look, i'm gonna try to be as polite as possible, but i can't make too many promises because this is a topic i'm very passionate about. personally, i think it's really weird to be weirded out by people who want a character's pronouns to be respected, but to each their own.
we do not know if those who refer to the hollow knight with it/its are dehumanizing it, or if those are just its pronouns. it is assumed that its being dehumanized (and i'm not arguing it wasn't dehumanized as a whole - it totally was, that's the whole point) but i think that narratively, we're given more proof that those are its pronouns rather than the assumption that they're not, which is largely based upon our own world's associations of it/its. (lots of bugs in hk use it/its. while it's most seen with lower-level enemies, characters such as the crystal guardian, soul warrior, nosk, etc also use it/its. it seems to be pretty common in their world.)
when the knight meets the white lady, she refers to thk with it/its. i bring her up specifically because while we can't know her thought process during thk's life, we know that in the time since she's grown to regret her actions and has realized the true cost of its sacrifice. as she says: "there is some shame i feel from my own part in the deed and this method guarantees it cease." the white lady is no longer trying to pretend that the "no mind to think, no will to break" was truly what the vessels were. she realizes they are their own people, and yet, refers to thk with its proper pronouns: "i implore you, usurp the vessel. its supposed strength was ill-judged."
this is more personal, but i think the city of tears memorial holds up a little less if thk is dehumanized by everyone. "through its sacrifice" has weight. if it/its would imply that it was not a person, and every bug saw thk as nothing more than an empty shell, what would there be for it to sacrifice? why not "through its duty" or "through its vow"? why would the bugs of hallownest uphold its actions as a sacrifice if they saw it as below them?
additionally, while we don't have many other examples, both other vessels we encounter use it/its (the knight and the broken vessel).
with the knight's case, there is no possibility of it being "dehumanized". the bugs who the knight interact with (for the most part) have no clue of the vessels' existence, much less that it is one. all of them, with only one exception, refer to it with it/its. the broken vessel's pronouns come from the hunter's journal, which reads: "the shape of this creature… i have seen something like it before. more than once, perhaps. it looks a little like the bugs of hallownest, but not quite the same. where did these empty little wanderers come from?" which tells us that the hunter does not know what the vessels are, but refers to one with it/its anyways. to me, having both vessels be referred to it/its by bugs without knowledge of their true origin is pretty solid proof that that's just the pronouns vessels use.
the only time the knight is they/them'd is in bretta's diary, in which she writes: "she knew the presence at her bed, knew the calm only they could bring." that's the only time anyone ever refers to the knight with anything other than it/its. personally, i think it's a very purposeful writing decision, and what really cements the knight's pronouns as it/its, as opposed to anything else. the whole point of bretta's journal is to be a joke. she doesn't the know the knight and is imposing her own ideas/fantasies upon it. she doesn't care about who it is or what it wants, and that extends to her not even bothering to use its right pronouns.
and if you want to they/them the knight still, i suppose it's fine. but if any other character had dozens of instances of being referred to with they/them pronouns, and one case of she/her, and everyone in the fandom decided to only use she/her pronouns, that'd be insane, wouldn't it?
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