Kit (he/she/they/them/it) is the user’s constant companion. Wherever they choose to roam, Kit will accompany and guide them with clever, playful encouragement and support — giving the user the confidence to run free.
That's the one and only place that even remotely mentions it as far as I can tell. And it's not even a statement that it's NB or they/them... More like it's a fictional mascot call it what you want.
Mozilla uses "they're" to refer to Kit, but other than that there's no explicit statement at all.
Kit is a companion, not a commentator. They’re not here to deliver punchlines. Kit shows up as a small signal that Firefox is working for you, then steps back so you can keep moving.
which is from a notoriously “pro-conservative” twitter account, so safe is highly debatable given that the “conservative” label is often applied to provably false arguments
look i agree the x post is culture war shit, but mozilla does mention the gender of their mascot in their branding resources… but imo this is less of an explicit recognition about the mascot being non-binary and more a function of the mascot being able to be interpreted by humans however they like, and “it” being the term they seem to use simply to increase ambiguity and feelings of personal connection to the mascot for the most people
which is from a notoriously “pro-conservative” twitter account, so safe is highly debatable given that the “conservative” label is often applied to provably false arguments
that’s exactly it: in context, kit is a feature intended to be interpreted by the user; not a representation of a sentient character having made a conscious choice to be non-binary simply because of mozilla’s chosen pronouns and lack of gender expression
they do though via stating its pronouns - even including it, repeatedly referring to it even in their intro blog post as “they”
but that’s because it’s a feature to increase the feeling friendliness of the browser by establishing personal connection via the application of any (or non-) gender by the user no matter their preference rather than intended as a portrayal of a sentient character having made a decision for themselves
Exactly this. It feels like some kind of nonsense spam or troll.
If I was to take the bait, I might say it was to cover for their CEO making some anti gay marriage political contribution. But that was like 15 years ago, I don’t even know if he’s still CEO or if anyone even remembers.
To me, this feels more like a PR move than an awareness move. Kind of like: "We don't wanna do anything substantial so uuuuh let's just make our logo non-binary".
It's a terrible PR move if you don't say anything about it. They didn't say "Hey, look! Our mascot is non-binary!" All they did was use they/them pronouns.
but it’s not a PR move… their blog post lays out the reasoning: kit is intended to exist in the browser to make users feel good about using the browser. it’s a friendly “congratulations for interacting” and “we’re doing something for your benefit” (as an anthropomorphic representation of that behaviour) character, and a feature of it as an engineered feature is that the user can apply any gender they like. kit hasn’t made a choice to be non-binary; mozilla has made a choice to make kit specifically ambiguous both in aesthetic when drawn and pronouns when written about
Well, if I was creating a mascot, and I didn't want to think about their gender orientation... they/them pronouns are what I would use. Mozilla actually didn't announce the mascot's gender. People just saw they/them pronouns and made the inference from there.
Most people default to "this entity is male" without more context. I do it too, it's a bit of an issue I try to be aware of but regularly fail. Male is default, female is marked; that's why the stereotypical "girl" character in video games is just the "boy" character but with eye lashes and lips and maybe high heels. (And non-binary doesn't exist, obv /s)
So I can see this as making the non-genderedness explicit.
Edit: I don't have the spoons to elaborate on "male is default". Can someone else maybe jump in? Thx.
Its a fucking cartoon logo, I've never once thought about its gender identity or called it any gender for that matter. I click on it, and that's the extent of my interaction or consideration.
Most people default to “this entity is male” without more context.
I have a hard time wrapping my head about this sentence. I don't think about the gender of any entity without more context because it's usually completely irrelevant.
Male is default, female is marked
So, I didn't grow up in an english speaking country, but if I hear "the baker" I don't automatically assume it's a man. I think it's a person that bakes bread and pastry. The same with "the mechanic", "the engineer", etc. It's all - by default - a person.
Now, if we were to talk german, there is actually a difference. As "the baker", for example, we have "Bäcker" as Male and "Bäckerin" as female. The reason why male is "the default" in german is because it's shorter. That's it. If you say "Der Bäcker", it's as you'd say "the baker" in english, you don't automatically make an assumption about the gender. If you say "Die Bäckerin", you are referring to a female baker specifically.
So I can see this as making the non-genderedness explicit.
Honestly this feels more like a mockery of people that identify as non-binary than raising any kind of awareness. Kinda has some "apache combat helicopter" vibes.
They're not talking about language with the male-as-default, but rather for example this:
The depiction with less discerning features is what we assume to be male. If you want to express female, you have to add a dress or long hair or curves etc..
There's actual scientific research on this bias existing, although I don't know in what way this extends to animal depictions.
I grew up in a very male-as-default English-speaking culture. Any animal, robot, or plant would be referred to as it or he, unless that creature/thing has additional female markers such as wearing pink, makeup, etc.
For examples look at the designs of Mickey and Minnie Mouse or Babs and Buster Bunny. If you draw a little blob with eyes, people will say "He's/It's cute." If you put a pink bow on it, they will say "She's cute."
You can even look at the word "woman" itself. "Man" originally just meant any person, but "woman" was invented to speak specifically about a "wife-man." Going to your German examples, why did they make special words for female bakers, etc. and none for male bakers? It's because male is the default and female is a deviation from that norm. You don't need a special word to describe the default assumption.
There's this old riddle:
A father and son are in a car accident. The father dies at the scene, and the son is rushed to the hospital. When he is taken into the operating room, the surgeon says, "I can't operate on this boy! He's my son!" How is this possible?
