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.

Swyers syndrome was mentioned earlier, with the implication this was fairly common:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XY_gonadal_dysgenesis

'Fewer than 100 cases have been reported as of 2018' - that is worldwide, ever.

It's not a sensible or relevant position to base UK legislation on. This isn't a case of discriminating against them, just that it's so vanishingly rare it wouldn't make the slightest sense to base law on such an anomalous situation.

How tenuous some of your identities and sense of selves must be if you lose them as soon as someone describes you as a person who is pregnant rather than a mother.

I very much resent the idea that the word 'mother' says anything about my innate identity. I still need clear language that describes the female reproductive role to protect my rights.

@unmarkedbythat

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

Nope. That's not an accurate reflection at all of this issue. No one decided to delete the word mother from the language.

How tenuous some of your identities and sense of selves must be if you lose them as soon as someone describes you as a person who is pregnant rather than a mother.

Again, pot, kettle. Gaslighting nonsense

How tenuous some of your identities and sense of selves must be if you lose them as soon as someone describes you as a person who is pregnant rather than a mother.

My description as a mother and a woman isn't an identity, so that makes no sense at all.

Sorry haven’t read whole thread but custody of children usually goes to “the mother” doesn’t it?
Wouldn’t that Be affected?

@unmarkedbythat

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

Nope. That's not an accurate reflection at all of this issue. No one decided to delete the word mother from the language.

How tenuous some of your identities and sense of selves must be if you lose them as soon as someone describes you as a person who is pregnant rather than a mother.

I have a very strong sense of who I am thank you very much as I'm sure do many women.

The issue is that if we don't have a strong, legally defined term for us with no blurred edges it makes it much harder to advocate for our rights and needs. The reason why we need legal protection against discrimination (Equality Act 2010) is that people get discriminated against.

Most employers/service providers are good (I think) but some are unscrupulous and will exploit any opportunity to treat or pay people worse because of who they are. We need strong legal protection against that and clear words to describe the people protected.

In America there was a case brought by a woman who was discriminated against for her breastfeeding needs. The claim failed partly because the defence offered that men could lactate (ie. produce a chemically induced liquid that may resemble breastmilk but has not been established to be safe for an infant) too so it wasn't discrimination on grounds of her sex.

That's what happens when you allow the tiniest area of grey in the definitions of things. People will find them and exploit them and in this case it will be to the detriment of women.

Part of the trial court’s reasoning was, according to Galen Sherwin of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), “that even if Angela had been fired because she was breastfeeding, that was not sex discrimination, in part because men can lactate under certain circumstances.”

This reasoning is used to defeat Ames attempt to demonstrate that she was a member of a protected class and suffered an adverse employment action due to discrimination based on her membership in this class. Breastfeeding mothers are not seen as being in a protected class based on sex, because men can also lactate.

campbelllawobserver.com/men-can-lactate-too-breastfeeding-mom-loses-discrimination-case/

How tenuous some of your identities and sense of selves must be if you lose them as soon as someone describes you as a person who is pregnant rather than a mother.

It's a simple fact that mothers carry and birth children. Legally, scientifically, and medically.

It's not really about 'sense of self', here, though, it's about legal definitions and legal protections.

Thank you, thank you, to the many formidable, intelligent women here who have so much more patience than me and with it have the inclination to spend your time making sure these issues are aired and seen by as many as possible, and explained again & again to those who are not aware or do not understand.

Language, and its (clear and precise) terms & definitions, is at the very core of Law & Legislation. Without it there is nothing. So yes, these things absolutely do matter. A lot.

Furthermore, and arching over and above this specific arena or our respective views on details of it, the freedom in society to speak the unwavering truth of biological fact (there is no truth as clear and consistent as this, which exists at the very core of humanity) is extremely important. It matters a great deal.

How tenuous some of your identities and sense of selves must be if you lose them as soon as someone describes you as a person who is pregnant rather than a mother.

I think anyone who has subscribed to gender woo woo talking about tenuous identities is on very thin ice! A woman who has given birth is a mother. That is just how our language works. Nothing to do with identity, it’s just what we call it. There’s a reality behind the word - a biological truth.

