'Don't call us menstruators' petition taken down by Change.org

[stumbledin]

The petition, titled “Don’t call us menstruators”, garnered 3,000 signatures in less than three days before Change.org removed the petition for violating the site’s “Community Guidelines”.

thepostmillennial.com/dont-call-us-menstruators-petition-censored-by-change-org?

My petition “Don’t call us menstruators” which had 3000 signatures in under 3 days has now been REMOVED by @change
for “violating the terms + conditions”.

They’ve literally silenced women on a petition about women being silenced. #WRONGTHINK #IstandwithJKR #BoycottBodyshop

twitter.com/jadakix/status/1274639721671557121

Presumably a TRA complained. If women complain about anti-women petitions started by activists, are they taken down??

The whole point of using “people who menstruate” is that not all women menstruate and some people who don’t identify as women do menstruate. The only one equating women to menstruaters is you lot.

The only people who lose rights because they menstruate - the ability to travel, access education and work - are women. Most women will, do or have menstruated, and women are preventing from participating in society on equal terms with men because of their biology.

Pussy footing around this fact and insisting that 'woman' is just an identity facilitates the oppression of women. I don't think being described as a 'menstruator' reduces my identity, I know that it reduces my ability to talk about my rights.

Honestly, I do not think that people born female and identifying as men or boys are the most vulnerable people in any society at the moment. I think they are people who have no choices what so ever because they were born female. The last thing any one cares about is their identity. We cannot talk about their rights if we can't talk about sex.

There are also people who do feel they don't want to define themselves by sex or think of it in those binary terms.

Yet that makes no difference to the rights they require because of their sex.

For years the word woman was used and women who didn't menstruated for whatever reason managed to cope

It's like saying that " just for men " hair dye should be renamed "just for hirsutes" dye cos some men are bald and some are not grey

Interesting how the initial claim from TRAs is that its "inclusive" to call us menstruator and we must do so to not exclude trans masc and non-binary individuals who menstruate, and to avoid triggering their dysphoria/dysmorphia. Yet by calling dysphoric trans guys 'menstruators', they are in fact referring to them purely in terms of the function of the exact same female reproductive system that distresses them and reminds them they're not XY.

Unsurprisingly it always starts as "but what about the trans men?", only for it to be a bait n switch, with them taking about five minutes to begin terfing and raging about "NOT ALL WOMEN MENSTRUATE!", and wanging on about how TRANS WOMEN ARE WOMEN !!!1!1!".

There are also people who do feel they don't want to define themselves by sex or think of it in those binary terms.

Yet that makes no difference to the rights they require because of their sex.

I agree. I'm perfectly happy however for them to state their beliefs and chosen self descriptors however they feel they need to - so long as they don't expect to control and erase mine.

Particularly now people are living longer, women are likely to spend half their lives 'not menstruating'. However, a woman will 'not menstruate' for a completely different reason to a man. If we can't talk about that, and have to pretend that we are protecting feelings by talking about 'menstruators' we make women's biology shameful. Again.

[quote riotlady]hmm I’ll agree with that when people who need condoms are called sperm makers or ejaculators, not all men make sperm and some sperm makers are not ‘men’... but no one has to mangle the English language or invent offensive nonwords for them.

Condom companies could do with catching up, I agree. But people with penises/testicles is definitely being used

www.teenhealthcare.org/article/sexual-anatomy-of-people-with-a-penis/

www.healthline.com/health/healthy-sex/play-with-testicles

www.cancer.net/cancer-types/testicular-cancer/symptoms-and-signs

www.healthline.com/health/signs-of-high-testosterone#signs-in-people-with-penises

www.plannedparenthood.org/learn/cancer/testicular-cancer[/quote]
These appear to be American sites - don’t know what that has to do with the UK. As you cannot find a UK site (which is sizeable / well known) I assume that it isn’t happening. Men aren’t be called ‘penis havers’, ‘beard wearers’ or ‘non women’.

There are currently 305 petitions with TW in the title.

www.change.org/search?q=trans%20women

The only one equating women to menstruaters is you lot.

Yes, that’s the problem - somehow the rest of the world is pretending to forget that only female people (the people previously known as ‘women and girls’) menstruate.

It’s batshittery and it undermines women’s advocacy and women’s rights (y’know, the rights we have specifically in relation to being the female of the species).

Should just be renamed Woke.org

Can’t believe they’ve taken it down.

When exactly am I to be described as a menstruator? When I’m actually bleeding?
Am I a non-menstruating menstruator in the three weeks that I'm not?