Example in Czech:
Generic Fox (Liška) is a girl
Generic Wolf (Vlk) is a boy
Because our words themself have genders.
Fox: Liška (girl) Lišák (boy) but default if you don't knoe the sex of the animal is in this case the girl version.
This differs per language. And in german (if I'm not mistaken) fox is Der Fuchs, so boy.
I'm using boy/girl instead of male/female, because ... I don't know, that is how I think about it.
And in german (if I’m not mistaken) fox is Der Fuchs, so boy.
That's true, but the grammatical gender has nothing to do with the actual gender. Nobody thinks that all foxes are male, just as nobody thinks that spoons (Der Löffel) are male or the street (Die Straße) are female. They can also change depending on the amount. For example, if we take "Haus", which means house, we say "Das Haus" if we talk about a single house, which would be neutral, but refer to multiple houses as "Die Häuser", which would be female. Nobody thinks houses become female once there's more than one tho.
I don't disagree, my point was that atleast in my case, if Im not given the gendre of an animal, I fallback to the gramatical gender. At-least in czeck, since it requires me to chabge the shape of the word to express the "other" gender.
to be honest, 99% of people don't even think about gender at all without being prompted to. especially when it comes to mascots like the firefox logo. its a browser.
this seems like a PR move by mozilla and nothing more.
it’s not even that… kit doesn’t have a gender identity: kit expresses ambiguity in gender so that the user can decide for themselves no matter who the user is. kit is a feature; not a character having made a decision about their gender… and their non-gendered pronouns are simply part of that feature
By the way this is NOT a new Firefox logo. It's just the fox mascot drawing that may be used in other parts of the UI like the welcome screen after a new install, or on social media.
Actually the whole thing may be bullshit. Literally the only Mozilla reference I can find to Kit's pronouns is a statement given to like one or two blogs, and it says that any pronoun is acceptable.
Kit (he/she/they/them/it) is the user’s constant companion. Wherever they choose to roam, Kit will accompany and guide them with clever, playful encouragement and support — giving the user the confidence to run free.
All other references seem to be chuds on X claiming that it's explicitly they/them and acting like Mozilla is making a big deal about that. As if it matters either way.
If you had some kind of reaction to this post you've fallen for culture war bullshit propaganda, congratulations.
they do make explicit mention of non-gendered pronouns in their branding guidelines for kit. the intro blog post is an expression of those guidelines
but every announcement by mozilla makes it clear that kit isn’t about taking a stance on gender: it’s simply explicitly about not taking a stance on gender
Its to funny how whenever a Mozilla brand related thing happens its clarified that the firefox logo is not being changed. In no other context of a product receiving a new mascot would a clarification be needed that the logo is still the same.
Not on topic but sure do wonder why they silently pulled the Dino 2 years (I think?) prior and made the browser look boring. I guess it was apart of the master plan to shove a new mascot there and make media attention, + furry bait.
The dino represents Mozilla, not Firefox itself. And yes, for a while, Mozilla didn't have the dino in its official branding, but it's now back in there. The flag is a dino head. As per usual, significantly more drama was made about them "removing" the dino than it was worth.
but that was again not about removing the dino as much as as it was about differentiating mozilla from firefox by taking the mozilla identity from firefox because mozilla is more than firefox and behaves differently to firefox, and giving firefox its own identity which is more friendly
What if.... hear me out.... what if we remove the focus on gender altogether? What if we stop engendering things that don't have genders? Like logos... and behavioral attributes...
I mean, if you can provide data which shows that anthropomorphisation - specifically the unwarranted attribution of gender to things which are genderless - is on the rise and can demonstrate, or even articulate what the real-world harm of this is, then maybe I will agree that ranting about it in response to a tweet from an anti-woke twitter user lying about it in order to stir up tired “culture war” arguments isn’t silly
Perhaps we should also rant about the erosion of male-dominated spaces into spaces which are “lame and gay”, given that there are now women who play Warhammer?
Why would I have an issue with women playing warhammer?
I'm explicitly saying that I think assigning things like warhammer (a genderless concept) as being for either men or women is stupid.
The issue I have is everything being put into one of two categories that are essentially irrelevant.
Gender is far less relevant than people make it; its emphasis is a long standing sociological trend that I hope can die as people feel more accepted and secure.
Again, the question is can you demonstrate that this is actually something that is increasing?
The relevance of the second tweet is that it’s from the same person. They’re trying to get an angry reaction from people to help fuel culture war bullshit. And you provided exactly the reaction they were after
There ** was** no “focus on gender”. They just pretended there was so that people like you would amplify the signal. You fell for it without first stopping to check whether or not it was true
It's a mascot, not a logo. So it having a gender isn't strange.
Also, since its pronouns are (quoting the announcement blog post) "he/him, they/them, she/her, and it" that is very open and not rather post-gender, in my opinion. The focus in the announcement is not on thee mascot's gender in fact.
in both the intro blog post and the branding guidelines mozilla does bring up the new (complimentary; not replacement) mascots pronouns as explicitly non-binary
Firefox is another name for the red panda, but the Firefox browser has always used foxes as logo/mascots. Before that it was called Phoenix, maybe that's why they decided to just use another fire-related animal name without thinking about it too much.
That’s actually a pretty complex question. Are they even capable of conceptualizing their own internal model of themselves as it compares to their species’ gender norms?
