“Birthing parent” language in work policy – inclusive or erasing women?

[InvisibleBumble]

Our workplace has just emailed all staff about changes to parental leave. Throughout the email they repeatedly use the term “the birthing parent”. There is no mention anywhere of women, mothers or maternity leave.

I’m honestly really uncomfortable with it. In trying to be “inclusive”, it feels like women - and our lived experience of pregnancy, childbirth and recovery - are being erased from a policy that is specifically about leave after giving birth.

I’m not anti-inclusion, but I do struggle with language that refuses to even acknowledge women or mothers in this context. Childbirth is not a neutral experience, and maternity leave exists for a reason.

It’s really bugged me, but I’m nervous about pushing back at work in case I’m labelled difficult or “not inclusive enough”.

Am I being unreasonable? Has anyone challenged this kind of language at work, and if so, how did it go?

Women - sorry, uterus havers - stop worrying about silly little things like the erasure of womanhood, sacrificed at the altar of ‘inclusivity’… 🙄🙄🙄

☺️

Again wrong any woman who gives birth is automatically a mother even surrogate mothers are still legally the mother and a judge has to agree to the removal of her rights and responsibilities to grant them to another person.

Please look at the law and how its written not at the interpretation of it by stonewall et al

Isn't this exactly why mail merge was invented? If you are female and identity as female, the letter should say birth mother and if you are female but identity as anything else, it can say birth parent.

I actually had this come up last year a month before I was due to go on maternity leave (so was already quite hormonal) and without thinking I fired off an email saying how I was deeply offended, I was NOT a birthing parent, I was NOT going on parental leave and I felt by removing the words of Women, Mother or maternity leave they were EXCLUDING ME from their policy and wording. I stated that as a women I have no problem with being inclusive of others but I did object to having my identity deleted for the sake of one or two people who would NEVER need to use this policy as they physically can not give birth to a child! (Yes before you all jump down my throat I understand that there are transgender men who could give birth but in my hormonal state I was just trying to point out that I was unhappy with the use of female language being erased).

Anyway, I started panicking after sending the email and wondering I was going to be pulled into a meeting and told off or worse. Instead the next day I received a response from HR apologising that they had offended me and that they had never meant to erase female language or minimise the experience that women went through in childbirth. They said they had reviewed the policy and would be reverting back to the “original” wording 😂

One small win but I was happy to take it. I have NO problem with people living their best life and being whoever they want to be. I do however have a problem with having my identity ignored/removed under the pretence of inclusivity.

Well done you!

In what way is someone who gives birth not a mother? I find being cooerced into someone else’s delusion deeply offensive. It’s as offensive as ‘cis’

Only women can give birth.

It's all a load of nonsense anyway.

Freddie McConnell is a woman who identifies as a trans man who brought a legal challenge on this point. The court found that even though Freddie has a GRC so is legally a man, that the status of mother is protected.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-49828705

So every woman who gives birth, regardless of how they identify is legally the baby's mother.

Regardless of your views on gender, it is the child who should be centred not the identity of the parent,

It beggars belief that someone who claims to 'live as a man' goes on to do something that only women can do.

This is a great example why birthing is always an important part of it
My wife is the biological mother of our child, but she did not birth them. Biological doesn't equal birthing. They aren't always the same people and wording like yours is what they seek to avoid

Historically some of the vagueness meant that in two woman relationships you could both get mat leave, companies wised up to this and made it more focused on birth

How is 'birthing parent' more inclusive!? All this obfuscation and messing about with language has erased critical thinking facilities. None of this has ANYTHING to do with lesbian couples. Please engage your brain.

Of course Freddie is the mother! I hope that we see an end to this insanity in the next few years.

Because Stonewall has induced them to shell out a lot of money for their ‘education’ in such matters?

How rude

I work for the NHS and they use “ people with a uterus”!Really bugs me because they don’t say people with a penis when describing a male!

Even if that were true, you still have not been dehumanised by being referred to as your child's parent.

It doesn't exclude you.

You are innately included because you are a parent and have given birth. You just don't like it, which is different.

You can't identify out of the fact you are a parent and that you gave birth to your child.

Well done for standing up for it!

This is really interesting and a good point to go back on. Especially here in the UK we have rights to time off for pregnancy care etc.

Is the language inclusive? Is it inclusive of adoptive mothers? Inclusive of people who struggle with English or reading? Inclusive of women who disagree with erasure of words such as women, mother or maternity?

My preference would be using the clear commonly used terms such as maternity leave etc. which are defined in law. You can also have a statement about recognising not everyone identifies with these terms and how the document applies to lesbian mothers.

I'm not very informed on what's been happening with gender and trans issues. I probably should read up on it more. However from what I have seen, there has never been an instance of the word man being removed or deemed offensive, right? I've only ever seen woman or mother being removed in case it upsets someone.

If being known as a birthing parent is very important to some people, I don't see why the guidance can't encapsulate everyone and say "mothers or birthing parents" or something along those lines.

Do trans people even really feel this way? If I was trans, I think I'd be offended at the idea that I can't bear the idea of female words existing.

I think language is important.

It’s like saying 'fastest running animal' instead of ‘cheetah' whenever referring to a cheetah. We can’t erase the word cheetah to describe a cheetah because some cheetahs identify as pandas.

Such nonsense. Only women give birth.

The equivalent would be us saying “savannah animals” instead of cheetahs, and this wouldn’t erase the existence of cheetahs - regardless of what animal they identify as, cheetahs or otherwise - to use your example.

I think birthing parent is absolutely fine. What if it was a lesbian couple? Mother may exclude the non-birthing mother.

Birthing parent is to the point and inclusive. I say we should pick our battles, this is a non-starter.