Also used pads after birth, miscarriages and a termination. Presume I will later need some tenor lady because of the above ‘woman’s lived experience’.

Should I be termed at times specifically as birthinator, terminator and leakinator? Pantwetter?

Lochiator (yuk)

Of course they shut it down, it was becoming far too popular. Imagine how many signatures it would've got if left up.

It would completely ruin the trans narrative. How dare women choose their own words!

@riotlady

“both reducing women to their biological functions, and dismissing that those biological functions are what differentiate women from men.”

This is the part I don’t get about GC feminists... you don’t want to be defined by your biology but you also want everyone to be defined by their biology. The whole point of using “people who menstruate” is that not all women menstruate and some people who don’t identify as women do menstruate. The only one equating women to menstruaters is you lot.

Yes, the fact that you don't get it is abundantly clear. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to have occurred to you that this inability might be down to a deficiency of yours, not ours.

@Michelleoftheresistance

Females - we want a say in what we're called, the way we've always had.

Trans activist lobby - you'll be what we call you and you'll shut up about it. You don't get a say, you don't get an opinion, you don't get to use any normal avenue of protest or complaint, you don't get to have feelings about it or to do anything but exactly what we say.

Then they're baffled females are very pissed off.

This is perfect. I am a woman and I will continue to call myself so. I refuse to have my womanhood erased.

When I started this thread I was confused as i was sure there had been a thread.

So have now tracked down the original thread and it is on petitions at www.mumsnet.com/Talk/petitions_noticeboard/3942329-Petition-Body-Shop-Dont-call-us-menstruators?pg=5

And if you go to page 5 of that thread there is an update suggestion on how to respond to change.

But I still cant think how anyone would think the original petition was against community standards.

Seems to some up perfectly what is going on at the moment.

Being a woman is against community standards!

This is the part I don’t get about GC feminists... you don’t want to be defined by your biology but you also want everyone to be defined by their biology.

Using the word 'woman' already defines our biology.

We just want everyone to stop fucking around with it.

We want to be called women because it negates the need to specify us as cervix havers or menstruators.

The other people claiming to be women need to use another noun.

This one is taken.

For the umpteenth time, how inclusive it it to women who have never menstruated due to medical conditions (not because they were born a male) or women who no longer menstruate? They are still women.

Is it to call women menstruators who have never menstruated etc.

Sorry.

The only one equating women to menstruaters is you lot.

No. Here is the "Women's" March (yes the same one in which Munroe Bergdorf told us not to centre our female bodies) telling us how many menstruators were in Parliament in 1973. Do you honestly think they knew their menstrual status? Or was it that they just see it as a handy dehumanising "inclusive" shorthand for woman?

'Fun history lesson - when the UK joined the eu it had a limited time to choose which products could remain tax free before everything had to have vat on it. In 1973 there were 23 menstruators in parliament. So really the tampon tax is an issue of political representation.'

If you disaggregate everything, you become less able to spot what they have in common.

Chest feeder forced to feed baby in toilet
Gestator refused promotion
Menstruators taxed on essential items

Slightly less impactful than ‘women fucked over again by the patriarchy’.

Excellent point.

Oh for fucks sake.

Mentruators. It fails to understand female biology. At all.

How does a female child know when she will start menstruating? If she will?

How does any woman who has had a period know for sure the next one will come? They are erratic at the start and for some girls/ women all the time.

Lots of sport can make them stop.

Weight loss can make them stop.

Illness can make them stop.

Pregnancy usually makes them stop.

Breastfeeding often keeps them stopped.

Any girl or woman on hormonal contraception has a withdrawal bleed, not a period, medically.

Stress can make them stop.

Women who are perimenopausal can go for months without one. Then have one. Is it the last one? Who can say.

So you tell me, riotlady. Who is a mentruator? Who needs information about menstruation? Because 'people who menstruate' in the context of actual female lives and biology, is really totally fucking unclear.

I am keen to hear your answer. I really am.

I also want to know what is wrong with eg 'women, girls and others who menstruate'. I mean it's a bit silly but I'd be ok with it.

Keen to hear your thoughts.

Noble yes of course.

I said years ago on here.

Say you are looking at education in X country.

100% boys educated 0% female.

If boy/ girl is something you can only know if you ask (a key thing with tra, assuming people's gender is totally out of order)

Then all you can say is 50 % of children are educated.

Sex differential erased.

Handy, eh.