Since they’re not social species, I’d be very surprised if they could.
likely yes. species in general are able to conceptualise gender because it’s necessary for procreation (keep reading; i promise this ends in a view that’s pro-trans but stronger because it’s harder to debate against)
homosexual behaviour in animals among complex species line anthropoids is at minimum of ~10%, so even accounting for preference imo it’s pretty clear mammals are able to conceptualise gender, since gender is about roles specifically rather than sex and this 10% number is about exclusively homosexual sheep (apparently the number is 25% among black swans where the number includes homosexual pairing/parenting/etc instead of just sexual relationships)
anyway, point being even among the most limited term animals tend to be able conceptualise gender
but that’s not at all what the character of a mascot is about: a mascot is inherently an anthropic projection of human behaviour onto an animal (thus basically why furries exist and are pretty closely associated with mascots)
imo firefox mascot can “somewhat legitimately” (and even perhaps “not uncharitably” - just ignorant maybe) be viewed either as less than 10% of animals displaying “transgender” behavour (ie the numbers displaying gendered behaviours that don’t match their sex - ignoring the concept of gender) and thus 10% of firefox mascots should be non-binary (yes i’m mixing those terms because remember this is the charitable but ignorant interpretation) and firefox doesn’t yet have 9 gendered mascots… or it can be viewed as 90% of mascots generally being gendered and thus a specifically non-gendered mascot in the “corpus of mascots” is warranted… but then it could be argued that actually the majority of mascots are non-gendered: perhaps not specifically, but implicitly simply because humans have grown to dislike misogyny and prefer female representation
i’m saying this not because i necessarily agree with the reaction, but because it’s important to understand the alternative viewpoint regardless of agreement in concept. it’s at the very least more complex than the simple argument acknowledges
imo representation is important, as we’ve pretty unambiguously agreed with female representation and even homosexual representation more broadly since about the 90s
Quantum computing yes, with qubits. But also tenery computing with trits, and probabilistic computing with p-bits. Analog computers probably fit in this category too.
Probabilistic computing will probably become big before quantum computers, because it's a natural fit for probabilistic LLMs. Lots of work being done in this hardware field with photonics, neuromorphic and thermodynamic chips.
At this point, if you're paying for extra engagement on Twitter, that is beyond "benefit of the doubt." It seems safe to assume its some kind of attention farm.
Eh at this point I'm just sick and fucking tired watching sexuality become nothing but marketing bait. People's sexuality and gender are becoming nothing but a two cent market gimmick and it's fucking insulting.
This isn't cool representation! It's hey lgbtq people your stupid and fucking easy. Look we can use the right words. Trust us and buy our shit.
It's just the fucking corporatization of rainbows in June all over again.
watching sexuality become nothing but marketing bait.
This is what I figured what would happen once people started pushing for more explicit sexuality acceptance. This is the bed they made.
Trust us and buy our shit.
This is also due to people inside said corporations pushing for this shit due to ideological reasons.
*some LGBT:* Give us the positive attention and validation that we crave!
*Large Corporations, seeing opportunities:* OK
*some LGBT:* No, not like that!
It's not just corporations. It's influencer-grifters like Pirat_Nation.
...And, to be blunt, reposters who further spread the ragebait, like OP.
The platforms, ultimately, are what facilitate "marketing bait." But I dunno what to do about that, as human being simply cannot help themselves once they see stuff like that. It works, apparently.
It's a fucking fox, why does it need to have a specific gender? It was genderless by default they don't need to announce it one way or another, other than to pander to people.
we don’t care about the kits genders but mozilla cares about it being ambiguous because kit is a character meant to increase feelings of personal connection with the user by being able to be interpreted however the user likes (female, male, or non-binary)
I found this quote supposedly attributed to Mozilla, as far as I can tell this is the whole issue, everything else is chuds on X running with it.
Kit (he/she/they/them/it) is the user’s constant companion. Wherever they choose to roam, Kit will accompany and guide them with clever, playful encouragement and support — giving the user the confidence to run free.
whilst it is legitimate, it misrepresents the purpose of both kit and branding guidelines: kit is a feature meant to invoke feelings; not a character having made a decision about its gender
Oh ffs we’re calling the word “manual” a micro aggression now?
sorry, did my comment trigger you? 🙄
nobody called anything a microaggression or said anything about the non-abbreviated word manual; jokes based on UNIX's abbreviation of it being homonymous with the common noun man have existed since the man command was created.
Look at all those distractions about nothing and lies. Everyone knows the real reason any mascot is ever made sexless or gender neutral is to save on materials, so merchandising is cheaper.
Edit: this post is literally not true Mozilla didn’t say any of this it’s just a hoax.
So they just laid off a bunch of developers from lack of funding but they have budget for this? When the fucking logo didn’t have a gender to begin with because it’s a fucking logo? Did their AI tell them this was a good idea.
the old logo still exists. this is a new mascot intended to increase user connection to the browser by providing a friendly anthropomorphised front for actions taken by the firefox team, browser, and congratulating users on taking actions. in furtherance of this idea, kit is represented by ambiguous pronouns when written about in order to avoid unnecessary gendering, and allow the user to imply their own gender as they like
imo even in socialist societies brands need some protection because it’s possible to have higher quality or “differently moral” products still where people can choose the cost trade-offs of the products they use which means one product shouldn’t be able to use the investment/differentiation of another product in brand (and to a point ux research as this disincentivises usability and feeling over brochureware and copying investment in non-tangibles) to pretend to be the different product
mozilla can be legitimately pro-foss-software in its mission and not include pro-foss-everything in furtherance of that single goal
heck even marketing - to a point - is necessary to foss software… linux probably wouldn’t have taken off without the investments of microsoft and apple in making consumer hardware both usable (relative to early computers) and marketable
Does Firefox welcome input from non-binary and LGBTQ+ folks? Are they part of the Mozilla Board of Directors? If they truly believe in inclusion, it seems it would be pretty easy to prove it rather than a cheap, meaningless stunt like this...
