4.

How It Spread

After the sir-franz-of-the-grape edit in October 2020, the James-is-a-racist version circulated across social platforms and set the pattern every later remix followed: outrageous confession up top, pronoun correction below4. Attention spiked in July 2021 when Twitter user SophNar0747 posted a Discord-sourced iteration tied to the Chris-Chan mother incest allegations, and that tweet gathered roughly 6,700 likes within a year5.

On August 14, 2021, a Political Compass Memes edit hit r/PoliticalCompassMemes and earned about 5,900 upvotes over ten months, which carried the template to a different politically charged audience6. The format kept picking up new subjects into the following year3.

On June 9, 2022, Twitter user LeadeAbrys posted a version aimed at The Flash actor Ezra Miller in the wake of the Tokata Iron Eyes 'minor' allegations, and the post gathered roughly 2,900 likes in five days7. That iteration drew pushback from users who argued that the format gave cover to misgendering public figures the poster disliked3.

Timeline

2020-08-10

Pink News publishes the original two-panel cartoon on Twitter about correcting pronouns for nonbinary friend James[2].

2020-08

The infographic is reposted to iFunny shortly after the original tweet[1].

2020-10

Tumblr user sir-franz-of-the-grape rewrites the green-haired character's line to make James a racist, creating the exploitable template[3].

2020-10-11

The sir-franz-of-the-grape edit is archived in a Kiwi Farms thread, the earliest surviving copy of the remix[4].

2021-07-31

Twitter user SophNar0747 posts a Chris-Chan allegations version that gathers around 6,700 likes within a year[5].

2021-08-14