#the point is i'm not here to shit on your trans trek headcanons i'm just trying to make stuff simple so if you vary from pronouns good on u

[ladybelowdeck]

acceptable ways to address Scotty

Mister Scott/Miss Scott

‘Mister’ is, in fact, acceptable for female officers both in canon and in the navy in real life, however ‘Miss’ can be used based on preference. presumably if you don’t know the gender of the person you’re speaking to, use mister over any alternative. Scotty isn’t especially fond of miss as it comes off almost diminutive, but may or may not correct it.

Sir/Ma’am

again, pretty straightforward. ‘Sir’ is acceptable for women, both in ST canon and the real life navy. ma’am is more specific. again, presumably ‘sir’ is the one that should be defaulted to if gender is unknown or has no term. Scotty has a very strong preference for ‘sir’ in this regard and generally corrects it.

Lieutenant Commander/Lieutenant Commander Scott

this is pretty obviously okay. I should note, though, that insisting on calling someone by the full Lieutenant Commander can be offensive, though it is not automatically so, by way of emphasizing that they aren’t a ‘real’ Commander. It can be used derogatorily especially if the Ltcdr in question is in a position (the XO or similar) usually held by someone of Commander or higher, and someone is trying to say that the Ltcdr is not qualified without outright saying so or being overtly disrespectful. it’s like refering to an lt jg as lt jg instead of just lt. you’re deliberately drawing attention to the fact that they aren’t a ‘full’ lt. in casual conversations that do not require full rank you can also use--

Commander/Commander Scott

this is the acceptable way to shorten the rank ‘Lieutenant Commander’ in an on-duty situation/while speaking about them, etc. the line between ltcdr and cdr is not so wide that the difference is important. lieutenant commander is a bit of a mouthful when just trying to talk and is can be very unwieldy if you’re trying to quickly relay info, hence, commander is an easy stand-in. one cannot use ‘lieutenant’ as referring to someone by a lesser rank is incredibly offensive. don’t do it.

Engineer/Engineer Scott

this is typically for superior officers only, if at all. kirk has canonically done so but I haven’t been able to figure out if it’s the same thing as calling bones ‘Dr. Mccoy’ instead of his rank or if it could be dismissive when used. Certainly for lt and ensign ranks ‘engineer lastname’ is acceptable, so, presumably it works for her as well. Scotty doesn’t really mind this, as being an engineer is, truthfully, all she wants.

other notes:

don’t use her first name at all ever while on duty. or any officer’s. the moments where crew use jim’s name are meant to be surprising and are also almost never in front of other crew members.

even if you have a personal relationship with scotty, platonic or otherwise, you don’t get to start refusing orders or addressing her in a personal manner while on duty. don’t fucking do it.

I’ll admit that gets fuzzy with characters such as bones who really doesn’t give a shit when it comes to formality versus letting you know you need to get your life together, but remember that mccoy gets a lot of leeway for being CMO and on top of that he can literally overrule the captain if it comes to it. he’s earned his leeway. a random ensign has not. that’s the distinction i’m going for, here.

remember that ‘Scotty’ is actually a nickname and is, thus, informal and lower ranking officers generally SHOULD NOT use informalities on duty, though Scotty’s liberal with her tolerance of it (eg. have half an ounce of respect in your tone and she doesn’t care if you call her scotty instead of sir/her rank.)

using ‘Scotty’ is perfectly acceptable off duty for pretty much everyone

‘boss’ is considered an acceptable and respectful way to address a superior, especially when revealing chain of command isn’t a good idea.

‘Captain’ is a position as well as a rank so anyone in that position is due that title, regardless of rank. If Spock, Scotty, Sulu, Uhura, or Ensign Joe Blow have the conn and are in charge, they can be addressed as ‘Acting Captain’ or just ‘Captain’, regardless. The exception to this might be admirals/commodores/etc. When in doubt, use the higher rank of address.

other positions/billets factor into who is in charge of who on board. scotty automatically outranks anyone else on board the enterprise short of kirk and spock because of her position as second officer! period! the duties of a second officer are separate from the other duties she performs! the only exception to the rank rule would be the chief medical officer acting in a medical capacity, as usual.

department heads also outrank those in their department; even if scotty were an ensign and not lt cmdr or second officer, she would outrank everyone in the engineering department by her status as chief engineering officer; this is why someone with a department head status is typically lt cdr or above, to avoid rank/rate/billet/position issues.

senior staff, at least on star trek/on the enterprise herself, seem to treat each other as relative equals without regards to rank. it should not be assumed this will hold true for every other crew member and certainly not for those that are not stationed on the enterprise. the main crew all know each other and where they stand in relation to each other, they don’t need to establish positions and boundaries with each other, they’ve already got them.