Student midwives at a Scottish university taught that men can give birth

[Clymene]

Look at this absolute nonsense:

According to the workbook, students were advised: “It is important to note that while most times the birthing person will have female genitalia, you may be caring for a pregnant or birthing person who is transitioning from male to female and may still have external male genitalia.”
https://reduxx.info/exclusive-midwifery-students-taught-how-to-care-for-males-giving-birth/

In a teaching workbook for midwifery students.

I just can't deal with so much stupid.

This is appalling

No way can this be real, and if it is, there's zero way it's being used in midwifery education. No midwife would teach this inaccuracy to students.

A midwife will never catheterise a penis. Obviously those with real penises won't be getting pregnant, and those with fake penises would have to have had female genitalia to get pregnant. Nobody is having surgery down there while pregnant.

Therefore nobody giving birth will have a penis.

There are various barriers to accessing healthcare for various demographics. And they still chose to create another one. This will put many people off because they need to he asked tontrust their drs and midwives with life and death situations. How can you trust staff with your babies life if they honestly hink men can give birth.

Wtf

No way can this be real, and if it is, there's zero way it's being used in midwifery education. No midwife would teach this inaccuracy to students.

Unfortunately, given that the University hasn't immediately issued a statement denying it, might suggest it is indeed true. It would have been very simple to issue a statement saying " don't be stupid, no self respecting medical institution would issue material suggesting that people with male genitalia can give birth."

I work in HE and I just despair. That this was published and given to students is just absurd. The have out woked themselves and tied themselves up in such complicated language that the hole is dug and they can't get out of this with any statements.

They cannot claim it was a mistake and it should have been female to male as there wouldn't be any talk of prostates etc..... if it was a mistake as they don't insert a prostate gland when they do trans surgery.

This just creates more sunlight on the nonsense language we are expected to use for everyone. Nothing wrong with having resources for midwives who may, once or twice in their life, encounter someone like Freddie whose gender dysphoria isn't so severe that they can't cope with being pregnant. Or a non-binary person who thinks they are the first biological woman with short hair and unshaven pudenda to give birth.
Have a module on that as part of the training by all means.
Make sure you have one on birth trauma too because that seemed to be a surprise to them when I gave birth.
But stop dehumanising women

The other thing that really pissed me off was trans patients getting private rooms to give them more privacy and dignity. As women I think we can all attest that we would like more dignity and privacy after giving birth but nope we get chucked into a multiple bay ward with no help or support and no chance of a rest due to the noise etc......

No way can this be real, and if it is, there's zero way it's being used in midwifery education. No midwife would teach this inaccuracy to students.

The trouble is people are really confused, and scared. You can literally lose your job, as well as be ostracised by friends and family, for questioning this madness. That’s why we also have nurses telling women that a male in the bed next to them on a women’s ward is a woman - even if he’s waving his penis around, wanking, harassing women and/or being called a male name by his visitors - and they’re a bigot for thinking otherwise.

Furthermore even some HCPs don’t understand the issues as they are being so misrepresented and lied about by the gender lobby. As a PP said there is actual important medical information that is needed to help trans men give birth, and that would be genuinely inclusive. But charities like stonewall don’t really care about that - instead they want organisations to mislead people about the law and force people to lie about others’ sex. It’s no wonder there’s so much misinformation and confusion around.

I’m actually not surprised by this as IMO it’s the natural end result of letting dogma replace fact and not letting people ask questions. Of course many people involved in creating and teaching this BS will know it doesn’t make sense to them - but they’ve been told that makes them a bigot and they must keep quiet.

I hope it’s another thing that helps institutions, the nhs in particular , finally wake up.

But this is literally wrong. It's impossible for a midwife to ever be in this position, given that womb transplants are not a viable option yet. If a lecturer in midwifery didn't refuse to teach this basic inaccuracy, they deserve to lose their job imo.

Trans women being on women's wards is open for discussion (no, I don't agree with it, but it is what it is). There can't possibly be any discussion around biological men giving birth because it can't happen.

Weren't Napier University in the news a year (or so) ago too? Disciplining a student for saying women have vaginas if I recall correctly?

Of course it’s wrong, I understand that and so probably does almost everyone involved. The point is people are being coerced into saying and agreeing with falsehoods and that’s been going on for years now. When something is clearly wrong, people would normally point that out, discuss it, correct it etc but with anything to do with trans, they are rightly scared they’ll lose their job, or maybe think that they just don’t get it but don’t want to a bigot so go along with it. People can justify things to themselves, we all do that in various ways.

So however this ended up in the materials, whether through ignorance, misunderstanding or a befuddled attempt to be inclusive, or even a silly pisstake, no one would dare to be the one who raises it. That’s what stonewalling has done - made people scared to mention reality.

A different university Floisme:

www.heraldscotland.com/news/19359567.abertay-university-student-lisa-keogh-cleared-investigated-saying-women-vaginas/

If a lecturer in midwifery didn't refuse to teach this basic inaccuracy, they deserve to lose their job imo.

And yet a midwife in this position could well reasonably fear that she’d lose her job if she did refuse.

In this case, I’m pretty sure a court of law would rule in her favour, but many people don’t want and/or can’t afford to go through all that.