@AdHominemNonSequitur

They believe "cis" people (non trans people), ALL cis people, oppress trans people, because they are seen as normal by society. They have 'cisprivilege' . They call these 'discourses', (society wide conversations). They think you need to disrupt 'normal' discourses on sex and gender. Flatten everything and start again

This is interesting. I need to read more. I hadn’t thought about this drive for ‘flattening’ in the context of sex and gender.

But I am aware of the concept of ‘sameness’ being used to gain power and control. The below are just examples to illustrate the idea

.you shouldn't use the word 'doctor' (someone with a recognised medical qualification), but should say ‘person who cures’ ----> hence you would 'include' shamans and hand healers
.you shouldn’t use the word ‘teacher’ (someone who has actually received teacher training), but should say ‘person who educates’ --→ hence you would be 'including' a Youtuber who has done a few videos teaching others how to fix a door bell

Once you have eroded valid credentials, you can reassign ‘worthiness’ as you see fit (and place your political allies/chums -whoever they are - in positions of influence/power)

I don’t think those wanting to erase the word ‘mother’ are white men (as they are already perceived to be privileged and would have no incentive to invert hierarchy), though obviously they would benefit from this move. Drug companies and surgeons, maybe, but the return on investment to finance so much activism is unclear (i.e. how many people would like to actually go ahead and require these services?).

I hope the truth comes to light soon enough.

I agree with a PP saying that we should be asking ourselves ‘now they are attacking women, but who will be next?’

And I also agree with the OP that this should not be moved to the Feminist Chats, as it appears to be a much wider and worrying trend

Mother would and will always be used to describe the lady that gives birth to her child. (If they want to be called father then that’s up to them.. and a different thread!)

The literature could ‘person that gave birth’ but everyone would still use the word ‘Mother’.

‘So, what relation are you rictus child?’

I’m DC Mother, oh sorry I mean person that gave birth to them.

The term Mother will always be associated with the lady that gave birth to their child - unless the child was adopted etc and the mother would be the lady that cares for their child. Again, you can call yourself dad, Micky mouse, whatever, but Mother will never cease to be used in spoken language- despite people’s best efforts to get rid of it 😬

Was the argument for replacing those terms completely, or was it for including additional optional terms for trans men? I genuinely don't know - that's why I'm asking.

The terms “woman” and “mother” had been completely avoided in favour of “person”. The (successful) argument was to put “mother” in.

I can see why many people may think this is an non-issue.

The purposeful erasure of common language we all understand to refer to people and facts we all know seems far fetched.

And yet, that's exactly what's happening. Through the back door so nobody notices.

And when people do notice, it's not surprising they think, surely this shit must be made up!

Except it isn't. It matters. Without precise language we can't define or talk about things, let alone improve or defend them.

I very much resent the idea that the word 'mother' says anything about my innate identity. I still need clear language that describes the female reproductive role to protect my rights.

Agreed. Women's requirement for healthcare targeted to our physical needs (and protected spaces for same) has nothing to do with 'identity'. It's gender that's the nebulous concept, which demands something in addition to what 'is', that requires some form of self-identification. Gender is simply other people's/society's ideals of what 'masculine' and 'feminine' should look like. And it shifts like the sands from generation to generation. Look at the change in 'ideal' female body shapes for one. Androgynous flappers in the 20s, buxom mothers in overalls in the 30s and 40s, hourglass in the Hollywood 50s, skinny supermodels in the 90s. And people diet or have surgery to mould themselves to fit these stereotypes. The pink/blue kids' toys/clothing categories weren't even a thing in the 80s. (And people were a sight less confused about it too: no one ever suggested Bowie, Robert Smith, Annie Lennox, Boy George et al were not actually 'really' men or women, but a different 'gender').

Gender by its own definition is therefore a very unstable, shaky foundation on which to build an 'identity'. Small wonder that it seems to induce such anxiety in people. This for sure is one key reason activists attempt to reclassify entire groups of people - without their consent - to fit their shaky, insubstantial interpretation of what gender should be. That women, in particular, should give up their own categories and even their defining language - a move putting them at significant physical and even potentially mortal risk - so that a small group of vociferous activists can set themselves up as exactly like us, while still maintaining the distinction of 'different' from the boring, everyday, conservative little people whose 'gender' is the 'same as we were "assigned" at birth'.

