Mother or Birthing Parent

[thaigreen]

Which term do you prefer?

YABU Birthing Parent
YANBU Mother

Great point peachgreen

Obviously mother. It encompasses so much more than birthing parent (as if all that is different bout motherhood is the act of giving birth). Birthing parent is horrible and clinical. I would accept:

Pregnant woman/ pregnant mother
Labouring mother/ woman in labour
Mother

If anyone whose gender dysphoria is so bad that they can't bear to be called mother (although the act of conceiving, gestating and labouring is apparently fine) then they can ask that and I would fight for their right to be called the birthing parent.

Please extend us the same courtesy though and let us be called mothers.

I am a mother. The phrase "birthing parent" only makes sense while the birth is actually ongoing. When the DC are older it should surely be "birthed"?

"Birthing parent" strikes me as both a dehumanising and a faintly ludicrous phrase.

@PrawnofthePatriarchy

I am a mother. The phrase "birthing parent" only makes sense while the birth is actually ongoing. When the DC are older it should surely be "birthed"?

"Birthing parent" strikes me as both a dehumanising and a faintly ludicrous phrase.

Isn't that the point though? Is this language not all about the birthing process?

DP and I are a lesbian couple and neither of us use 'mother' as our term used daily. We use mum and mama. I highly doubt many women here are asking for their DCs to actually call them mother. This whole debate is literally focused around pregnancy and birth, not parenthood - at least in my eyes.

Asking a well established echo chamber known for having a lot of extreme opinions is not verified polling. But you knew that.

Calling the largest female majority forum an "echo chamber" on the issue of motherhood makes you look more than a little foolish, RuggerHug.

RuggerHug
There's no one way to bring a child into the world so whatever works for the people involved.

Last time I looked, creating a human embryo required an ovum from a woman and a sperm from a man, or no baby happened... That seems like only one way to me.

I actually think this kind of debate does the gender critical movement no favours. This isn't an infringement on women's rights. It is simply a move to increase the accuracy of language in formal documentation. It is very different to other areas of concern like how to accommodate transgender people in prisons, and how to ensure natal women aren't disadvantaged in professional sports etc etc. Lumping both in together is damaging to the argument, imo.

@peachgreen

I actually think this kind of debate does the gender critical movement no favours. This isn't an infringement on women's rights. It is simply a move to increase the accuracy of language in formal documentation. It is very different to other areas of concern like how to accommodate transgender people in prisons, and how to ensure natal women aren't disadvantaged in professional sports etc etc. Lumping both in together is damaging to the argument, imo.

This. Obviously the word change will impact trans folk positivity but it's not just about trans people, it's much wider than that.

If someone called me a birthing parent I'd be SO disgusted. I'm a mother. The other phrase is derogatory and awful.

How can you be both non binary and a lesbian?

@RuggerHug

Whichever applies to the person in that situation. As pp said, lesbian couples, surrogacy. There's no one way to bring a child into the world so whatever works for the people involved.

There's no one way to make a family but there is only one way to bring a child into the world. A woman's egg fertilised by a man's sperm carried inside a woman's uterus.

Personally, mother is my preferred term. Though I can understand that in a lesbian relationship it may be useful to distinguish which mother gave birth.

I don't think "birthing parent" should be the norm, maybe used in specific scenarios where there may be more than one mother, or the mother wants to identify as the father.

@LennyAndTheDucks

How can you be both non binary and a lesbian?

Er, have you met lesbians? Quite a big group of us are pretty gender non conforming

Well obviously. Being gender non conforming and non binary are not the same thing though.

I don't think it applies in adoptive or lesbian situations. In the latter, both are mothers and one is the birthing mother. Do the majority of women who place their children for adoption and give up their parental rights, really want to be called a birthing parent? That could be hurtful on both counts, they are a person not just a 'birther' and also have had to/made the choice not be a parent. Aren't both those situations going to be more common than a transman giving birth?

I was born female and have used my uterus for pregnancy and childbirth so I'm a mother.

There has been precisely one transman in the UK (Freddie McConnell) who has given birth. In England the House of Lords says the legal term for the parent who gives birth is 'mother', Freddie is recorded in Freddie's son's birth certificate as his mother. All children have a mother and that needs to be reflected in that child's birth certificate because that document belongs to the child not the parent.

Scotland has swallowed the kool aid and is offending 50% of its population for a theoretical possibility. The parent who gives birth is a mother, the child may have other mothers (by adoption or lesbian parents) but that does not change the fact that the female who gives birth is that child's birth mother.

YANBU!!!!!!!

Mother. Obviously.

I'm curious to know what they would suggest calling an adoptive mother? Would they be non-birthing parent aswell? So the child would have two non birthing parents?

Another lesbian here. We also use "mummy" and "mama", but depending on context (normally medical), we have described ourselves as "birth mum", "bio mum", "non-bio mum", "the other mother" etc.

Ignoring the obvious benefit to trans/non binary people, "birthing parent" could be helpful to couples where the child is biologically related to one parent but carried by the other, or even when asking relevant recent history for medical reasons - "which of you is the birthing parent?".

I have no issues at all with the terminology, I see it as accurate and in no way removes my right to refer to myself as "mother", "mama" or anything else.

I'm a mother
Birthing parent my arse

I actually couldn't give birth naturally and both dd & I would have died without emcs

Birthing is a triggering word for me & insulting to adoptive and foster parents

The phrase 'Birthing parent' can FOTTFSOF!

@KarlUrbansWife

I wish to be called mother. Other people can call themselves whatever they like, as long as they don't foist a label on me that I don't want.

What if it's in advertisements though? Like on the NHS website for example?

I didn’t give birth so what does that make me? I don’t think Birthing Parent and Mother mean the same thing.

@alsorang

If anyone refers to me as a birthing parent , I shall "shake and cry," I shall tell them they have made feel "unsafe", I shall demand a "safe space" just for mothers, I will tell them that they have committed " literal violence " against me. I will not back down.

🤣🤣🤣

Would refer to myself as mother but don’t care if anyone else refers to me as birthing parent. Happy for inclusive language to be used as it doesn’t cost me anything and makes life better for other people.