Midwives told to stop using terms such as 'breastfeeding' and 'breastmilk'

[MissMoped]

because it’s not gender inclusive language, I believe with particular reference to the transexual debate.

This is at Brighton and Sussex nhs trust btw, good to know NHS money is being spent wisely btw, poring over the “incorrect” use of language.

The word “mother” apparently should not be used on its own; instead “mother or birthing parent” (um, isn’t that a mother?).

Breast milk and breastfeeding is to be replace by “breast/chest milk” or “milk from the feeding parent”. “Woman” should be replaced with “woman or person”.

Gobsmacked.

No, most men don't refer to their chest as their breast, and don't think of themselves as having brreasts.
Men are lucky enough not to have to think about their breasts much at all.
I sincerely hope you never have the misfortune to have breast cancer, DadJoke.

Breast is the correct, neutral term. There's simply no need to pretend otherwise.

I do wonder if babies are centred in “perinatal” services will it be as newborn human people or as products...

Also what happens to the interests of women or should I say “gestational carriers”? Gestational carrier sounds more like a thing than a person. The baby becomes what? The natal product, another thing?

I believe that mothers and babies needs align, in fact that the concept of the mother-baby dyad is relevant and important in the well being of both.

A previous poster mentioned matrescence or the process of becoming a mother.

How do we honour these aspects of motherhood and birth in this brave new world, let alone fight for the basics under the banner of women’s rights and feminism.

The term birth worker, as others have said could refer to anyone. Midwife is a protected term I believe, that is it has a specific meaning defined in law and requires the appropriate level of training and education.

In a few years time how will we indicate to the female children with the body type that supports gestation that they may soon start bleeding regularly and that their friend who is also ‘female’ but with a different body type that produces small mobile gametes won’t and that is not a health issue that needs investigating.

There was one on Twitter recently. An autistic charity alerting ‘autistics with a cervix’ to the fact that they may need regular screening for cervical cancer. But how would they know if they have a cervix?

How do they understand whether they are of the female body type that has a cervix or the ‘female’ body type that doesn’t??

The whole point of public health information is to make it easier for people to understand their health risks.

Making language around women’s health less clear (and downright obscure in some cases) is not going to benefit women. It is going to have a detrimental effect on women’s health - why would we cause that deliberately?

This is chestfeeding.

www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/photos-of-breastfeeding-dad-go-viral/

An autistic charity alerting ‘autistics with a cervix’ to the fact that they may need regular screening for cervical cancer.

'Autistics'? Not even 'Autistic people', let alone 'autistic women'!

Partner pointed out that if he used his ‘human milk’ he’d be arrested. Vile joke but it shows the total absurdity of the conversation

@Imworthit

If trans women want to be women, then isn’t it more inclusive to use female terms?

And yes a would say a lot of people feel that cis women is horribly marginalising

Oh I wasn’t thinking trans men want to use the term chest feeding. That makes more sense.

It’s bad enough this ideology capture by other organisations, but when a health organisation uses unclear or inaccurate language about our sexed bodies and associated healthcare needs, and even argues that ‘biological essentialism’ (even in the context of healthcare needs that are only associated with one biological sex) is not sufficiently inclusive, it does feel like absolutely no one in a position of influence gives a shit about how these decisions affect women.

@gardenbird48

Compare and contrast. Macmillan ‘people get Cervical Cancer but men get Penile Cancer (and Prostate cancer). Interestingly I would suggest that ALL men know they have a penis so may be at risk of penile cancer but a study showed that 44% of women don’t know they have a cervix.

Which group is being out at risk here by making language around health issues LESS clear? For whose benefit??

I contacted Macmillan and they ignored my concerns about clarity of language and are apparently being inclusive in the language on the website.

And btw I haven’t just cherry picked on that screenshot, the word woman has been replaced by people.

Well it's hard to argue with the unfairness of that.