What's the stunt? All they did was use they/them pronouns when talking about their mascot. People made the inference from there and ran with it, and y'all are too lazy to do a web search and read the announcement.
I'm 90% sure they only did this as a ploy, like, "Our mascot is a non-binary fox! We're inclusive!" when it's just them trying to get more people to use their platform
it even: the original source of the non-binary claim is an anti-woke blog post about them removing the old mascot and replacing it with a non-binary mascot, when in fact mozilla had a logo rather than full expression of a mascot, and now they’re a fully formed branding representation of the firefox which includes non-gendered pronouns (as a feature of the characters function; not as an explicit choice about gender representation)
The gender orientation of the firefox logo is something I haven't thought about ever.
What's the point of this?
The point is that you've fallen for some idiots on X making up culture war bullshit.
Kit's supposed pronouns aren't mentioned by Mozilla anywhere in any Mozilla announcements.
One news site attributes this quote to Mozilla
That's the one and only place that even remotely mentions it as far as I can tell. And it's not even a statement that it's NB or they/them... More like it's a fictional mascot call it what you want.
Mozilla uses "they're" to refer to Kit, but other than that there's no explicit statement at all.
I used "they" etc. when I don't know the gender of the person I'm talking about. I feel like that's the safest assumption.
which is from a notoriously “pro-conservative” twitter account, so safe is highly debatable given that the “conservative” label is often applied to provably false argumentsreplied to the wrong comment
U good b
Jesus, it's Clippy all over again.
look i agree the x post is culture war shit, but mozilla does mention the gender of their mascot in their branding resources… but imo this is less of an explicit recognition about the mascot being non-binary and more a function of the mascot being able to be interpreted by humans however they like, and “it” being the term they seem to use simply to increase ambiguity and feelings of personal connection to the mascot for the most people
I think it's more a statement that it's not gendered
I just read the screenshot lol
which is from a notoriously “pro-conservative” twitter account, so safe is highly debatable given that the “conservative” label is often applied to provably false arguments
True, it was just "a fox" for me so far. I didn't really care about the gender of a drawing. I guess it is a good awareness move though
Feels like a publicity stunt more than a genuine attempt to include non-binary people.
It isn't, though. They never said that the mascot was non-binary.
Awww bummer. I was excited for the NB fox.
The fox is schrodinger's gender so... they/them until proven guilty?
that’s exactly it: in context, kit is a feature intended to be interpreted by the user; not a representation of a sentient character having made a conscious choice to be non-binary simply because of mozilla’s chosen pronouns and lack of gender expression
they do though via stating its pronouns - even including it, repeatedly referring to it even in their intro blog post as “they”
but that’s because it’s a feature to increase the feeling friendliness of the browser by establishing personal connection via the application of any (or non-) gender by the user no matter their preference rather than intended as a portrayal of a sentient character having made a decision for themselves
Exactly this. It feels like some kind of nonsense spam or troll.
If I was to take the bait, I might say it was to cover for their CEO making some anti gay marriage political contribution. But that was like 15 years ago, I don’t even know if he’s still CEO or if anyone even remembers.
To me, this feels more like a PR move than an awareness move. Kind of like: "We don't wanna do anything substantial so uuuuh let's just make our logo non-binary".
It's a terrible PR move if you don't say anything about it. They didn't say "Hey, look! Our mascot is non-binary!" All they did was use they/them pronouns.
but it’s not a PR move… their blog post lays out the reasoning: kit is intended to exist in the browser to make users feel good about using the browser. it’s a friendly “congratulations for interacting” and “we’re doing something for your benefit” (as an anthropomorphic representation of that behaviour) character, and a feature of it as an engineered feature is that the user can apply any gender they like. kit hasn’t made a choice to be non-binary; mozilla has made a choice to make kit specifically ambiguous both in aesthetic when drawn and pronouns when written about
It's a s***** awareness move. It's just a marketing ploy.
It's a distraction from the real important issue, which is...
...what does the fox say? /j
Wha-pa-pa-pa-pa-pa-pow?!
Ring-di-ding-di-ding-di-ding?
Well, if I was creating a mascot, and I didn't want to think about their gender orientation... they/them pronouns are what I would use. Mozilla actually didn't announce the mascot's gender. People just saw they/them pronouns and made the inference from there.
Most people default to "this entity is male" without more context. I do it too, it's a bit of an issue I try to be aware of but regularly fail. Male is default, female is marked; that's why the stereotypical "girl" character in video games is just the "boy" character but with eye lashes and lips and maybe high heels. (And non-binary doesn't exist, obv /s)
So I can see this as making the non-genderedness explicit.
Edit: I don't have the spoons to elaborate on "male is default". Can someone else maybe jump in? Thx.
Its a fucking cartoon logo, I've never once thought about its gender identity or called it any gender for that matter. I click on it, and that's the extent of my interaction or consideration.
