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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

AIBU to tell every mother on mumsnet...

999 replies

LastRoloIsMine · 25/02/2021 22:18

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.

OP posts:
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17
Yesididmeantobesorude · 26/02/2021 15:12

All women want to do is keep the language in the new legislation exactly the same and consistent with other legislation. We're not arguing for changes, we're arguing for no changes.

It's incumbent on the people wanting to make the changes to come up with a good reason why the word 'mother' should be omitted from maternity legislation.

cheeseismydownfall · 26/02/2021 15:23

@Whenwillow

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?
This was called out by one of the Lords who spoke yesterday, I forget which one. But I think he was a mumsnetter.
Gurufloof · 26/02/2021 15:24

Nobody (sane) is gonna stop using the word mother just because a legal document doesn't

It's the precedent it sets, it's the laws coming up that misgendering will be a hate crime, it's a legal document about women so it's supposed to be accurate. I can imagine it could be used in a court case and then in that court using the word mother would be not allowed, because the law didnt use it.

Words have meanings!’ you shout, like it’s something profound
instead of an endlessly trite phrase that conveys nothing more than fear and prejudice

To avoid being deleted here, I'm making a point by using banned phrases, words and initials. Please think about the above point before deleting this post.
If words do not have meanings then why the furore about MtF, transwomen and trans women.
We once upon a time all happily used MtF as a short way of saying Male to female, then all hell let loose and we were told to be kind and only use transwomen, then all hell kicked off and we now must use trans women. Am still waiting for the next hugely important iteration of what we must say because the last version was just so terrible. But now we ate the trite ones for wanting the same damn word as we've always used. Who's afraid now?

Erkrie · 26/02/2021 15:26

All women want to do is keep the language in the new legislation exactly the same and consistent with other legislation. We're not arguing for changes, we're arguing for no changes

And we will be, thanks to the hol. Time for celebration. 🥂 Cheers.

merrymouse · 26/02/2021 15:33

Name the specific harms you fear. If they existed, you could do so. What does it say about you that you can’t?

The specific harm I fear is sexism, which I cannot fight without a linguistic concept of sex and the female reproductive role.

Sexnotgender · 26/02/2021 15:37

@Whenwillow

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?
Indeed they are not.

I was looking at vasectomies (not for me obviously) and you can request a male doctor. How terribly transphobic!

AIBU to tell every mother on mumsnet...
Keepitnerdy · 26/02/2021 15:37

Why can't the legislation include mother's,women and pregnant persons. I do feel it would be unfair to a person who was pregnant to be denied maternity rights.

Sexnotgender · 26/02/2021 15:38

This was called out by one of the Lords who spoke yesterday, I forget which one. But I think he was a mumsnetter.

Lord Philip Hunt.

Cloudbeeb · 26/02/2021 15:41

@Keepitnerdy

Why can't the legislation include mother's,women and pregnant persons. I do feel it would be unfair to a person who was pregnant to be denied maternity rights.
They would not be denied maternity rights.
BoreOfWhabylon · 26/02/2021 15:42

@fastwigglylines

Scientists estimate that DSD is as frequent as red hair or green eyes among humans. Do ginger people then not deserve rights? Or those with the rarest eye colour of green?

Not "scientists". One gender studies professor, Fausto-Sterling, who claimed that as many as 1.7% of people have DSDs. This has been thoroughly debunked as she was including all sorts of people who would not think of themselves intersex.

The figure is more like 0.018, so 100 times lower. pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12476264

It really doesn't do much for your credibility to keep on quoting the gender lobbyists's mantras and talking point. The time of no debate is over and we can see right through them.

The Emperor has no clothes on!

Yes indeed. As explained very clearly in this BBC radio programme (only a short segment, really worth a listen)

www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000222z

They also point out that the 'common as red hair' thing is pretty meaningless. In Scotland that would translate to a very large number of people, in China it would be very very few.

CuriousaboutSamphire · 26/02/2021 15:43

@Keepitnerdy

Why can't the legislation include mother's,women and pregnant persons. I do feel it would be unfair to a person who was pregnant to be denied maternity rights.
Nobody would be denied maternity rights.

