Sam Smith fans criticise news outlets for using the singer's old pronouns

Last week singer Sam Smith announced that they would be adopting they/them gender pronouns.

Having come out as non-binary earlier this year, the singer said on Twitter that the pronoun change had come after “after a lifetime of being at war with my gender I’ve decided to embrace myself for who I am, inside and out”.

But in a news report of the news, the Associated Press seems to have struggled with the concept of pronouns.

On Twitter, the outlet was criticised for appearing to misgender Smith. In a screengrab posted to Twitter by non binary journalist @ashleycdye, the AP refer to Smith with male pronouns seven times in just three short paragraphs.

People weren’t impressed on Twitter…

The Associated Press then updated their report to remove the male pronouns.

Revealing the news, Smith said that they understand that there will be mistakes, but asked people to try their best to respect their new pronouns.

If you’re interested in learning more about what it means to be non-binary or why pronouns are important, read indy100’s reports here.

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