Yes, cool. It's awareness.
I have a hard time wrapping my head about this sentence. I don't think about the gender of any entity without more context because it's usually completely irrelevant.
So, I didn't grow up in an english speaking country, but if I hear "the baker" I don't automatically assume it's a man. I think it's a person that bakes bread and pastry. The same with "the mechanic", "the engineer", etc. It's all - by default - a person.
Now, if we were to talk german, there is actually a difference. As "the baker", for example, we have "Bäcker" as Male and "Bäckerin" as female. The reason why male is "the default" in german is because it's shorter. That's it. If you say "Der Bäcker", it's as you'd say "the baker" in english, you don't automatically make an assumption about the gender. If you say "Die Bäckerin", you are referring to a female baker specifically.
Honestly this feels more like a mockery of people that identify as non-binary than raising any kind of awareness. Kinda has some "apache combat helicopter" vibes.
They're not talking about language with the male-as-default, but rather for example this:
The depiction with less discerning features is what we assume to be male. If you want to express female, you have to add a dress or long hair or curves etc..
There's actual scientific research on this bias existing, although I don't know in what way this extends to animal depictions.
I grew up in a very male-as-default English-speaking culture. Any animal, robot, or plant would be referred to as it or he, unless that creature/thing has additional female markers such as wearing pink, makeup, etc.
For examples look at the designs of Mickey and Minnie Mouse or Babs and Buster Bunny. If you draw a little blob with eyes, people will say "He's/It's cute." If you put a pink bow on it, they will say "She's cute."
You can even look at the word "woman" itself. "Man" originally just meant any person, but "woman" was invented to speak specifically about a "wife-man." Going to your German examples, why did they make special words for female bakers, etc. and none for male bakers? It's because male is the default and female is a deviation from that norm. You don't need a special word to describe the default assumption.
There's this old riddle:
It plays on one's assumptions about gender.
If not binary then how made of 1s and 0s?
Have you ever seen 1s and 0s out in the real world, outside your smarty-pants books? Thought so. Maths don't real, checkmate atheist.
That highly depends on the language.
Example in Czech: Generic Fox (Liška) is a girl Generic Wolf (Vlk) is a boy
Because our words themself have genders. Fox: Liška (girl) Lišák (boy) but default if you don't knoe the sex of the animal is in this case the girl version.
This differs per language. And in german (if I'm not mistaken) fox is Der Fuchs, so boy.
I'm using boy/girl instead of male/female, because ... I don't know, that is how I think about it.
That's true, but the grammatical gender has nothing to do with the actual gender. Nobody thinks that all foxes are male, just as nobody thinks that spoons (Der Löffel) are male or the street (Die Straße) are female. They can also change depending on the amount. For example, if we take "Haus", which means house, we say "Das Haus" if we talk about a single house, which would be neutral, but refer to multiple houses as "Die Häuser", which would be female. Nobody thinks houses become female once there's more than one tho.
I don't disagree, my point was that atleast in my case, if Im not given the gendre of an animal, I fallback to the gramatical gender. At-least in czeck, since it requires me to chabge the shape of the word to express the "other" gender.
to be honest, 99% of people don't even think about gender at all without being prompted to. especially when it comes to mascots like the firefox logo. its a browser.
this seems like a PR move by mozilla and nothing more.
What’s more is the non binary fox somehow seems more binary.
The point is corporations have realizing lgbtq people are fucking just as retarded and easy to manipulate as everyone else
You say they/them and sell shit to a new demographic. It's the same shit as all the rainbow fucking crap in June.
There's no actual representation happening here. It's all just shallow bullshit to sell you shit and manipulate you.
Edit: this post is literally not true Mozilla didn’t say any of this it’s just a hoax.
Somebody at the Mozilla foundation justifying their pointless job.
There's no point. It's just some dumb manager fixated over gender identity spreading their ideology
it’s not even that… kit doesn’t have a gender identity: kit expresses ambiguity in gender so that the user can decide for themselves no matter who the user is. kit is a feature; not a character having made a decision about their gender… and their non-gendered pronouns are simply part of that feature
By the way this is NOT a new Firefox logo. It's just the fox mascot drawing that may be used in other parts of the UI like the welcome screen after a new install, or on social media.
The actual logo remains unchanged.
On top of that nowhere in the announcement are the supposed pronouns mentioned: https://blog.mozilla.org/en/firefox/meet-kit/
Actually the whole thing may be bullshit. Literally the only Mozilla reference I can find to Kit's pronouns is a statement given to like one or two blogs, and it says that any pronoun is acceptable.
That's attributed to Mozilla here: https://www.neowin.net/news/firefox-has-killed-its-old-mascot-heres-what-the-new-cute-one-looks-like/
All other references seem to be chuds on X claiming that it's explicitly they/them and acting like Mozilla is making a big deal about that. As if it matters either way.
If you had some kind of reaction to this post you've fallen for culture war bullshit propaganda, congratulations.
Solid sleuthing there. Edited the post to include your context.
they do make explicit mention of non-gendered pronouns in their branding guidelines for kit. the intro blog post is an expression of those guidelines
but every announcement by mozilla makes it clear that kit isn’t about taking a stance on gender: it’s simply explicitly about not taking a stance on gender
Its to funny how whenever a Mozilla brand related thing happens its clarified that the firefox logo is not being changed. In no other context of a product receiving a new mascot would a clarification be needed that the logo is still the same.
