Pregnant people?

[Trustisamust]

So our local NHS Trust have finally updated their guidance re allowing partners to attend pregnancy scans etc.
They now refer to pregnant people, not pregnant women.
I don't know if I am being unreasonable here but this does not sit comfortably with me?

ASugarr If 'woman' is a gender term (it isn't but let's pretend for the purpose of this question) how many women are there and what is it specifically that makes them a woman? Also, how can you justify excluding billions of ex-women who would say they are women but can't be now that you, the ultimate arbiter, have to decree that's the case?

Completely agree with @edgeofacoin. Weird too how everything must change for the feelings of a tiny minority of women who don't want to be called women (no offence intended, but I'm using the definition of adult human female like the law and most of the world does), and yet the fact that most women want to be called women doesn't matter.

Pregnancy, miscarriage, birth, PND, are all uniquely female experiences. That matters. I was really relieved that my local Trust didn't call me a "person who is pregnant" or worse, a "person who has miscarried". I am a woman, and these are women's experiences, including all the pain and grief.

I'm not sure I can fully explain the importance of these experiences being recognised as female, but it is important to most of us.

Only women have wombs. The clue is in the name.

Woman is a term for an adult human female. Therefore it is a sex-based term.

If you really want a term based on gender stereotypes please can you invent your own word.

The dictionary definition of woman shows that ‘woman is a gender term’ is simply wrong and no amount of repetition will make it so.

I'm not sure I can fully explain the importance of these experiences being recognised as female, but it is important to most of us.

Yes it is important. And we don't have to give our language up to appease a minority who thinks it's possible to identify into or out of womanhood. People can dress however they want. They can't change what's underneath though.

Someone coming onto a feminist board to argue that the demands of a group of individuals (miniscule in numbers) outweighs the needs of all women, including the truly marginalised / dispossessed groups of women in this country. Women living in poverty as asylum seekers, women with English as an additional language, women with learning disabilities, with special needs - all women who may struggle to access medical treatment and information. None of their needs matter compared with the demands of this tiny and unrepresentative group.

Indefensible.

Woman is the word which is used to refer to an adult human female, the type of human whose physiology has the reproductive organs associated with large gametes and the capacity to bear young whether or not that capacity is used, whether or not menopause, illness or anomaly makes it impossible. This is widely accepted as fact.

“Woman is a gender” is a minority belief or point of view.

You know what I find extremely, extremely offensive? The suggestion that transwomen and infertile women are in some how any way similar situations - transwomen can still have their own biological children for f-sake! And without painful and expensive medical interventions.

Someone coming onto a feminist board to argue that the demands of a group of individuals (miniscule in numbers) outweighs the needs of all women

Really it's best to entirely ignore these people. They come here because they're bored, they like trying to wind people up, their world appears to be conducted almost entirely online, and they're looking for more twitter followers to give them kudos for their 'activism'. It's quite pathetic and the immaturity / lack of logic / knowledge they display is really quite astounding. My kids are still quite young, yet they have so much more knowledge and understanding around critical thought and safeguarding than these so called adults.

@Erkrie

Someone coming onto a feminist board to argue that the demands of a group of individuals (miniscule in numbers) outweighs the needs of all women

Really it's best to entirely ignore these people. They come here because they're bored, they like trying to wind people up, their world appears to be conducted almost entirely online, and they're looking for more twitter followers to give them kudos for their 'activism'. It's quite pathetic and the immaturity / lack of logic / knowledge they display is really quite astounding. My kids are still quite young, yet they have so much more knowledge and understanding around critical thought and safeguarding than these so called adults.

How very true. It is an education to see individuals who are so opposed to women's identity, language and rights spending so much time on here desperately word salading around

@AuroraBor

You know what I find extremely, extremely offensive? The suggestion that transwomen and infertile women are in some how any way similar situations - transwomen can still have their own biological children for f-sake! And without painful and expensive medical interventions.

You've hit the nail on the head here. As someone who really struggled to conceive and had to go through IVF I find this so offensive.

I think its just time for us all to accept that using language to describe ourselves and our particular experiences is a privilege that only applies to some.

At least for now we're still defined as people which is nice. 😶

It is an education to see individuals who are so opposed to women's identity, language and rights spending so much time on here desperately word salading around

Yes. They keep saying they are going (when things get a little too academically challenging for their brain to cope with) yet still hang around to keep a 'watchful' eye, allowing their incoherent thoughts to spew all over the page when they see an opportunity to do so. Not only that, but these individuals always grandly think of themselves as 'professional' with expert knowledge. There's absolutely no value in engaging with people like that.

@FrancesGumm

By saying ‘people’ it erases no-one. True. But by saying ‘people’ it includes everyone. Which is incorrect. Only women can become pregnant. Every single human being on this planet was carried in the womb of an adult human female aka a woman.

