Dozens of Halifax customers are closing their accounts with the bank after a staff member told them to leave if they didn’t like their latest pronoun policy.
The bank revealed on Twitter earlier this week that it would permit staff to display their pronouns on their name badges.
In a post that read ‘pronouns matter’ and the hashtag ‘ItsAPeopleThing’, it showed a photograph of a female staff member’s name badge which featured ‘she/her/her’s’ in brackets, but more than 150 social media users have since said they’re boycotting the former building society after being lectured about inclusivity.
Some have even cut up their credit cards while others are lodging complaints about Halifax’s social media manager who, when customers accused the bank of ‘virtue signalling’, told them that if they disagreed with their values they were welcome to close their accounts.
One user said that they just closed their Halifax account after 19 years with them and that they could stick their pronouns where the sun doesn’t shine.
Another said that he and his wife have followed the same advice, partly due to Halifax’s recent virtue signalling but mainly because of their willingness to lose customers.
He said that his mortgage had been transferred, credit cards had been revoked, deposit account closed and that he’d been with them since the 1990s.
Speaking, PR expert Martin Townsend said Halifax’s policy was a ‘Ratner moment’ and ‘astonishing.’
It was a reference to Gerald Ratner, who infamously caused the value of the jewellery firm he was chief executive of to dive after branding some of its products ‘total rubbish’ in a speech.
A customer Caroline Ffiske, a former Conservative councillor, said that it was quite rude for Halifax to say to customers if you don’t like it go away and that it was astonishing to have a bank acting like a trans activist.
Halifax said its pronoun move was designed to evade accidental misgendering.
By last night close to 10,000 people had protested on social media, and one woman said she’d closed her Halifax credit card account over the crazy policy.
‘I don’t want to be having conversations about gender when I go into my bank,’ said the 50-year-old psychologist from London. ‘Frankly, I’d rather they be focused on lowering interest rates.’
Another woman said she’d moved her saving account to Nat West, adding that she wanted to do her banking and not have a ridiculous, often deeply misogynistic belief forced on her.
Numerous people have closed their accounts down with Halifax and have said that people need to be speaking out and taking a stance. However, in this day and age, it’s the minority opinions that prevail, however, I’m not quite sure how this impacts everyone’s life, and I’m genuinely curious why anybody cares, it’s just some additional information.
What is wrong is Halifax shouldn’t be telling customers that if they don’t like it that they can take their business elsewhere. However, if people are closing their accounts down over something as inconsequential as this then they really do have too much time on their hands and an extremely odd view of the world that they live in, and what will happen when all banks inevitably have this on their name tags? Does that mean they will keep their money under the mattress?
It appears that some things have moved on for the better, but respect and discipline have been lost along the way, but sadly the whole infrastructure is getting to the point where stupidity is controlling us.
THE MONTHLY MOSQUITO 