It/its pronouns: why some people use them, and when not to
For someone who chose it, it is respectful. For anyone else, it is dehumanising. Both are true.
The forms
| Subject | it |
|---|---|
| Object | it |
| Possessive before a noun | its |
| Possessive on its own | its |
| Reflexive | itself |
In a sentence
- It is on its way over now.
- I told it the good news.
- Its drawings are pinned above the desk.
- That seat by the window is its.
- It taught itself to play the piano.
The forms
It is the subject and the object, its is both the determiner and the standalone possessive, and itself is the reflexive, with singular verbs: it is, it was, it has. Some people use it on its own; others use it alongside another set.
The line that matters
Used for a person who has not asked for it, it is dehumanising. It has a history as a way of saying a trans person is a thing rather than a person, and pronoun guides are blunt about it: Vassar College's LGBTQ Center calls it an offensive slur against trans and non-binary people unless someone specifically asks for it, and Pronouns.page reminds readers of its history of transphobic use.
Used for a person who has asked for it, it is simply their pronoun. UW-Milwaukee's LGBTQ+ Resource Center puts it this way: as long as you are not misgendering someone by using it, it is a valid pronoun. The only thing that separates the two is whether the person chose it.
Why some people choose it
The reasons belong to the people who give them, and they vary. Speaking to Yahoo Life in 2021, young people who use it/its described feeling neither feminine nor masculine and finding comfort in it, said it gave them more gender euphoria than any other set, or called it an honest expression of being without gender. Some described taking the word back from the people who used it against them, the way queer was taken back.
Some people only want it from people who understand the context. The Gender Census mentions respondents who are comfortable with it/its from other queer people and not from everyone. If someone tells you it is fine from you, that is permission for you, not a general announcement.
How common it is
22.8% of respondents to the 2025 Gender Census said they were happy to be called it, and the survey reports that share climbing steadily since around 2021. The respondents skew young and very online, so this shows it/its is a real and growing choice in that community, not how common it is anywhere else.
If it feels wrong to say
Plenty of people find it hard to say it about a person, precisely because they learned that it is an insult. That instinct is a good one aimed at the wrong target. Declining someone's own pronoun because it feels rude to you puts your discomfort ahead of what they asked for. Say it in ordinary sentences and the strangeness wears off.
Where it could be confused with an object in the same sentence, use the name. That is about clarity, not avoidance. And if you slip, fix it and move on: misgendering explains why.
Questions people ask
Is it offensive to use it/its for a person?
Only if they have not asked for it. For someone who uses it/its, it is their pronoun and using it is respectful. For anyone else it is dehumanising.
Why would someone use it/its pronouns?
Reasons vary: some feel it fits being without gender, some find it the most comfortable set, some are reclaiming a word used against them. Nobody owes you the reason.
Can I use it for someone if I don't know their pronouns?
No. Use their name, or ask. It is only right for people who have chosen it.
It feels rude to say. Do I still use it?
Yes. The harm is in using it for someone who did not choose it. For someone who did, avoiding it is the problem.