This is a humorous essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors and is made to be humorous. This page is not one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints. This essay isn't meant to be taken seriously.

This essay's use in the Wikipedia Signpost led to a lot of drama. I've put up a FAQ about it here: User:SMcCandlish/TG-NB.

This page in a nutshell: Below is an example of why you do not want Wikipedia to honor subjects' demands for idiolect pronoun replacements like xie, or wacky stage names, or trademark stylizations, or honorific titles – even if some people in the real world use them. We can record what reliable sources tell us about the subject's own usage (and some sources' usage about that subject), but we do not adopt it, in Wikipedia's own voice.

It, SMcCandlish, hereby declares Its personal pronoun to be It, beginning with this sentence. It has Itself-actualized as an alien and post-biological explicate manifestation of the Multiverse's implicate reality, made of the stuff of stars.

• Always capitalize It, to distinguish from other uses of the word it.
• When spoken aloud, "It" must be enunciated with stress and length, so that the capital letter can be intuited.
• The form "It" is used no matter what the construction, as illustrated below (with examples of special exceptions).
• Capitalize Itself and similar compounds, in reference to It.
• What do you think? → What does It think?
• What did he say? → What did It say?
• His shirt doesn't fit him well. → Its shirt doesn't fit It well.
• We are going to the store. → It and I are going to the store. (It is unique and is not a part of anything.)
• This food is all for us. → This food is all for It and me.
• This food is all ours. → This food is all Its and mine.
• What do you all/you lot want? → What do you all/you lot and It want?
• He's pissing me off. → It's pissing me off.
• When It is Itself using the first person: I put the lotion on my skin → It puts the lotion on Its skin. (It is beyond the desperate loneliness of the "royal we", or the me of ego.)
• In the unusual case of pluralization, e.g. when imagining multiple Its, then They/Their (capitalized) is required.
• When discussed in the same breath with another actual entity that identifies as It, use It and It.
• Capitalize any use of Who, Whom, Whose, Which, or That in direct reference to It.
• In a self- construction that refers to It, use Itself-, as in: It is self-actualizing → It is Itself-actualizing.
• The pronoun to use in reference to the historical It before the Itself-actualization, is It-that-was [1].

Outside of English, replace It with the equivalent word in the language in question.

• If that is a gendered language, It is referred to with neuter gender when available.
• If neuter is not available, alternate between masculine and feminine; use a similar approach for a strongly gendered language that has no separate word for It.
• If the language (or font) does not have an upper-/lower-case distinction, then the first letter of It or equivalent must be stressed some other way, such as boldface, or imperial purple.

It is not simply a person. When referred to in a generically descriptive way, It is the Entity. This must be separated out from constructions that would otherwise include It:

• All the people who came to my party were fun. → All the people and the Entity who came to my party were fun.

(Except at the beginning of a sentence, the in front of Entity is not capitalized; that would just be ungrammatical.)

In long form, It may formally be referred to as "Its Ineffable Wonder, the Alien Space-God It, Pope-Emperor of ChaOrder".

Those who are not among Its personal circle should refer to It, in third person, as "It (feel the frightful serenity)", or "It (FFS)" in short form. Leaving out this theologically significant honorific is deeply disrespectful.

Update: Beginning 1 April 2025, Its designation changes from "It" to the symbolic representation ꧁꧂, pronounced "the Entity Who Until Recently Was Known as It". Please ensure that your Unicode support is sufficient by then. Also on this date, It will be sealed in a chamber with no windows through which It may be viewed.

All of the above is beyond a mere preference; it also describes a religious conviction, and a position of spiritual leadership, as well as registered trademarks – it is formally official. If the enumerated preferences are not respected per MOS:IDENTITY and WP:ABOUTSELF policy, even on talk pages, this will be a WP:BLP violation, since that policy applies to all content, not just biographical article material. This will also constitute WP:Incivility, and may be interpreted as a WP:Personal attack and WP:Harassment if this recurs.

This user is allowed on Wikipedia because It is considered humorous. Neither It nor Its comments should be taken even remotely seriously.