'Mother' and 'Father' advised against.

[AdaFuckingShelby]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-56372118

What's next? Primary care giver day?

@Lilyofthevalleys

Are they rebranding as Personchester university?

Haha 😂

I prefer these:

•	Parent or guardian, rather than mother or father
•	Partner, rather than husband or wife
•	Sibling, rather than brother or sister
•	Artificial or synthetic, rather than man-made
•	Humankind, not mankind
•	Workforce, not manpower
•	We provide cover or staff, rather than to 'man'

I do not like:

•	You or they/their/them, not he/she or him/her
•	People/person or individual(s), rather than man/men or woman/women

It reminds me of when someone was looking for a colleague and everyone was saying "black hair, short, wearing blah, blah" and I sat there amused as everyone tried to describe the person using the word Asian.

Parent or Guardian is appropriate in a school situation, because it is addressed to the person(s) who have legal responsibility to the child.

It makes no sense beyond that though. Certainly not adults at university.

• WITHOUT using the word Asian

Also, when you meet someone you might say do you have any siblings but you quickly start talking about brothers/sisters once it's established what they have. Same with partner and wife/husband parent and mum/dad.

So it's fine for initial contact but I'd think you were a bit weird for continuing to talk about sibling when I've clearly said sister and parent when I've said mum.

I agree Melroses . Completely understandable in a school setting where parental/guardian consent is required for things. But in a university I can't help but feel it's part of the erosion of the sexes.

Quadzilla

"so you can be rewarded by climbing their Workplace Index."

That will be "The wokeplace". Are these supposedly intelligent organisations really so scared of Stonewall that they are forced to perform actions which are more typical of an extreme religious cult?

Wokeplace

And below that in Other Stories there was a headline

Man and woman seriously injured after crash in north Manchester - an Audi fled the scene

WIth the same gudiance applied that would be Persons seriously injured (I hope thay are alright) outside Personchester and the anthropomorphising of a car? So

Two people injusted just outside Personchester. An Audi fled the scene

Do I worry for an aunt and uncle who live in Manchester and may have been involved? Or shrug and say no, it's just people, somewhere, nothing to do with me. But what about that car?

Somehow the car would be the most human thing in the headline!

@Melroses

Parent or Guardian is appropriate in a school situation, because it is addressed to the person(s) who have legal responsibility to the child.

It makes no sense beyond that though. Certainly not adults at university.

Of course it does. Employers may have policies around adjustments for parental responsibilities. A uni almost certainly has crèches - they're not only for the benefit of mothers.

Using neutral for parent in these sort of situations is good.

If they've eg got breastfeeding facilities then they should refer to mothers, and add additional descriptors for the (mostly theoretical) Nb or trans parents needing to feed a baby.

But in a university I can't help but feel it's part of the erosion of the sexes.

I think it's more to do with trying to erode artificial 'gendered' roles and behaviours. Normalise the idea that parents, rather than mothers, need to shoulder parental responsibilities.

I can confirm that a very woke staff member of this University has just sent her Mum a lovely Mother's Day card.

Parent or guardian is used a lot on generic forms and I don't see a huge issue, not because of gender though. Partner is also fair enough, my best friend is married to a woman and she always by default gets asked about her husband; but saying that she's happy to just say nah it's wife, but appreciate not everyone is as laid back about it.

I do agree that mother and father shouldn't be 'banned', but it doesn't seem that's what is happening here?

CuriousaboutSamphire
Good point eloquently made.

Pity I didn't proof read it

@Lilyofthevalleys

Are they rebranding as Personchester university?

I think you mean Peroffspringchester university.

Ooh! yes! I checked 'chest' but not 'son'!!! Grr!

Peroffspringchester it is!

You know that whole thing where TRAs act like just because an idea is also held by people they've deemed problematic it is therefore a bad idea? Yeah, let's not do this here. Just because Stonewall think parent/guardian is better for gender identity reasons, doesn't mean parent/guardian doesn't make sense in terms of different family setups.

Really don't see the issue with this.
I am legally a parent to two children but not their mother. It's not woke of me to want to be included when referring to my child?

Lots of people up in arms about this in my local Facebook group last night. Claiming mother's day was cancelled. Its just about including everyone.

@MedusasBadHairDay

You know that whole thing where TRAs act like just because an idea is also held by people they've deemed problematic it is therefore a bad idea? Yeah, let's not do this here. Just because Stonewall think parent/guardian is better for gender identity reasons, doesn't mean parent/guardian doesn't make sense in terms of different family setups.

It's part of the wider whole, I think!

Stonewall have a stated aim, it's been there for over a decade. They work towards, in their own words, removing the protected characterstic of sex, single sex spaces as they deem this injurious to transpeople.

So we see a slow creep:

Remove sexed terms and replace it with gender neutral

Take sex out of everything, make gender the go to term.

That's what is really being objected to. The continued slow creep.

@MedusasBadHairDay

You know that whole thing where TRAs act like just because an idea is also held by people they've deemed problematic it is therefore a bad idea? Yeah, let's not do this here. Just because Stonewall think parent/guardian is better for gender identity reasons, doesn't mean parent/guardian doesn't make sense in terms of different family setups.

It's actually an instance of stonewall promoting - for whatever reason - perfectly standard feminist and anti homophobic adjustments to the language. Part or all of stonewalls intent in this case could be primarily for the benefit of LGB more than T.

When we're thinking of employment, for centuries many employers including all universities were single sex spaces and shouldn't have been. Society at large was completely heteronormative and shouldn't have been. A move to neutral language for roles which shouldn't be predicated on sex or sexuality is good. Imposing neutral language on roles which are necessarily sexed is bad.

I’m a teacher and never refer to parents/mother/father, I say ‘care giver’. I teach children from all households - step families, children with same sex parents, children in care. I think that term is all encompassing.

@motherrunner

I’m a teacher and never refer to parents/mother/father, I say ‘care giver’. I teach children from all households - step families, children with same sex parents, children in care. I think that term is all encompassing.

Yes, quite - and this doesn't mean for one moment mean you want to ban the word 'mother', your NN suggests it's part of your own identity.

@motherrunner

I’m a teacher and never refer to parents/mother/father, I say ‘care giver’. I teach children from all households - step families, children with same sex parents, children in care. I think that term is all encompassing.

As Errol said, that's as it should be, though I was never comfortable with 'care giver' and used 'parent or guardian', which actually isn't that much better.

A parent/care giver is a non sexed position.

But a mother is female! Father male. They don't need to be removed, just used as appropriate!