what will it mean to you if we lose the word "mother"

endoftheline

We cannot celebrate the ferocity of motherhood in animals and then make it worthless within language when referring to humans. It makes no sense.

I like this badge, might start wearing one...

One of my sons is dead. I will always be his mother. I am sick of a few men and their handmaidens trying to appropriate something that is unique to women and impossible for men, not matter how much they shout and tantrum.

Beautiful post, viv. It's how I feel too and it brought tears to my eyes.
Thank you.

Brilliant post. Thank you.

Fabulous post 👏👏👏

I saw your thread title in the list OP and had a total WTAF moment, even though I know all about this, am a seasoned feminist who believes in women's sex-based rights and have opposed gender ideology (NB not trans people) from the start.

what will it mean to you if we lose the word "mother"?

How can we even be discussing potentially losing a word that we don't want to lose? We're not talking about an offensive word that's racist or demeaning in any way. But a word that's central to most of our lives in one way or another and is used every day an a million conversations (or its shortened versions).

Just by discussing that we're agreeing that we're in an orwellian situation where we have to worry about the state and major organisations like the NHS possibly banning normal everyday words simply because they relate to women's bodies and experiences. Not only driven by hatred of sex-based reality, but by hatred of women specifically (because surprise surprise, father and man are not under attack in the same way).

In fact, the latest developments suggest even the most egregious offenders like the SNP are pulling back from the brink on this one because it's obviously FUCKING INSANE even to them. But there are still forces pushing for it.

What it would mean to we if we lost it - though I don't think that would be possible - is that this lunacy had won.

Fuck. That.

What a beautiful piece of writing.

Thank you @vivariumvivariumsvivaria - what a beautiful post. I'm with you 100%.

I was angry about the attempts to coopt women, furious about female but I'm incandescent about mother. My feelings about motherhood are visceral, primal. They cannot be taken because they are woven into the very fabric of who I am.

Being a mother has fundamentally changed me. It has brought me such joy, their joy is mine. It has also brought me such deep sorrow and pain after watching by boys fight for their lives and losing 3 of my babies.
I am broken and complete from my journey and I am a mother.
It's a bond I have with my own mother. I watched her carry my sister and she supported me in my 5 pregnancies, she held me when I couldn't hold my baby and she supported when I fought for my life and that of my surviving children.
I earned that title and so has every woman who has carried a baby, adopted, fostered or cared for a child like a mother.
Will they be erasing Father too?

Thank you viv ❤

Beautiful post viv. Thank you

No one is actually stopping you using the word

They will never take mother. They crossed the line and they know it. Hence the backpeddling/denying they ever suggested it by Nancy K on the Womens Hour interview.

Me too. It's what defines me.

Beautifully put, @vivariumvivariumsvivaria. Becoming a mother has been a physical, physiological and personal challenge for me.
It has been the hardest work of my life, and, as a result, I am a far stronger and better person.

The analogy of the fungus and the tree is apt; the symbiosis moves benefits both ways.
Suzanne Simard has researched the role of the "mother tree" in a forest, and talks about how she initially baulked at using the terminology of "mother" - but that it is the word that fits.

All mothers know that any cost-benefit-analysis would land on the side of "hell no, I'm not doing that".

Beautiful.

I read The Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams recently and there was a beautiful and heartbreaking section about what it means to be a mother and the definition of the word. Here is an extract from a review of the book:

'She puzzles over the definition of “mother” and whether it excludes a woman who has a stillbirth, or who gives her daughter up for adoption, or whose son dies in the first world war.'

www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/books/2021/apr/16/dictionary-of-lost-words-by-pip-williams-review-a-gentle-hopeful-story

Perfectly put vivariumvivariumsvivaria

I was 17 years old when I become a mother so was still a child myself. I had to grow up pretty fast but I wouldn't change it for the world and no one is going to take that away from me,

Also, what Artichokeleaves said!

@vivariumvivariumsvivaria - your words gave me shivers. You have captured so much in that short passage.

I strongly identify as a mother. Motherhood has completed me, healed me and changed me for the better.

It's infinitely more than being the passive vessel of birthing parent.

Thank you and beautifully put ♥️ @vivariumvivariumsvivaria

It's like parenting a toddler, just because you want it, doesn't mean you can have it. Temper tantrums will not be effective against us mothers.

Wow, @vivariumvivariumsvivaria, that's a stunningly beautiful post. Every word resonated.

And no, men don't get the word mother. Ever. They've made a massive error of judgment thinking they can.

Beautifully well put. Thank you for starting this thread. I think mother is one of the most beautiful and powerful words in our language, its not just a person. Its a place, its a feeling, its our home.

Its known that many people's dying words they call for their mother, even if she's no longer alive. Thats how important it is. So no, its not up for debate and its going nowhere.