Every single human being on this planet was carried in the womb of an adult human female aka a woman.

This is the heart of the issue. Whoever came up with the term "penis envy" got it completely arse backwards

Why do you talk in meaningless platitudes, @ASugarr?

I asked you what distinguishes a 'man' from a 'woman'. You ignored the question. Let me make it clearer: if you cannot tell me what I, as an adult human female have in common with a mtf transitioner, why should I be expected to share my communal gym changing room with a mtf transitioner? Why can't the changing rooms be segregated by sex? Why can't hospital wards? Why can't prisons?

'Woman' is a gender term. What does that mean? How can I determine what my gender is? How do I know if I have the same gender identity as Katy Montgomerie or Eddie Izzard? What questions would you ask in order to help someone figure out their gender identity? You are going to ignore these questions too, I know.

Saying 'woman' is a gender term means nothing when you can't explain it. All you can say is that it has nothing to do with stereotypes.

Oh, and you can't give an example of a feminist issue. Everything is just a human rights issue.

The foundation of this ideology is based on sand.

I only hope lurkers are reading and learning from this exchange.

I'll leave my opinions as a sexual health professional there for today as I'm not here to try to anger or upset anyone.

Ahahahahahahahahahah........hahahahahaha Of course dear

Why don't we ever get TW on the tails of prostate cancer organisations etc hassling them to change it to "person with a prostate"? That applies to them after all, I would have thought the word "man" would be triggering as being misgendered is literal violence don't you know?

All quiet on the western front on that though. However activist after activist admonishing everything going with the word "woman" in it to get that word removed.

The day they start going after the word "man" as vehemently as "woman" I may feel differently. I shan't hold my breath. To me, this is less about inclusive language and more about no reminders of the things women have, that only women have. It's the word "woman" that is triggering and they want it wiped out. No naming women, no naming the things that only happen to women, no naming women only experiences. And if you can't name the sex, you can't fight sexism, or say there are issues that only affect that sex, or in the end, any differences between TW and women at all. And that's the goal. Already claiming the word female now women has all been but conquered.

Inclusive language is "women and other pregnant people". You want to be called something other than "woman" then you make a request for that, not the other way round. Not when women might be deeply offended - but being women, won't want to make a fuss, so stay silent and put up with it.

They wouldn't pull that shit with men. They wouldn't dare. Its why women get the death and rape threats for saying it, and a man might say the same and get fuck all pushback. When it comes to who to target, they know.

And saying that women experiencing fertility problems are part of the reason we need to change language. What utter rubbish. Many many women are unable to get pregnant for a variety of reasons. We know they're women, it's not hard.

As woman is the word used to define a member of the human species who is of the female sex why are you unwilling to use it ?

If sex is not gender why is the noun defining a female of the human species not acceptable when referring to something that only said members of that sex class can undergo? If sex is not gender why is it unacceptable to say that transmen are female and transwomen are male? If sex is not gender why is a " transgender male" now used to mean a person of the female sex who identifies as a man?
Make your mind up . Do you believe that people can change their physical sex or not?

And remember, gender and sex aren't the same thing. Woman is a gender term

Who exactly do you think you are? I tolerate being lectured to only by people I think actually know more than me.

@ASugarr

Well I don't like to think being pregnant as a womanly thing as (since you are all claiming being a woman is a sex term when it isn't) it is insulting to women who can't give birth or get pregnant. That's why we don't use gendered language because it isn't just to help transgender people. Trust me.

But anyway, I'm leaving it there for today. Have a lovely sunday all 🤍

And remember, gender and sex aren't the same thing. Woman is a gender term 🤍

Every single human being you have ever met on the entire planet came out of a woman.

I'll just leave that there.

^ ok I'll concede that if a baby human being ever came out of a woman who identifies as a man they came out of a woman who identifies as a man.

Who exactly do you think you are? I tolerate being lectured to only by people I think actually know more than me.

The high level of grandiosity is really quite something. I suspect they should be contacting their mental health practitioner rather than hanging around on Mumsnet delivering poorly thought out and illogical lectures to women here.

And remember, gender and sex aren't the same thing. Woman is a gender term

I'm old and this really upsets me. When I was a wee 'un I knew (because I was told) that I was a girl and that girls were inferior to boys (because I was told, by boys) and this was because they had dicks and I didn't. When I was older I was told that it sucks to be a girl because girls have babies. I was told that girls could not do all the things I wanted to do and when I tried (like play cricket) the boys were extra hard to keep me out. In those days women gave up work when they were married or had children, men's violence against women was accepted and acceptable and women daren't dream of anything other than being a wife and mother.

Some things have changed. But now I am not even allowed to name those real and tangible things about my sex that had a direct and personal impact on me.

This feels like virtual violence - symbolic violence and the theft of my ability to articulate my herstory and who I am.