Use of the term "hamburger" by sonographers to describe baby girl "bits"

[ahhhhhpushit]

I've heard this term reported by mothers so many terms that it must by the term sonographers aee taught at sonographer school.

Anybody else feel uncomfortable by it?

Imagine it being said about a baby's bits once she'd been born!

Is it just me?

btw i call godwin's!

That makes sense to me, then aitch.

I have to say, I would prefer (just personally) a sonographer to say a shape resembled a particular set of line - I would think it was odd if they said it looked like a swastika.

I am sure sonographers are motivated by wanted to communicate what they know, to the woman or the people who're eager to understand. I'm convinced the sonographer would always prefer a term that makes sense, and doesn't upset anyone. It's not the sonographer's fault, but sadly the term 'hamburger' has some really nasty associations for some women. So - why not avoid using it? There is no good reason to use the term, and some reasons against. Like the term 'swastika', there is nothing inherently rude about the shape described, and sonographers are the last people who should feel bad that such a term has other connotations.

i think if you were to look into it, though, you might find more people are sensitised to swastikas than they are hamburgers...

maybe you should take this off Feminism and onto the main boards and see what % of women (and men, unfortunately, beachcomber ) make the association between hamburgers and female oppression? because as i said before, i do think Toothbrushthief made a good point earlier about this board.

btw 'a particular set of lines' doesn't sound anything like a swastika in shape. so that would be a completely useless description of a thing shaped like a swastika.

Oh .. I thought this board was for feminism, no?

I am sure that more people would think bad things of a set of lines compared to a swastika, than to a hamburger. That is pretty much the point I'm making. A swastika used to be a sign that did not denote Nazism. However, now, to want people it does not matter that the symbol's original meaning was not racist or anti-Semitic. The meaning of that symbol was taken over my a minority group - Nazis in Germany - who, sadly, made that symbol meaningful to a huge number of men and women. They tainted that symbol.

I think we always need to start by adapting to what a needy individual finds hurtful. If 'humburger' denotes female sexual organs equated with meat (as for a minority of us it does), why not use another term?

because it's the shape of a hamburger, that's why.
and it's my belief that so few people would ever begin to think about taking offence at something shaped like a hamburger being describes as being 'in the shape of a hamburger' that there is more to lose than to gain. if 'three little lines' did the trick, 'the shape of a hamburger' wouldn't be being used.
and i'm just asking you to test your thinking in a wider forum, that's all. as someone who has taken quite a pasting on this thread for not going along with the line here, i can understand why you would shrink from it.

Surely, though, if hamburgers didn't exist, they'd find another description - right?

bloody hell, stewie... read the thread. one person beaten up by the vast majority and I'M the one who is being dismissive? lolol. and trampling? am i not allowed on here? fucksakes, the amount of times i have stood up for this place, but i really see what they are talking about now. you, in particular, have sought to undermine in your customary passive aggressive way and you really seem to object to the fact that i haven't rolled over.

jericho... hamburgers exist. as your pal stewie would say... get over it.

Shit ! Sorry, I only just realized!

I was actually arguing against the existence of hamburgers!

Damn, I feel bad for all that basic and simple feminist analysis I bothered with there.

no idea if you are being sarcastic or making a joke. so i am going to go with 'making a joke' and in return.

Ah, good.

I was beginning to worry!

Surely, even if you think that its only a small proportion of women, who've been abused and exposed to some unpleasant stuff, who think 'hamburger' evokes nasty connotations in the context of female genitalia, you'd want to care for that small proportion?

Most doctors are wonderful people who aim to make the majority of their patients content.

we have 11 pages on this????
weird

It looks like a hamburger. So whats wrong with saying it looks like a hamburger?

nice idea, but that's not true of the NHS at all. it's an organisation that needs to find the most expedient way of achieving the result, and with five mins per scan they're going to use the most obvious allusion. and actually on this thread i'd be inclined to think that the middle of the venn diagram that includes pregnant women who have ever heard female genitals described as 'hamburgers' and been offended by it to the degree that they would be offended by the mere expression 'shape' of a hamburger despite the fact that it IS describing something that is the shape of a hamburger would be so statistically insignificant as not to warrant the cost of re-training every sonographer in the country.

to be fair a lot of it is me asking exactly that, tuffintop.

So, female genitalia on a scan looks mostly like a hamburger, so sonagraphers who can read scans easily, tell parents who can't read scans easily that they should look for the bit that looks like a hamburger?

and some people think that they have heard female genitalia in porn referred to as hamburger?

Therefore, porn terminology must have filtered through to sonographers?

Sorry, but this is one of the craziest theories I have ever heard of

It isn't about female genitalia being referred to as hamburgers in porn. As I said earlier, the connection is more subtle.

I can't find a link to the Hustler image I'm looking for, oddly, because it is as famous as the meat grinder one. It is late and my googling skills have left me. It is in a slide in a presentation by Gail Dines. The whole presentation is well worth watching but for people pressed for time, you get the burger image at about 10.20 - 10.25 in (you should be able to drag forward).

i imagine most people know of the images, beachcomber. no question they're awful, but it's you who is drawing the line between that and a foetus's genitalia. not the sonographer and not the vast, vast, vast majority of parents.

I'm not really drawing a line. I'm just am able to see why it is an unfortunate turn of phrase.

That the vast majority of people will not be aware of.

And it is nothing to do with descriptions of genitalia. It is to do with graphic representations of women.

I'm guessing that it won't bother most people now. But at the time Hustler published those images (in an issue that was called the 'all meat' issue), women took to the streets in protest.

Honestly, check out the burger one in the Dines presentation. It might illustrate why this bothers feminists. You don't have to agree of course. And I accept that for most people, it is a pretty obscure reference nowadays. It was headline news at the time though.

Forgot to say - what made Hustler publish the 'all meat' issue was the fact that women were speaking out about 'being hung up like pieces of meat' in porn.

That is the referecne that I would imagine most people to be aware of, even if they aren't aware of Hustler's 'fuck you' response to that protest.

But hey, like I said, it is crass and unfortunate - not the first up against the wall come the revolution, but little things do matter.

Just look at how we all police our language when it comes to crass racist language (and so we should).

look, beachcomber, i would agree with you if the thing wasn't actually shaped like a farking hamburger. i presume a black person would be okay with, as one of the sonographers said below, something that looked like a banana being described as 'banana shaped', despite the fact that throwing bananas onto the pitch has very publicly and very globally been used to oppress black football players.