Not on topic but sure do wonder why they silently pulled the Dino 2 years (I think?) prior and made the browser look boring. I guess it was apart of the master plan to shove a new mascot there and make media attention, + furry bait.
The dino represents Mozilla, not Firefox itself. And yes, for a while, Mozilla didn't have the dino in its official branding, but it's now back in there. The flag is a dino head. As per usual, significantly more drama was made about them "removing" the dino than it was worth.
I meant that there was a different dino on the error pages in Firefox.
but that was again not about removing the dino as much as as it was about differentiating mozilla from firefox by taking the mozilla identity from firefox because mozilla is more than firefox and behaves differently to firefox, and giving firefox its own identity which is more friendly
Firefox is now exclusive to ternary computers.
No, Mozilla has seen the future of computing. (CS/CE/IT, don't watch if you don't want to be frustrated.)
What if.... hear me out.... what if we remove the focus on gender altogether? What if we stop engendering things that don't have genders? Like logos... and behavioral attributes...
Since Mozilla actually didn’t and the post is based on a lie, I’ll say congratulations, your reaction is almost certainly what they were hoping for
You don't think people childishly over-anthropomorphize a lot these days? Cause I do, and that's what my comment was about.
[relevant smbc]
I mean, if you can provide data which shows that anthropomorphisation - specifically the unwarranted attribution of gender to things which are genderless - is on the rise and can demonstrate, or even articulate what the real-world harm of this is, then maybe I will agree that ranting about it in response to a tweet from an anti-woke twitter user lying about it in order to stir up tired “culture war” arguments isn’t silly
Perhaps we should also rant about the erosion of male-dominated spaces into spaces which are “lame and gay”, given that there are now women who play Warhammer?
Why would I have an issue with women playing warhammer?
I'm explicitly saying that I think assigning things like warhammer (a genderless concept) as being for either men or women is stupid.
The issue I have is everything being put into one of two categories that are essentially irrelevant.
Gender is far less relevant than people make it; its emphasis is a long standing sociological trend that I hope can die as people feel more accepted and secure.
Again, the question is can you demonstrate that this is actually something that is increasing?
The relevance of the second tweet is that it’s from the same person. They’re trying to get an angry reaction from people to help fuel culture war bullshit. And you provided exactly the reaction they were after
There ** was** no “focus on gender”. They just pretended there was so that people like you would amplify the signal. You fell for it without first stopping to check whether or not it was true
I understand. I'm not trying to win an argument or write a thesis.
It's a mascot, not a logo. So it having a gender isn't strange.
Also, since its pronouns are (quoting the announcement blog post) "he/him, they/them, she/her, and it" that is very open and not rather post-gender, in my opinion. The focus in the announcement is not on thee mascot's gender in fact.
Any and all other identities as well. It’s a never ending ad nauseam non evidence based, non measurable and inconclusive debate.
Like we're in The Beasts' castle. Sometimes a candleholder is just a candleholder.
Just don't go as extreme as trying to de-gender languages, like Spanish, which is a gendered language (as are several others):
There is no latinx, only latina and latino. Whoever uses latinx unironically can fuck right off, for being an ignorance cringelord.
Waterfox needs to catch up with a gender-fluid fox
Wait, there is a Waterfox? Is there also an Earth and Air fox? Then we could have an AvatarFox!
Librewolf also needs to come up with something.
@green_copper @ShinkanTrain @cannedtuna Librewolf needs to cut to the chase and adopt a furry mascot.
2Fast2Furry
Gender-free wolf
I'll switch to whatever browser that has a postgender mascot
As someone who has both LibreWolf and Amarok pinned to the taskbar, I can definitely say the icon similarity is confusing.
Waterfox used to have a fox in the logo but Mozilla didn't like that so waterfox removed the fox after many threats from Mozilla
Isn't the old mascot/logo completely non-gendered already?
There was nothing like that with the old fox-that-is-on-fire, so I guess mozilla is making a statement by pointing it out.
Except there's basically nowhere that Mozilla actually does. The post is misinformation
in both the intro blog post and the branding guidelines mozilla does bring up the new (complimentary; not replacement) mascots pronouns as explicitly non-binary
I kinda wish that they had pointed it out, but they didn't.
Except it's not pointing it out, OP is
That's stupid, it was genderless before until they brought it up.
Mozilla didn't bring it up. The story is made up by right-wing trolls.
The old one was also non-binary. Prove me wrong.
(Honestly, I just don't care. Load the web page and render some JavaScript already)
Just search for "Firefox Chan". And maybe keep on SafeSearch too...
No, I don't think I will
If you've found a non-binary one then I'd love to see what you're running it on.
Old Russian trinary hardware? That would be quite an achievement!
Malbolge
Or analog computing with opamps
It's a fox. I like the fox.
Its actually a red panda iirc
Firefox is another name for the red panda, but the Firefox browser has always used foxes as logo/mascots. Before that it was called Phoenix, maybe that's why they decided to just use another fire-related animal name without thinking about it too much.
the firefox is explicitly (in the case of mozilla firefox) neither fox nor red panda
https://brand.mozilla.com/d/5UkPdpbtt8LS/visual-elements#/-/mascot-1
Maybe it’s meant to run on the old Soviet Setun platform.
Are telling me they fired the previous mascot to hire a gender minority? Smh
I never knew or thought about the old one's gender.
Has anyone even thought about the gender of the original?
Everyone knows the original was a hetro white male.