Get out of town. The whole thing is so ambivalent and contradictory it's hardly surprising the courts and establishment are of late increasingly refusing to take it seriously. And women are also saying 'no'. No, you don't get to define who I am. No, you don't have a free pass to ride roughshod over my hard won rights. No, you don't have the freedom to colonise and misappropriate my language, or to force me to announce 'my' pronouns. No, you don't have autonomy over my physical body.

'No'.

It is straight out of Nineteen Eighty-Four. Truly dangerous. And people who ‘don’t give a fuck’ because it ‘doesn’t affect them’ (yet) need to keep in mind that at some point the nightmare will come for them.

On that note, I’m off now to enjoy the sunshine, and to celebrate the light that has been shone. ☀️ ☀️☀️

I saw a post the other day about Mr potato head from toy story is changing to gender neutral, so he will just be called potato head, as far as I'm concerned it's Mr potato head to me and will be to my kid when growing up. That's what I grew up with and I'm not changing what I know to something different. Of course this probably doesn't even tie in with the post but I just wanted to get it off my chest.

I feel better now

I've not rtft so perhaps it's been mentioned, but I've noticed that the prostate cancer ad is very clearly aimed at men. No changing of language for them, is there?

How tenuous some of your identities and sense of selves must be if you lose them as soon as someone describes you as a person who is pregnant rather than a mother.

Next week we'll try changing the word father to 'parent who can't get pregnant' and see whether that goes down well.

And the truly inhumane rewording of FGM to mean forced genital mutilation, instantly erasing the sex to whom it happens

Makes sense when you realise the same people are absolutely for genital mutilation of children and young adults in the name of reassignment.

How tenuous some of your identities and sense of selves must be if you lose them as soon as someone describes you as a person who is pregnant rather than a mother.

'Mother/Women' are not 'identities'. They are physical bodily characteristics requiring targeted health care and protected spaces on account of those characteristics.

The 'tenuous identities' are the ones based around the nebulous, indefinable, social construct that is 'Gender'.

HTH.

@AnnaPotter

You’re being ridiculous. Your experience isn’t defined by legislation. If you consider ‘mother’ to be the right word for you then use it freely, as is your right. Whether legislation is trans-inclusive it not doesn’t affect your ability to do so in the slightest.

Why should women lose the words which define them and their experiences just to suit the vanity of a few individuals?

Trans individuals can define themselves how they like - no-one is stopping them If a Transperson considers a particular designation to be the right word for them, then they can use it freely, as is their right. The legislation doesn't affect their ability to do so in the slightest.

However it does go towards providing a legal definition of the terms involved - and that is important. There has been a lot of blurring of the edges, and words risk losing their meaning when they can mean anything and everything that any individual decides they want them to.

[quote Mockolate]@slashlover
We nearly lost the word mother and all that comes with it?
Surely the 26 page thread that's been in trending all day would do that?

Ah, was that in the main boards though or just FWR?
Because there's some sort of drive on at the moment to fill all the boards with trans threads.
Starting to realise why the first thread originally got moved, seemed bizarre to me at first but becoming clearer lol[/quote]
You see, that's the problem isn't it?

As at least one of the participants in the HoLs said yesterday

THIS IS NOT ABOUT TRANS RIGHTS

THIS IS ABOUT WOMENS RIGHTS

Stop making women's issues all about trans issues. Stop obfuscating the problem.

EVERYONE needs to take that to heart. Stop referring to the constant battle between two protected characteristics and start discussing ONLY WOMENS RIGHTS.

@stayathomer

Stop making shit up to suit your agenda. Exactly. I love all the I am not trans phobic people on mn. You are. Do all of you know there's trans people on mn? How awful for them to listen to this rubbish weekly at least. Also: How in a time of a global pandemic is this what you felt the need to post about?

If you change ‘trans’ to ‘women’ then your post actually makes sense.

Thank you women of mumsnet for your tireless patience in explaining why womens rights matter

More and more people are reading and starting to understand why it is important that women have control over language relating to them and the right to discuss it and everything else concerning their sex.

Great posts @MarieIVanArkleStinks