Guardian: people unable to identify or name women's genitalia

[Lettera]

The cognitive dissonance beggars belief

www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/may/30/most-britons-cannot-name-parts-vulva-survey

I think thankfully it's a very small survey.

Oh FFS.

And yet "people with a cervix" is deemed inclusive. It's really annoying, people keep doing these surveys, and pontificating about how terrible and shocking it is, but nothing is ever done.

Perhaps if schools spent more time teaching anatomy and less time teaching that children can be born in the wrong bodies....

Less than half the people surveyed knew women have three openings?
Jesus, that's ridiculous.

Perhaps if schools spent more time teaching anatomy

But they can't teach anatomy because they can't say this is what a male/mans/boys body looks like and this what a female/womans/girls body looks like.

I know of a biology teacher who is constantly 'corrected' by one of their schools trans children

If you teach that there is no right way to be female, it’s very difficult to also say that a healthy female body should function in a particular way.

@VettiyaIruken

Less than half the people surveyed knew women have three openings? Jesus, that's ridiculous.

It is, but sadly I’m not surprised. It’s amazing how many people think women pee out of the vagina. Even some women - you’d think they’d have noticed

“It’s horrifying that people know so little about the vulva and female anatomy,” said Lynn Enright, the author of Vagina: A Re-education. “It’s not that surprising though. I think we are much more familiar with diagrams depicting the female reproductive system – the uterus, fallopian tubes and ovaries – than images of the external genitalia, correctly labelled.”

Isn't it considered transphobic now to "gender body parts". I'm surprised the Guardian has published something that refers to the "female reproductive system" and "female anatomy"!

There are many many people in the country who may have poor understanding of things like this, some of it may be down to education, some of it may be down to cultural differences, communication difficulties or learning disabilities.
People with learning disabilities have far poorer health outcomes than people without, and a part of this is unclear communication on the part of the people producing health messages.
It infuriates me when this vulnerable group of people are derided for not knowing about this sort of information, especially when Sen support is so poor in this country.

Using “people with a cervix” on cervical screening letters could cost lives. My local NHS trust uses “women and people with a cervix”, which is better, but it’s still not right. It suggests that women don’t have cervices.

Well this is what happens when women's genitalia is unspeakable and shameful, and its only getting worse as speaking about it is now exclusionary too.

Can you even imagine if we lived in a world where men had no idea how to identify their penis, foreskin, scrotum, and if all their genitals were just called 'man bits' or something vague and general like that?

I always make it very clear to the students I teach that they have three holes. I always say "there's a wee hole, a poo hole and a baby hole" before we get into the proper anatomy. They are almost all surprised and a lot just don't seem to believe me. I tell them to get a mirror and take a look!

So the guardian has written an article saying that many people, even women, don’t know what the external layout of the female genital region is - and they’re much more familiar with the school text book diagram of the internal female reproductive system and this lack of knowledge is very worrying. And they’ve illustrated it with….a school textbook diagram of the internal female reproductive system? What exactly was their thinking there? Or do they assume that anyone reading this on the Guardian already knows everything so this is a story about how ignorant the proles are rather than a chance to inform anyone.

I was showing a student how to catheterise a patient and my student, a 2nd year nursing student, thought that women peed outta their vagina.

I was absolutely bloody shocked at that!

I had a colleague who returned from her maternity leave. She told me that her baby came early because she had "a water infection". I asked whether it was a urine infection or the amniotic fluid. "I don't know," she replied, "the doctors just said it was an infection in my waters."

It's no wonder that young people swallow the nonsensical claim that biology is irrelevant.

Why is life now so complicated?

@VettiyaIruken

Less than half the people surveyed knew women have three openings? Jesus, that's ridiculous.

When my son was about two he announced loudly in a cafe that "mummies have three holes, one for wee, one for poo and one for babies". I can't exactly remember how we got to that point in the discussion. It certainly turned some heads amongst the other customers.

Very small sample. Though I would not be surprised if a significant proportion of men had no idea about women's genitalia.

My husband only realised last year (aged 42) that women have 3 'openings'. I made a passing comment about it in conversation and he looked utterly confused. I was pretty shocked - he's intelligent and has plenty of common sense. He just didn't know. I don't think that it's that uncommon for men particularly to not know.

Mark my words - this is all leading up to the scenario whereby victims of abuse won't be permitted or able to name their own private parts in court, meaning that nonces will get off Scot free.

Eve Appeal is a charity that highlights female reproductive cancers. They did a survey a few years ago, quite a bit survey, and found that 50% of women don't know the difference between their vulva and their vagina.

So, how do you know if you have vulval cancer if you don't know where your vulva is?

Women die because of this stuff.

Interesting article from the Guardian as their journalist got it wrong earlier in the year.
‘This article was amended on 5 January 2021 because an earlier version, in two instances, referred to the sculpture as of a vagina, when vulva was the correct term.’

They didn’t change the headline though probably because of the pun on ‘vagina monologues’.

www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/03/the-vagina-dialogues-33-metre-artwork-draws-far-rights-ire-in-brazil

Drives me mad on naked attraction when they “what do you think about her vagina”, etc. No it’s not her vagina, it’s her vulva you idiots. Seeing her vagina is going to take some interesting camera angles!