Why would you even bother?
It's a fucking red panda.
Do they not have genders?
That’s actually a pretty complex question. Are they even capable of conceptualizing their own internal model of themselves as it compares to their species’ gender norms?
Since they’re not social species, I’d be very surprised if they could.
likely yes. species in general are able to conceptualise gender because it’s necessary for procreation (keep reading; i promise this ends in a view that’s pro-trans but stronger because it’s harder to debate against)
homosexual behaviour in animals among complex species line anthropoids is at minimum of ~10%, so even accounting for preference imo it’s pretty clear mammals are able to conceptualise gender, since gender is about roles specifically rather than sex and this 10% number is about exclusively homosexual sheep (apparently the number is 25% among black swans where the number includes homosexual pairing/parenting/etc instead of just sexual relationships)
anyway, point being even among the most limited term animals tend to be able conceptualise gender
but that’s not at all what the character of a mascot is about: a mascot is inherently an anthropic projection of human behaviour onto an animal (thus basically why furries exist and are pretty closely associated with mascots)
imo firefox mascot can “somewhat legitimately” (and even perhaps “not uncharitably” - just ignorant maybe) be viewed either as less than 10% of animals displaying “transgender” behavour (ie the numbers displaying gendered behaviours that don’t match their sex - ignoring the concept of gender) and thus 10% of firefox mascots should be non-binary (yes i’m mixing those terms because remember this is the charitable but ignorant interpretation) and firefox doesn’t yet have 9 gendered mascots… or it can be viewed as 90% of mascots generally being gendered and thus a specifically non-gendered mascot in the “corpus of mascots” is warranted… but then it could be argued that actually the majority of mascots are non-gendered: perhaps not specifically, but implicitly simply because humans have grown to dislike misogyny and prefer female representation
i’m saying this not because i necessarily agree with the reaction, but because it’s important to understand the alternative viewpoint regardless of agreement in concept. it’s at the very least more complex than the simple argument acknowledges
imo representation is important, as we’ve pretty unambiguously agreed with female representation and even homosexual representation more broadly since about the 90s
Non-binary PC is just a quantum computer innit?
No, ternary exists. We could have built computers with triodes.
I feel that you're stringing us along with that theory.
There's also analog computers: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analog_computer
Alas, they got largely displaced by digital computers...
Quantum computing yes, with qubits. But also tenery computing with trits, and probabilistic computing with p-bits. Analog computers probably fit in this category too.
Probabilistic computing will probably become big before quantum computers, because it's a natural fit for probabilistic LLMs. Lots of work being done in this hardware field with photonics, neuromorphic and thermodynamic chips.
It uses qubits sorry. Get a quantum computer loser
I have a friend IRL called Kit, who also happens to use they/them pronouns.
At risk of being abrasive...
I see blue checkmarks, I downvote. Nothing personal. But I don't want to support that even indirectly.
Good instinct. Pirat_Nation is a grifter/ragebaiting account. No one should be giving him visibility.
I mean, yeah... It's a blue checkmark account.
At this point, if you're paying for extra engagement on Twitter, that is beyond "benefit of the doubt." It seems safe to assume its some kind of attention farm.
Eh at this point I'm just sick and fucking tired watching sexuality become nothing but marketing bait. People's sexuality and gender are becoming nothing but a two cent market gimmick and it's fucking insulting.
This isn't cool representation! It's hey lgbtq people your stupid and fucking easy. Look we can use the right words. Trust us and buy our shit.
It's just the fucking corporatization of rainbows in June all over again.
This is what I figured what would happen once people started pushing for more explicit sexuality acceptance. This is the bed they made.
This is also due to people inside said corporations pushing for this shit due to ideological reasons.
*some LGBT:* Give us the positive attention and validation that we crave! *Large Corporations, seeing opportunities:* OK *some LGBT:* No, not like that!
Again, welcome to their bed.
It's not just corporations. It's influencer-grifters like Pirat_Nation.
...And, to be blunt, reposters who further spread the ragebait, like OP.
The platforms, ultimately, are what facilitate "marketing bait." But I dunno what to do about that, as human being simply cannot help themselves once they see stuff like that. It works, apparently.
"Becoming" as though "sex sells" hasn't been a thing for literally as long as we've had the concept of commerce…
Yeah agree
It's a fucking fox, why does it need to have a specific gender? It was genderless by default they don't need to announce it one way or another, other than to pander to people.
Because it was what before? Why do we care about the gender identity of the fox mascot of a web browser?
Don’t answer, please
This story is made up by right-wing trolls.
we don’t care about the kits genders but mozilla cares about it being ambiguous because kit is a character meant to increase feelings of personal connection with the user by being able to be interpreted however the user likes (female, male, or non-binary)
The joke is that computers use binary.
Thanks captain obvious
Distraction from being a shit corporation.
It's not just a binary. It's a BLOB!
Don’t tell the furries
all logos require genders
Clippy would be a metallic furry: everyone hates it.
Okay, I know that this is supposed to be a riff, but that non-binary line is fucking hilarious.
You could write the whole browser in some kind of interpreted script?
the four genders are 00, 01, 10, and 11.
That's not even a full byte! Surely we can spare 6 more bits and support 255 genders.
Is 00 not a gender?
gotta account for people who say "no" to "gender?"
I think it should.
i guess were getting into the philisophical question of "is 'no gender' a gender?"
Everything is a gender if you are brave about it.
