AIBU to tell every mother on mumsnet...

[LastRoloIsMine]

We nearly lost the word mother and all that comes with it?

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4176497-History-in-the-making-Watch-Parliament-Live-at-2-30pm

The maternity bill wanted to remove the word mother/woman and replace it with pregnant person.
Those words are important and women have fought for a century to be recognised yet we were nearly wiped out in favour of belief not fact.

I wont say "I am not transphobic" like some sort of plea! I dont actually have to I am just fighting for womens rights no need for me to explain myself any further.

Octane
Similarly, I don't think if it had been, it would've meant we "lost the word mother and all that comes with it".

I am referring to what the word mother/woman means in relation to the law not that it will fall from everyday language. That said the words pregnant people is replacing the word mother in some places.

You are correct most people don't give a shit because they either don't need this law or are using it under its current guise.
We cannot have rights that are specif to us unless we can state clearly who needs those rights and why. People don't need maternity rights women do.

Sex discrimination goes against the Equality Act. If we are all just people and sex doesn't matter then why do we have laws about sex discrimination?

Women matter. Reality matters.

It's one thing to acknowledge that a small minority of a particular group do not 'identify as' women, but quite another to change the language that applies to that entire group - especially when that entire group is still discriminated against.

Identifying into or out of a discriminated-against identity is generally frowned upon - except when it comes to biological sex.

Wow people and gents, you really need to calm down!

I am saddened by some of the responses here. Our mothers have fought hard for the recognition and rights regarding women’s maternity care and we should never forget it.

My mother, a teacher, married in the mid 70’s and back then the policy in many Catholic schools, where she lived, was that married female teachers were not allowed to remain on staff. She had to leave her job as her rights as a woman were inadequately protected in law.

She did get work in another school and was then entitled to only 6 weeks maternity leave for each baby. You were expected to be back at work if you wanted to keep your job.

Words do have meaning, especially in law. Women’s rights regarding pregnancy and maternity leave have not been won easily and we should not allow them to ever be weakened in the eyes of the law.

The fact that someone bothered to insert pregnant person into the original law and enough people in the lords blocked that word should be enough evidence in itself that this is a big, big deal. It's funny isn't it, that when women say that a word is important to them, then it's "just words" and we should "calm down", but when it's a transgender women, then we should all be very careful of our words and it's suddenly very important.

@Plumedenom

The fact that someone bothered to insert pregnant person into the original law and enough people in the lords blocked that word should be enough evidence in itself that this is a big, big deal. It's funny isn't it, that when women say that a word is important to them, then it's "just words" and we should "calm down", but when it's a transgender women, then we should all be very careful of our words and it's suddenly very important.

Just to make it clear, I fully agree with you. My calm down comment was a joke (well it was the changing ladies in 'ladies and gents' to people that was the joke, highlighting that we wouldn't change male terminology)

@Thelnebriati

This is nonsense;

8 out of 10 people under 40 will get pregnant within a year if they have sex without contraception regularly

Imagine if you taught this in sex education

Cons: a lot of confusion and the biology teacher would be annoyed with you because they would have to go over the reproduction topic again.
Pros: boys might take more responsibility for contraception.

Some of you should be hanging your head in shame. Why done you give a shit about your own sex?

Women have been oppressed since time began and have only managed to turn it around in recent decades. Even now, we are raped and murdered in a regular basis: men can walk away with hugely light jail sentences because choking is consensual: lockdown is virtually an excuse for being able murder your partner and get away with it.

Women die and always have done, bringing life into the world. Women have always died at the hands of their fathers and husbands. We’ve only just comparatively recently stopped being classed as assets of our husbands. My mum needed my dads permission to go back to work after having a baby and also to open a bank account - 1973 & 1971 respectively.

It’s is a fucking insult that some of you woke chumps think that’s it’s quite ok to remove our legal definition. How do you manage to defend women rights if they can’t be defined? How do you track domestic violence stats if there is no to identify the perpetrator? How do you help and target vulnerable women in any situation?

