Vulva owners?!

[Tallulah28]

Just came across this (no pun intended!) on Insta. Can someone explain to me how this company can use the “by mums for
mums” advertising ploy yet then go on to reduce us to “vulva owners”?

I've reported a few posts to try to draw attention to this thread.

Mumsnet should give a response to how they allow us to be so grossly described and treated

Mine keeps running away, so I have to pin up ‘lost vulva’ posters on all of the lamp posts.

That's one up from the usual hysterical wandering womb

Fucking hell, vulva owners is grim. I might start using ‘individuals with retained male genitalia’ for men. It’s perfect as it is both a wholly inadequate phrase and quite insulting. Just like ‘vulva owner’.

But by the same logic some 'mums' might have penises? Surely calling something for a vulva 'for mums' is trans exclusionary?

Exactly. They could just say "women and transmen who haven't had gender change surgery" surely.

To be honest marketing something just at mums is going to risk excluding women (and transmen) who wanted to have a baby but couldn't due to infertility etc. It's a minefield. They'd be better off just describing the product and letting people decide if they want it for themselves.

I think what upsets me most is that I see being a woman as an integral part of my identity and central to the vast majority of my life experiences (good and the bad), particularly as a mother. I am inseperable from my womanhood. It's much more than the sum of its parts.

I feel a lot of sympathy and respect for trans and non binary people's movement but I don't want to be stripped of my womanhood and reduced to my sex organs.

You wouldn't say 'a person with black skin', 'someone with gayness' because race and sexuality is part of identity. There's even a movement away from 'person with autism' to 'autistic person' recognising neurodivergent identity-first.

I'd never deliberately misgender someone or seek to cause offence but I find this 'chest feeder', 'birther', 'menstruator' really upsetting and not very inclusive of my needs and rights as a woman.

Ties in nicely with sex work is work. You can hire it out.

No nasty human trafficking here. Just a perfectly legal rental.

Over on the other thread about the mumsnet “mums’” dildo, it was the term “vulva owners”on the manufacturer’s website that really annoyed me too. I commented that my auto correct wanted me to type “Volvo owners”. What planet are they on if they want to appeal to women let alone “mums”?

Yeah it does sound a bit cringey 'speaking as a mother...' type thing

I sort of assumed this meant they had designed a special vibrator for a woman that's given birth. But then what about c sections. It doesn't really make any sense.
Or maybe they mean it's very quick so you can use it between putting a wash on and doing the school run?

😂😂😂

You're statement doesn't make sense. If you are duly concerned about the word being erased, you should be concerned about this, where the word woman has been erased.

Maybe it's a special design for multitasking?

I guess they're terrified of the Twitter pile on if they use the 'wrong' language. Understandable maybe if you're marketing it at the 18-25 demographic, but the average age for first giving birth in this country is around 30. I would imagine the vast, vast majority of women who've carried and birthed a child 'identify' as (bloody well are!) women. And your average 20 year old Twitter user in a purity spiral over the word 'woman' would run a mile before going anywhere near a vibrator 'made for mums' anyway. Plus it's developed with Mumsnet users. Don't their marketing team know our rep?!

And that's before we even get on to how is this extra-special-made-for-mums toy any different to the dozens of other non-penetrative vibrators out there ...

At car shows you often see stickers saying built not bought, funny that this is the opposite.

Why don’t they just market it at women? If a transwomen buys it, so what?

Presumably American not brummie....
If it was a U.K. company, they'd hopefully know that 'mother' has been legally decided to be a sexed rather than 'gendered' term so it's inclusive of transmen.

These strange labels don't "erase" women any more than, pre-brexit, being called an EU citizen erased your British nationality. You could be a British citizen and an EU national at the same time. But EU nationals were a wider group, and it was sometimes a more useful label.

(And the idea that anyone is being sued for using the word woman is as fanciful as Daily Express readers convincing themselves that they're "not allowed" to say they're white.)

Agree.

I'll buy one of these the day they market a product for p.e.n.i.s* havers, ejaculators, testicle owners or anything else along those lines.

Why is it that referring to men by their genitalia is still seen as 'not the done thing' yet its perfectly OK to refer to a woman by her reproductive organs/functions? I am a woman, not a body part or function thank you very much.

*yes, I can spell that word and no, I'm not a prude. My spellchecker seems to have different ideas though.

I think if someone's grown up and tough enough to have given birth to another human being, they can cope with being called a 'woman'. If you're a parent you need to be capable of putting aside your emotions occasionally.

I mean, you seem not to have understood the logic! Maybe try venn diagrams ...

Look what my owned finger can do 🖕🏼

Mine too. They can buzz right off if they think that calling women "vulva owners" is an appropriate marketing strategy.

A business who rely on its members for its profits.
No members = no advertisers = no profits

These strange labels don't "erase" women any more than, pre-brexit, being called an EU citizen erased your British nationality. You could be a British citizen and an EU national at the same time. But EU nationals were a wider group, and it was sometimes a more useful label.

Your analogy doesn't work . Vulva owners are all actually women so why not just say women? ( whereas EU National and British are 2 different descriptions for 2 different categories). And of course I never said women are being erased, I said the words women and woman are being erased in print, adverts and by organisations.

(the idea that anyone is being sued for using the word woman is as fanciful as Daily Express readers convincing themselves that they're "not allowed" to say they're white.)

No idea what you are referring to here as I didn't even reference Daily Express.

I thought it was more saying “people assume Mumsnet is all about baby food and sexist stereotypes, but it’s actually full of political debate?” Maybe I’ve misunderstood something but I thought it was quite funny actually