“We want gas and air to be available for women and….”

Me too.

Well, my husband did give up work when I had a baby so not got an issue with parents instead of mothers

To be honest I‘ll accept the and - but only because I give zero craps if someone wants to refer to themselves as a leaf or a teapot so long as they don’t expect me to refer to myself as something I’m not

I'm with AnyFucker too. Only women give birth. Fuck these compromises they just give leverage for more and more shit.

Problem is that there is a tiny but vocal minority of women who will say that yes they are female but no they don’t consider themselves to be a woman and are NB or trans - given the broad umbrella definition of trans now, it’s unclear what that even means. It mostly comes across as very narcissistic, the demands that the rest of the world affirms those individuals self-perception which is objectively untrue.

I don't care what that tiny vocal minority say to be honest, not considering themselves as a woman and then becoming pregnant and giving birth means that whatever they think they are a woman because only women can become pregnant and give birth. Now if it is too triggering or traumatising to be called a woman at that point maybe they should re-think doing something that ONLY WOMEN can do.

It is totally narcissistic.

I spent many years working alongside maternity teams supporting and representing mothers.

I remember the fight we had to have women and mothers recognised as an acceptable term to use when the ob-gyn teams were dead set on referring to everyone as "patients". It took so long to have this change recognised.

100% agree.

Indeed! Very interesting listening to Mary Harrington on the Modern Wisdom podcast, one of the things she touched on was the research that is being done into womb transplants, alongside questions around where wombs would come from, and the commodification of human bodies, especially women’s bodies. Depressing listening 😟although important to bee we aware of I guess.

There must be a tick list of buzzwords for them to use !

This is why the insanity of 'look, I'm a man having a baby, a miracle has happened, now men give birth too'.

YY. I'm not willing to pander to this.

Same here!

Problem is that there is a tiny but vocal minority of women who will say that yes they are female but no they don’t consider themselves to be a woman and are NB or trans - given the broad umbrella definition of trans now, it’s unclear what that even means. It mostly comes across as very narcissistic, the demands that the rest of the world affirms those individuals self-perception which is objectively untrue.

It’s the demands on the rest of society that really bothers me, especially when our children are brought into it (“nb” child at Cubs and having to talk about sex v gender to my then 8 year old!).

Watched BBC today talking about the cost of childcare. Someone said 'families have to give up work' - which made no sense whatsoever. Even 'parents' would have made more sense.

I think this is the point being made, though, Arabella. Unless we use sex based words and everyone knows and accepts that sex is binary and biological and immutable we are up the proverbial creek, as you point out.

Not all women give birth but ONLY women give birth. It is dehumanising and erasing of women to say 'people who give birth', people in general do not give birth, women do, and we need to say so. Slippery slope as someone has already said.

No-one is a birthing person unless they are a woman, so birthing people is redundant and a tautology - unless women are not people.

'advocating' is dramatic. But I see nothing wrong with it, as it includes the word 'women' also. People who give birth are women, and if someone would rather be known as that, so be it. Doesn't mean that fact and science are any less real.

Was it? You seemed to be advocating for "Women and ..." to ensure all women were included.
My point is that the word women alone is quite sufficient.

yes, that's the point I was trying to make.

Same.

Yes, it's like pronouns "Let it go, it doesn't matter, it's just manners/Kind"

Only women give birth is factually correct. You can call yourself a tree should you be so inclined, but only women with female biology can give birth.
The "birthing people" are women, regardless of what they like to call themselves. If they were male, they wouldn't be on a maternity ward 🤷🏻‍♀️

And yes I think it matters.

I disagree that it's factually correct. The 'and' implies that there are other people in addition to women who give birth.

I was replying to a PP that said ‘only women give birth. Facts and science matter’. I said that ‘women and birthing people’ are factually correct. Trans women was only used an example to show what would have been factually incorrect.

100% with you on this AnyFucker.