The reason we are the much more vulnerable is down to plain ole biology. The difference between men and women are far more than mere lifestyle choice.

Who would you chose to carry a sofa for you? A trans woman or a biology woman? WHY? Because it’s biology innit. Yes not just about your feelz

My mum has no uterus - so I suppose she is not a uterus haver now is she? Oops. What is she?

My friend had her body carved up to try and survive cancer - was she no longer a woman when she had her breast and ovaries removed?

What does “feeling like a woman” feel like? Liking Prosecco and dancing to ABBA? Getting emotional at Steel Magnolias? Funnily enough, “feeling like a woman” in this context never includes being vulnerable the minute you’re born: a sitting duck for violence simply because of size and strength or dying in childbirth.

What is feel like is having your identity erasure because of a generation that seems it obsolete.

And can I just reiterate:
Transwomem aren’t the problem MEN are the problem and we cannot protect ourselves with defining ourselves.

Presumably fathers would be called sperm givers or people who have contributed to the conception of a baby (PWHCTTCOABs) ‘Fathers for justice’ could be called ‘people for justice’.

@Katypyee

It is not a 'belief' as you call it. Religion is a 'belief', the tooth fairy is a 'belief'.

Gender is when people 'believe' they're are not the sex they're are born. It is the very definition of a belief. A belief is not always a religious one, but gender ideology follows the same pattern as religion. Sex is biological fact, gender is undefined and unproven. Doesnt mean we shouldn't respect people's gender beliefs, but since there is no tangability to their claims then they have no place in law.

These words belong to women, they're important to protect female rights and health.

@JackieWeaversZoomAc

When you talk about pregnant person instead of woman or mother you are inviting all people to participate in pregnancy. Inviting all people to have a say in pregnancy & women's bodies.

This then opens up men into having more of a say about pregnancy and maternity when it's really got very little to do with them. It's a woman's issue and it affects woman and their bodies and lives. woman should be mentioned in legislation dealing with these specific issues. Who on earth would object to that? What the fuck is going on?

And by the way in case you missed it, every single person who has ever lived on this planet ever, was grown and birthed by a woman, a mother. Without one single exception.

A woman is a specific type of person being an adult human female. When that female person takes up an entire class, being the only type of person who can give birth and become a mother it's perfectly reasonable and essential even to use the correct words to refer to her. Not using the correct word to describe her is erasure.

Nothing about this is controversial. Or at least it shouldn't be.

Agree with this.

I don’t understand what was trying to be achieved by the potential removal of the word “mother” from the legislation? Why were they considering it?

There's a lot of ignorance in the UK.

Erasing women should be of high concern in the general population.

@recluse

I don’t understand what was trying to be achieved by the potential removal of the word “mother” from the legislation? Why were they considering it?

Because they're testing the waters for bigger things. Trying changing 'sex' for 'gender' on something that doesn't seem to matter on the face of things opens the door to changing the word elsewhere in legislation. Obviously it snowballs from there, takings women's sex-based rights and replacing with gender inclusion whilst trans rights activist keep on that 'it doesn't matter, it doesn't affect you'. Until suddenly it does of course.

Tbh I can't get upset about being called a pregnant person. Women are people. If I am a pregnant woman, I am a pregnant person. I
would get upset at chest feeding and the other terms you list, but they weren't up for legislation (to my knowledge, correct if mistaken).

Of course men can't have babies. This legislation would not by itself have implied that they can. I take it though that there is a deeper problem here and it's the implication that the word woman is somehow bad, perhaps because it excludes a certain group of people. And I agree with you that we should resist this. There is nothing wrong with the term woman, and it excludes / includes the correct people.

YANBU. How can we stop this nonsense?!

Maternity terminology and period terminology do not affect transwomen. Why are people even mentioning transwomen in this thread? It's not about that at all.