That would make for an awfully complex gender reveal party supply chain.
(/s)
Kit looks more she/her than the OG icon.
Hmm.. ..the silliness continues.
NBs don't have to be androgynous.
I didn't ascribe a he/him/her/she/them/they to an icon.
It was just that... it.. ..and it is fine.
The rest just strikes me as so much marketing.
does this mean nonbinary
peoplefoxes/red pandas have fire bending?Where do y'all take info on pronouns?
Haven't seen anything in the official announcement: https://blog.mozilla.org/en/firefox/meet-kit/
Okay, don't search for the word "binary". Search for the word "they".
Yes, really.
That's all it took for people like this guy to freak out over wokeness gone amok and Mozilla is coming for your children.
Ah so it's just more culture war bullshit from perpetually outraged rightoids and grifters. Nothing new then.
Yeah I noticed that too.
I found this quote supposedly attributed to Mozilla, as far as I can tell this is the whole issue, everything else is chuds on X running with it.
https://www.neowin.net/news/firefox-has-killed-its-old-mascot-heres-what-the-new-cute-one-looks-like/
that line is from the branding guidelines for kit
whilst it is legitimate, it misrepresents the purpose of both kit and branding guidelines: kit is a feature meant to invoke feelings; not a character having made a decision about its gender
nb(short for nota bene) would actually be a good name for a modern replacement for themancommand 😂This would make life harder for me since I have this installed on my system.
Oh ffs we’re calling the word “manual” a micro aggression now?
sorry, did my comment trigger you? 🙄
nobody called anything a microaggression or said anything about the non-abbreviated word manual; jokes based on UNIX's abbreviation of it being homonymous with the common noun man have existed since the
mancommand was created.Interpreter based firefox script?
A nuclear bomb just hir the furry community
It's ternary computing time.
I mean the source is mostly ascii anyway.
fuzzy foxy
Look at all those distractions about nothing and lies. Everyone knows the real reason any mascot is ever made sexless or gender neutral is to save on materials, so merchandising is cheaper.
The blue dye was getting expensive.
This was an unnecessary addition to the culture war.
Apparently, it's right-wing trolls who made up this non-binary thing. So, you are correct, but it came from the other side of the culture war.
Hate to break it to you, but it’s literally in the name already
Iso-linear.
What if the answer is JavaScript?
LMAO
Edit: this post is literally not true Mozilla didn’t say any of this it’s just a hoax.
So they just laid off a bunch of developers from lack of funding but they have budget for this? When the fucking logo didn’t have a gender to begin with because it’s a fucking logo? Did their AI tell them this was a good idea.
the old logo still exists. this is a new mascot intended to increase user connection to the browser by providing a friendly anthropomorphised front for actions taken by the firefox team, browser, and congratulating users on taking actions. in furtherance of this idea, kit is represented by ambiguous pronouns when written about in order to avoid unnecessary gendering, and allow the user to imply their own gender as they like
My phone would simply give up and restart at this point 😂
Such wildly fake outrage.
The real outrage should be that we care what the pronouns of any corporate mascot are.
They aren't real. They aren't able to feel. Corporations are not people.
"It" until you are open source and then we talk.
Same goes for Ronald McDonald.
imo even in socialist societies brands need some protection because it’s possible to have higher quality or “differently moral” products still where people can choose the cost trade-offs of the products they use which means one product shouldn’t be able to use the investment/differentiation of another product in brand (and to a point ux research as this disincentivises usability and feeling over brochureware and copying investment in non-tangibles) to pretend to be the different product
mozilla can be legitimately pro-foss-software in its mission and not include pro-foss-everything in furtherance of that single goal
even then though mozilla provides downloads of their kit assets
heck even marketing - to a point - is necessary to foss software… linux probably wouldn’t have taken off without the investments of microsoft and apple in making consumer hardware both usable (relative to early computers) and marketable
Clearly it must be made from ascii art and just zoomed way back.
Does Firefox welcome input from non-binary and LGBTQ+ folks? Are they part of the Mozilla Board of Directors? If they truly believe in inclusion, it seems it would be pretty easy to prove it rather than a cheap, meaningless stunt like this...
What's the stunt? All they did was use they/them pronouns when talking about their mascot. People made the inference from there and ran with it, and y'all are too lazy to do a web search and read the announcement.
I'm 90% sure they only did this as a ploy, like, "Our mascot is a non-binary fox! We're inclusive!" when it's just them trying to get more people to use their platform
it even: the original source of the non-binary claim is an anti-woke blog post about them removing the old mascot and replacing it with a non-binary mascot, when in fact mozilla had a logo rather than full expression of a mascot, and now they’re a fully formed branding representation of the firefox which includes non-gendered pronouns (as a feature of the characters function; not as an explicit choice about gender representation)
Dragonfucker with shitty takes is on the lose again!
Being woke, and awareness, should be the default of any feeling human being.
Fucking fedditors and reading comprehension, someone tell this g*rman that this is a channer not dragonrider dingus
ah yes, because going woke makes one broke and dumb. Being fueled by right wing hatred makes you dumb and broke.
no 4chan is, like unironically. stop going there
I was on 4chan from age 12 to 25 and I never ended up a bigot
so the rot hadn't taken yet. Or you were able to detox?
Jesus Christ
I'm sure the epstein op is our best bet for humanity lmfao
I don't know what battle was fought here, but it must have been a good one
An epstein glazing terf kept screeching about wokeness