London North Eastern Railway (LNER) apologized to their non-binary passenger after the train manager greeted passengers with, "Good morning, ladies and gentleman."
During the ride, the non-binary passenger, Laurence Coles, complained on Twitter, saying:
"Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls…" As a non-binary person, this announcement doesn't actually apply to me, so I won't listen."
LNER soon replied, stating that their train managers "should not be using language like this."
LNER spokesperson added:
"We've been working very hard with educating our people on why gender-specific pronouns are not suitable in instances like these, and we're sorry to see this has not been applied here."
"It is entirely valid for someone who does not identify with the terms used to feel excluded and as a business we do not accept that anyone should feel excluded."
Coles' friend, who was with them, added:
"I was sat with Laurence when this tweet was sent. Both of us are non-binary, and we were both alarmed and uncomfortable by the lack of inclusion."
Many Twitter users agreed that this response from LNER was a step in the right direction.
Others were having none of it, accusing the LNER of "pandering to nonsense."
Twitter Debates Always End Badly
Many LNER customers were happy to see such a positive attitude towards the LGBTQ community. Despite the unfortunate event, the train manager will not be facing any penalties.
However, some other Twitter users accused LNER of supporting nonsense.
One wrote:
"Stop pandering to this nonsense. Your announcer said nothing wrong. Laurence's complaint is ridiculous. No one was excluded or discriminated against. Just do your job of running trains on time and leave the woke politics to someone else with nothing better to do."
Another expressed their opinion:
"@LNER, you should NOT be apologizing; your Train Manager did absolutely nothing wrong! Announcements like that have been made in trains since trains were invented. Don't bow down to this nonsense, and it just fuels the fire. Soon nobody will be able to say anything."
What do you think? Should we all grow thicker skin, or do we actually need to be more aware of other people's feelings?