I'm so happy about this. It would have been a big problem for me as we don't use the word 'pregnant' in my culture, it's seen as a rude word. I would have been really upset to have been referred to as a 'pregnant person'.

I am amazed how naive some women on here are. Of course language matters in legislation. If you believe that it's possible for females to face in any form discrimination based on their sex then you should understand the need for the correct terms to be used in law. If they aren't there is no way to effectively protect females from that discrimination.

recluse

I have only read the last page of this thread and I confess I wasn't following this debate until this week, but my understanding is that, some time back (google tells me 2007) it was decided to use gender neutral language on Bills rather than defaulting to 'he' or using he/she throughout. In general this is okay and deemed more inclusive, but in terms of maternity it should of course be 'woman' not 'person' as per the language in the EA 2010.

The replacing of person with 'mother' has succeeded in part because in law, a person who gestates and then gives birth to a baby is that baby's mother (as shown by the Freddy McConnell case - where transman Freddy wanted to be named as father on the birth certicate of his child and this was not allowed). So the term 'mother' includes transmen and non binary females who give birth in any provision around maternity.

Yes @doyoumind completely correct. It baffles me that there are so many woman on here who clearly do not care about their rights. But whatever eh, at least they are 'woke'.

If you give birth, you’re a mother. If you’re pregnant, you’re a pregnant woman. I understand that some people want to use different words in their personal live - fine. I don’t see why that should affect me as a woman and a mother. I don’t want to be referred to as a “pregnant person” in legislation about my body.

I think the nonsense vis a vis women is so ingrained throughout the NHS that it will take more than the intervention of The Lords relating to one bill to stop it:

1994 - pregnant and midwife said they didn't use Mrs because not all women were married; likewise I had a partner not a husband. 18 mos later when I had a MMC my baby was referred to as It - Chelsea & Westminster.

Outpatients where all men are called into appointments as Mr X or Mr Y whereas all women as Jane X or Jane Y. St George's 2015.

The MH Trust where my dd was a patient where all staff referred to me as mum - not even x's mum.

The countless Drs and their staff who expect me to afford the Dr the courtesy of a title but passively aggressively do not use mine.

It's a fundamental issue of equality that has been going on for a very long time where women are marginalised by a state provided, patriarchal health system. Had the fundamental issues of equality been resolved we would not be in this position now.

I'm amazed at how desperate 'some' are to remove all traces of womanhood from exclusively female experiences.

I'm shocked at how many women are willing to stand by and allow it 'wHAt hArm is IT CAuSiNG YoU'

In social, medical and now legal spheres 'woman' is a dirty word.

This language is trickling down too, my son always uses “they” rather than he or she - he’s 7 🙄

I support terms being trans-inclusive but not at the cost of removing terms that would only define cis-women. Inclusivity is not about erasure of one group's identity in order to support the identity of another. Could the legislation not have read 'women and pregnant people are entitled to...' ? In the same way the NHS guidance for cervical screening currently says: 'All women and people with a cervix aged 25 to 64 should be invited by letter.' www.nhs.uk/conditions/cervical-screening/

I do note that on the NHS site currently the equivalent page on prostate testing says : ;Routinely screening all men to check their prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels is a controversial subject in the international medical community.' Surely to ensure inclusivity is truly happening it should read: routinely screening all men and people with prostates? www.nhs.uk/conditions/prostate-cancer/psa-testing/
Not sure why only the cervix page was amended in the way it was and the prostate page wasn't.

Also- just to note OP the chest-feeding thing that hit the headlines was a bit of a misnomer- Brighton NHS trust had introduced the term to sit alongside breastfeeding, not to replace the term and I don't see any issue with that. It's important there are appropriate terms being used which ALL people identify with. 'ists new terms such as "breast/chestfeeding", "mothers and birthing parents" and "father or second biological parent".' www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-56007728