Student midwives at Napier University taught that men can get pregnant

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/d628cf34-c706-11ec-81c0-e8eabc9951c2?shareToken=3d065f541f9be64ea4190c44fae0e84e

This story is in the Times today. Apparently.....the member of staff who updated the text, confused a trans man with a trans woman.

See, this issue demonstrates perfectly the problem we often have with many of this issues.

People just cannot believe that they are real. The automatic (and logical, tbh) response is 'this has to be a hoax'.

Unfortunately, it's a 'hoax' that's been played out in hospital wards, schools, prisons, workplaces, public meetings, sports venues and publishing houses for the past decade.

Yes, it's absurd. Yes, it's really happening. Yes, it's dangerous.

Sadly, it is not a hoax.

It's impossible for a midwife to ever be in this position, given that womb transplants are not a viable option yet.

I take your overall point in context. Womb transplants (to a female recipient) have happened and resulted in successful pregnancies (40+ worldwide, iirc).

Womb implants (to a male recipient) are a very different matter. I gather there's an intention to research this but it's certainly nowhere near inclusion in a textbook or workbook.

Ah my mistake, apologies.

I'm afraid it is real.

A spokesperson from Napier University has acknowledged it.

A spokesman for Napier said the university was “committed to upholding the professional standards required of us” by the Nursing and Midwifery Council and that it wished “to be inclusive of all people, including those who identify within the LGBTQ+ communities”.
The spokesman added: “The teaching materials will be updated as required.”

(From the Times article @Igneococcus linked to).

I don't blame the students for not speaking up. There is a toxic culture which means women who do challenge and question are ostracised and targeted with harassment - ask Milli Hill.

When something is clearly wrong, people would normally point that out, discuss it, correct it etc but with anything to do with trans, they are rightly scared they’ll lose their job, or maybe think that they just don’t get it but don’t want to a bigot so go along with it. People can justify things to themselves, we all do that in various ways.

I liked this pithy phrasing I saw on Twitter the other day:

Censorship is a fatal error, as it destroys the means of error correction.

Great comments under the article in the Times.

Edinburgh Napier is usually known for not "resting on its laurels" just for having been founded a long time ago like St Andrews or the University of Edinburgh, but for focusing on getting its students really well prepared for the workplace, having really high employment rates among its graduates etc.
What on earth is it doing using this rubbish in teaching?

Clearly not written by an expert. (or anyone even vaguely medically trained.) It looks like someone has said "Ah, transmen can give birth" and decided that all transmen have had magical surgery which gives them identical bodies to males (while still somehow retaining a functioning womb). Then has just copied & pasted all the instructions for male catheterisation out of a general nursing textbook (leaving in references to prostates etc). Without thinking at all about it.

This is really, really poor advice and completely inadequate in training medics to be able to treat transmen. What if one of the students trained on this is called in to help in another department one day, sees a post-phalloplasty transman who needs to be catheterised, and thinks "Oh yes, I remember from the workbook that the procedure is the same as male catherisation" and ends up doing damage to the phalloplasty site?

Quite apart from how I wouldn't feel confident that anything else from that workbook is medically correct.

So true @DomesticatedZombie . For years now these issues were not on my radar. I bought in to the message that changes were needed to improve the lives of a marginalised and often victimised minority group. I'm a middle aged woman and it was only through my teenage kids that I learned the names of all the different new genders. I admit it wasn't until my daughter started asking if she could have her uterus removed and her breasts binded that I started to read more into it. Prior to that I stupidly assumed there was no harm in accommodating all groups. I've had a massive wake up call. I'm in admiration of brave women like Allison Bailey and Maya Forstater who are challenging and succeeding in the courts of law. I'm no longer a bystander on these matters.

MNHQ please can you sort out the size of the pictures? Clicking to maximise barely makes it any bigger. The only way I could see the above was to copy and paste the image onto a word document and enlarge it. Thanks

Bergamotte
Clearly not written by an expert.

Who picked that information provider to produce the education material?

Who's job was that?

Who did they report to?

What process was in place to ensure that all the medical texts are updating as medicine and best pratice changed?

What basic audit of new / topical materials was made to ensure they were in line with the latest advances?

Who's job was it to present all that work to the board of examiners to assure them that the texts and teaching materials used to cover the syllabus produced a knowledgeable student nurse?

Why was there no thought that the student nurse would need a minimum competency to understand its a female with extra needs. That's actually important as female and male "normal" test results may differ, medicines (note the male was given more than the female so a possible medical error becomes best pratice) and the equipment differed by female/male body. A pregnant female with a complex medical history is not a pregnant male.

Without thinking at all about it.
The old saying Doctors bury their mistakes.

Quite apart from how I wouldn't feel confident that anything else from that workbook is medically correct.

I would be more cynical, who was getting the academic boost of having their material used by a recognised educational body?

Who got paid for the work involved in producing the document?

At each step who was involved and how did they benefit by publishing that material?

Students felt scared to speak up, or to question what they were being told.
What happens when those students become midwives and find themselves in a situation where they need to speak up on behalf of their patient, or question those in authority over them but are still scared?