I find it extremely surprising that women don’t know they have a cervix? Really

But I see that wasn’t really the main point

If your first language isn't English you might not know the word, whereas you'd probably recognise 'woman'.

@Imworthit

Educational levels and access to health information vary. That's why we have public health programmes, to try and level the playing field. Not much use being told important info about your body though if you don't know it's your body the message is referring to.

The BBC providing helpful hormone advice for ‘teenagers who menstruate’ - they manage not to mention female, girl or woman in that piece.

The worst and most heartless example I’ve seen was a bereavement charity referring to ‘birthing parent’ in relation to miscarriage and baby death and then accusing the mothers who objected of being bigots.

Apart from the fact that women who have miscarried don’t generally ‘give birth’ so birthing parent excludes those women and the worst but was that when a support charity is being told BY THE WOMEN IT IS SUPPOSED TO BE SUPPORTING, it says nasty things to them.

In my book, women who have suffered the loss of a baby get to determine how they want to be named and everyone including the support charity should respect that. Anything else is inhuman.

I find it extremely surprising that women don’t know they have a cervix? Really

And if you change your details at the drs based on gender not sex then it's possible that regardless of whether or not someone knows they have a cervix, well they may not even receive the call/leaflet calling them up for cervical screening. Same with anyone born male who changes their sex markers the dr. They may not get called in for prostate screening.

Similar with the miscarriage thing. Anorexic women, menopausal women, infertile women. It’s all very heartbreaking and extremely offensive language.

imworthit

metro.co.uk/2020/11/09/almost-50-of-women-dont-know-where-their-cervix-is-finds-study-13561743/

This is a wake up call for those who believe this language will not cause harm.

Milli Hill, writer of “Give birth like a feminist” has recently written a book about periods for girls, given the hassle she is receiving from certain quarters on Twitter I imagine it may be based in the traditional understanding of biology.

I haven’t read it myself yet but I am thinking of buying it for my youngest DD.

I suppose I have heard people say some really stupid things regarding sex and reproductive issues. University is sometimes unhelpful for making you think people ‘just know these things’ but definitely complicating language further isn’t going to help.

This is a wake up call for those who believe this language will not cause harm

Just read that article.
Seems it's not the word cervix that people don't know, it's that they don't know whereabouts it is.

"non-trans" to avoid offending delicate sensibilities

PMSL (sometimes literally..)
Most WOMEN on here have pushed an entire human being out of their vaginas. There nowt delicate about my sensibilities love.

@Mockolate

This is a wake up call for those who believe this language will not cause harm

Just read that article.
Seems it's not the word cervix that people don't know, it's that they don't know whereabouts it is.

hence, they don't understand what a 'cervix' is .....

It's utterly outrageous.

In the pretence of "being inclusive", they're excluding the actual women who conceive, gestate, give birth, and nourish babies.

Oh but who cares, it's only women.

Naming women and the things our bodies can do and are is seen as hateful nowadays, so I'm going to make a list of hateful words. Strap yourselves in, it's going to be traumatic

woman
girl
breasts
vagina
menstruation
breast-feeding
uterus
womb
clitoris
ovaries
labia
vulva
pregnant woman
maternity leave

Better stop, I think that's about as much as we can all take of the hate for one post.

@IfNot

"non-trans" to avoid offending delicate sensibilities

PMSL (sometimes literally..)
Most WOMEN on here have pushed an entire human being out of their vaginas. There nowt delicate about my sensibilities love.

Some of the people who have pushed entire human beings out of the vaginas are trans men. There is no issue with using the language people prefer to refer to their bodies. For most non-trans women, that's breastfeeding, mother, etc. For trans men, it's not. Why on earth would you have a problem with it?

It's almost indistinguishable from the Daily Mail comments, which ought to be a wake up call.

And this is literally not true: "Midwives told to stop using terms such as 'breastfeeding' and 'breastmilk'" but you believe it because you get to be outraged.

For most non-trans women

For most women there, corrected it for you.