@Erkrie
PlanDeRaccordement thanks, an interesting and very rare case where an xy person with swyer who does not produce ova and has some level of female (and male) reproduction structures, was able to give birth with donated eggs and HRT and considerable help from science. I don't believe this case is a reason however to remove all the language from around women, such as female, mother, particularly as legislation supports this person as a mother anyway.
Exactly.
The term used on the legislation is mother. Not woman. People with DSDs, transmen, etc are all legally covered. Not excluded.
It's my understanding that mother describes a person who gestates and gives birth. It's used in all sorts of other interwoven legislation like the children's act. And confers responsibility of the child, the initial responsibility, on the person who gives birth. That's what the word mother means legally, as far as I'm aware. It's to protect the child.
What struck the House of Lords was that during the debate about the bill and the specific maternity rights and how it would all be worked out, the word woman was used over 300 times. Whereas in the actual legislation it wasn't used once.
A prime example of everyone knowing which sex this involves, and the specific language being entirely necessary to discuss it, using that language to determine the scope of the bill, and then it being written out entirely.
I know it sounds simple, but the phrase if you can't see sex, you won't see sexism is entirely appropriate.
The idea that if you neutralise sex specific words, sexism will disappear, is patently untrue.
Because it's already happening. Men are women, women are men, and lots of people are neither. And all that happens is people that used to be called men get put in a female prison and attack the inmates. Or people that used to be called women no longer have fair political representation. Except now you've lost the words to describe it.