That was the point. Every body that gets pregnant is a female body. Every body that gives birth is a mother's body.

Again, nobody would be denied maternity rights.

jeaux90 · 26/02/2021 15:49

The legislation is using the word mother. This IS inclusive according to the current law. A transman is still considered a mother with in law (and on the birth certificate as per the ruling on the recent case)

So whilst the word woman may have excluded Transmen (it doesn't in my head) the word mother IS inclusive

I'd recommend listening to the HOL speeches on this issue. Mainly brilliant apart from the LIbdems whose brains have fallen out.

Facultymeatings · 26/02/2021 15:55

I am very wary of saying much on these threads other than to say I love being a woman. I will say that the news about Tiger Woods it reminded me of Gentlemen. Only. Ladies.Forbidden or Golf as it’s better known. A sport whose entire name is designed to exclude women. We should always be aware of our rights and protect them and we should never forget what women went through to get them.

NannyGythaOgg · 26/02/2021 15:57

@PlanDeRaccordement Fri 26-Feb-21 10:45:18
I know I’m in a minority opinion group here. But I’m fully a gender abolitionist, which means that all genders and gendered terms need to be abolished. This includes feminine abs masculine terms for the same role. No mother, no father, only parents. No brother, no sister, only siblings. And so on.

I believe everyone should be able to present themself as they like but the reality of biology means that only men need a prostate exam and only women need cervical scans etc. Or do you believe we should all be tested for everything despite biological evidence of how impossible that is.

CuriousaboutSamphire · 26/02/2021 15:58

@Facultymeatings

I am very wary of saying much on these threads other than to say I love being a woman. I will say that the news about Tiger Woods it reminded me of Gentlemen. Only. Ladies.Forbidden or Golf as it’s better known. A sport whose entire name is designed to exclude women. We should always be aware of our rights and protect them and we should never forget what women went through to get them.
Don't be daft, that's a bacronym!

Goff, gowf, golf, goif, goiff, gof, gowfe, gouff or golve (other spellings available depending on your century of choice) is a gaelic word, 'goilf' and a golf course is 'raon goilf' or 'cùrsa goilf'.

CuriousaboutSamphire · 26/02/2021 16:02

But I’m fully a gender abolitionist, which means that all genders and gendered terms need to be abolished. This includes feminine abs masculine terms for the same role. No mother, no father, only parents. No brother, no sister, only siblings. And so on.

So how do you know which parent to call in for a prostate check, a cervical smear? Know which child is of the cohort that will need more support in school for certain subjects? The list is endelss beause sex based differences are very real!

Banish gender stereotypes, yay! We will all support you!

But don't confuse it witj sex based reality. That's throwing the baby out with the bath water - whatever it's sex!

cheeseismydownfall · 26/02/2021 16:08

But I’m fully a gender abolitionist, which means that all genders and gendered terms need to be abolished. This includes feminine abs masculine terms for the same role. No mother, no father, only parents. No brother, no sister, only siblings. And so on.

Sorry, come again? How the fuck does that work in the billions of every day contexts when we need to make a distinction due to the biological realities of men and women?

BitOfFun · 26/02/2021 16:09

I'm reading the transcript of the first debate from Monday (it's all on Hansard, which I hadn't realised), and I'm chortling at the dry humour of Lord Cormack in particular:

For many—I include myself—a mother has been the most significant and important figure in their early life. I still think of her very fondly.

Grin
JackieWeaversZoomAc · 26/02/2021 16:09

Mainly brilliant apart from the LIbdems whose brains have fallen out.

Got to wonder if the LD's all get called together to be schooled in groupthink, get the KoolAid administered and those who do not bow down to gender ideoology get weeded out and eliminated from the party? And isn't this a breach of lockdown rules?

BiBabbles · 26/02/2021 16:26

If you consider ‘mother’ to be the right word for you then use it freely, as is your right.

One of the big 'harms'/issues has been with women who have stillbirth, have a child die, and women who die in childbirth. The former two often have a complicated relationship with that word and it's been shown, over and over, that for many the importance of being recognized by others as a mother, of a mother of that child, is major. We're a social species and in horrible situations, we often look to others on what is our 'right' no matter how we feel.

