I've just noticed that (both in CAS and in in-game relationship profiles) non-familial relationships are gender-neutral (spouse, partner, engaged), however tags for parents, children and siblings etc are still gendered. An update should potentially be considered for further inclusivity.Based on how sex and gender currently works in the game, I assume it would be easier to totally overhaul the relationship names rather than add bits for non-binary sims, as currently it appears that textual references to Sims' gender identity is primarily controlled by the male/female toggle and then pronouns are overridden by whatever is selected in CAS.As suggested by @kaichen04, @batmansxrobin, these tags could link to pronoun usage instead (and then default per the male/female toggle if no pronouns are selected).English gender-neutral terms:I suggest:((great-)grand/step)mother/father = ((great-)grand/step)parent((great-)grand/step)son/daughter = ((great-)grand/step)child(step/half)brother/sister = (step/half)siblingI also suggest (less confidently):aunt/uncle = piblingniece/nephew = niblingParenthood EP also adds a couple more gendered relationship types: 'Mommy/Daddy Dearest', 'Mommy/Daddy's Girl/Boy', 'Plain Ol' Gran/Gramps', 'World's Best Grandma/pa'. I currently have no alternative suggestions myself as these are a bit more nuanced.(Note: I am a cisgender he/him man, please do not take my suggestions as gospel without further input from non-binary simmers).

Options are always good and I support this, but if some devs are reading this and thinking of doing the same as they did with the relationship lables: add gender neutral variety, but leave the old gendered ones there too. Please please don't take 'mother' away from me when you already took 'wife'. Please.

I can't understand how erasing people's gender can be inclusive. New nouns should be added, like pronouns were, so everyone can be represented, instead of entirely erasing people's genders.

People have fought a lifetime to be able to marry and call their significant other husband/wife. You can't erase all gendered word from the game and call it inclusive. I find extremely offesive to go backwards and have gay couples be denied being husbands and wives again. How even trans people would feel? To fight to be respectred as men and women, but to never be able to be represented as a wife/mother or a husband/ father? To have their gender they fought for erarssed? And how does that affect other languages? English is very gender-neutral. People in other languages are having to deal with very strange words. Fiancé / Fianceé became "Engagement Pair", which sounds terrible in portuguese. Husband ?wife had to become "cônjuge", a legal term you generally only see in technical language in divorce papers. I don't think erasure is the way when you can just add new words. The nouns can be paired with the pronouns (he/his: father. She/her: mother. They/them: parent. That would be inclusive.

@DonPaxis Or just give people free choice of their relationship label and be able to edit the family tree in cas

@kaichen04this is why I put @batmansxrobin 's suggestion from the other thread here. I can imagine it is probably easier to make the default terms gender-neutral and then gendered/alternative flavour can be customised/added back just like pronouns. This way nothing is erased.In life, people of any gender identity are addressed as parents/siblings/children in various contexts with no offence made, but if you don't fit within the gender binary, being referred to as a 'son/daughter'/'brother/sister' etc could be discomforting.I think an implementation similar to how pronouns work would be easier than, say, adding a non-binary gender alongside male and female in CAS.

Gender-neutral family relationship descriptors

14 Replies

1ozicgwcks44
Rising Newcomer
8 months ago
Today I was playing with CAS a little bit and made two sims that matter for this bug. One is transgender female with she/her pronouns selected. The other is her child who is nonbinary. The mother shows up as the child’s father and the child shows up as the mother’s daughter. This does not fit with either of their pronouns nor the inclusivity feature added to make it partner, sibling, and spouse. I don’t know if this was a bug or is intentional but it feels wrong.
PepperDee101
Rising Adventurer
7 months ago
I was just watching a livestreamer go through the Business and Hobbies pack, and she was looking at the household with old Jazz singer Cannonball, art collector Crispin, and the art collector's adopted kid Ollie. However, in CAS, the streamer hovered over Ollie, and it labelled them as Crispin's "son," which made the livestreamer have a freaudian slip and call Ollie Crispin's "son" and made her think they called them "son" in the lore box. So, yeah, it's pretty frustrating!
Sophaloaf2327
New Novice
3 months ago
I'm VERY late to this discussion, but I fully agree. Ideally, they would have baked a third gender option into the game at its foundation, but they didn't and as much as I wish they would now, I am pretty confident that they never will. That said, I do still think they might come around to making the gendered relationship names an option in the customization menu (which would be awesome).
As far as terminology goes, parent, child, and sibling are all great, but there is already a neutral term for aunt/uncle and it is ommer. And while I know a lot of people love the term neiphling, as an enby myself, it isn't my preferred term (neiph would be ideal for me).
Sophaloaf2327
New Novice
3 months ago
Just to add, I just noticed your section about Growing Together and would like to add some of my options (as a non-binary person myself):
Mommy/Daddy Dearest -> Nonny or Emmy Dearest
Mommy/Daddy's Girl/Boy -> Nonny/Emmy's Kiddo or Pal
Plain Ol' Gran/Gramps -> Plain Ol' Grump
World's Best Grandma/pa -> World's Best Grandy

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Gender-neutral family relationship descriptors

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