For the latter, it's on those left behind. I lost a friend to a pregnancy-related complication. Obviously, she wouldn't benefit from a Maternity Bill, but I think culturally it's important that she and those like her are recognized as mothers and how the cultural idea of mothers and a mother's sacrifice and how women's health issues are disregarded contributed to her death. You don't get that with pregnant person. We barely as a society recognize the risks of pregnancy and childbirth as it is, we know demographics affects how people are treated in medical care, and I think we need to be more clear about these factors, not less, especially in the law.

“Mother” is a sexist term derived from “woman” anyway, it should be “parent or expectant parent”

I've never seen anywhere say it's derived from woman, in fact most think the basis for mother was among the first words, well before woman. It's largely discussed in etymology as likely having derived from baby talk - mama / ama - possibly from sounds while breastfeeding which may be why more words derived from mama mean female parent compared to papa, though some language switch or use different baby sounds.

It’s called Swyer Syndrome where the person has 46, XY DNA, or male DNA but all the organs and appearance of a female.

And if you read on the topic, they talk about girls and women with Swyer's, because while chromosomes causes development, it's not the defining factor, we sex biologically on gametes and the structures that support those gametes even if someone cannot produce them and we sex socially on phenotype - the latter can be altered somewhat but not fundamentally.

We can see this in plants and all other animals, humans are not unique in this - like all other mammals, we can only support and develop one if any kind of gametes. Someone who can develop and support eggs and an embryo is female. Someone who has a female phenotype is female whether or not she can produce eggs. Ovotestes don't actually mean both structures are there in a way that would function, just that both tissues are present.

Caster Semaya does not have Swyer's, but 5-ARD, which is a very different condition that include male structures. Someone with 5-ARD wouldn't be able to support eggs or an embryo - the structures aren't there for it. It does no benefit to try to blur all DSDs together and ignore the very important biological differences between them and while there is debate in sports, I think each type of DSD needs to be considered with their own traits.

Yes, there has long been a fight for sex neutral language for legislation and government writing (though him as neutral is still found), as well as in other fields - but not for things that are sex-specific.

When I talk about deaths in teenagers, I need to divide the sexes. I know there are a lot of different branches of feminism, but none I've met yet - even gender abolitionists - think I should arrange data, for the world we live in now, in a way that would make deaths by maternal conditions seem less serious when it's the number cause of death for girls and women 15-19. I also think it would be ridiculous to blur both sexes together and not to point out boys and young men of those ages are at significantly higher rate of vehicle-related deaths and interpersonal violence compared to their female counterparts.

When it comes to aspirations, we can often be sex-neutral, but when it comes to risks and what's being given to counteract those risks and difficulties like maternity protection, it does a disservice to ignore sex and it does many women and their families that have gone through the worst to not use mother in legal literature around those who are pregnant and give birth.

CaveMum · 26/02/2021 16:31

Here’s the Hansard link for those who want to read the full transcript. I particularly recommend Lord Winston’s contribution which has already been partially quoted up thread:

hansard.parliament.uk/lords/2021-02-25/debates/DFB70DF3-ABA0-4168-8DBF-DBDA63BA4AEE/MinisterialAndOtherMaternityAllowancesBill

TheChampagneGalop · 26/02/2021 16:33

But I’m fully a gender abolitionist, which means that all genders and gendered terms need to be abolished. This includes feminine abs masculine terms for the same role. No mother, no father, only parents. No brother, no sister, only siblings. And so on.

And what purpose would that serve other than making people confused? To make it harder to describe who you're talking about, hiding the different needs of women and men, and hiding sexism?

Facultymeatings · 26/02/2021 16:35

@CuriousaboutSamphire I didn’t know that!

Facultymeatings · 26/02/2021 16:38

Darn it time for a name change. Just checked snopes. Slinks off cussing Sad

SchadenfreudePersonified · 26/02/2021 16:40

@AnnaPotter

If all 7.8 billion people could give birth it wouldn't matter but only 51% are the sex that can. We are women not just people and we deserve rights.

And what rights are at issue here? What right do you currently have that wouldn’t exist if a piece of language used the phrase ‘pregnant person’?

What rights are others denied if the description used is "mother"?