The NHS responded to my query about erasing women from their website

[pink85]

Been a lurker here for a while and saw the thread about the NHS erasing the word woman from biological women's cancers. This was the response email. What does everyone think? (also sorry if I do anything wrong, not posted here before but love the gender discussions which are always honest and fair as I believe in sex based reality and am on the side of JK)

Thank you for contacting the NHS Website service desk.
The NHS Website provides information for everyone. We aim to use language that is inclusive, respectful, and relevant to the people reading it.
We are working to improve content across the NHS website to make it clearer, easier to understand and more accessible. This includes improving the structure of the pages, writing in plain English, and improving the inclusivity of the language we use to ensure people get the correct clinical information.
As part of this work, we recently updated a number of our cancer topics. As a result of our user research, we made significant changes to how the information was originally structured.
We have not removed the word women from any of our cancer topics, we use it on the causes page when speaking about who is at risk. On topics like ovarian and cervical cancers, where we previously only mentioned "women" we now say "women, trans men, non-binary and intersex people with ovaries". This ensures anyone who could get these cancers can understand the information is relevant to them.
There are 1000s of pages of content on the website and doing this work takes time. Some cancers (such as ovarian, penile and anal cancer) have been updated already, whereas some still need to be updated (such as vulval and testicular cancer). This can lead to some differences in our content. We are working towards being clear and consistent across the website.
^You can find out more about our approach to inclusive content and writing about sex and gender here: service-manual.nhs.uk/content/inclusive-content/sex-gender-and-sexuality.^

(funny how the results on testicular cancer on the first page state men yet for cervical cancer it lists a whole load of people)

Badqueen is bringing a great deal of ill temper to the debate

@Badqueen is actually among the most calm and even tempered people on this thread. It's those arguing against her points who seem most ill tempered @TullyApplebottom

It's possible to be GC without having a knee jerk reaction to any amendments to documents and sites that acknowledge transgender people's existence. Refusing to try to understand any of the rationales behind such amendments reflects badly on those of us who are GC, and encourages others to see us as irrational extremists.

As per a pp, while the term woman remains, and where there a clear reasons for the amendments on that NHS site, I'm fine with it. There are other amendments elsewhere in the internet or in documentation that I'm not fine with.

I'm not fine with knee jerk one issue posters undermining our cause though.

twitter.com/fairplaywomen/status/1530134328381956097?s=20&t=zZZOD-y-9O30GQV5l0KY_Q

That's the single issue I have a kneejerk response to.

It would be nice to have an acknowledgement that the word woman has been suborned. That just maybe there is a reason why some of us decry any and every instance where woman is clarified, made less clear.

But even then, the fisherman thread shows that a woman can still be a woman and identify as such but she will still be posted about here for not being womanly enough. Whoever posted that thread did so knowing their audience was here.

Your last sentence is rather at odds with what actually happened on that thread. The OP's intial post seemed to imply by their use of 'woman' in inverted commas that the person in the article wasn't female. Nearly every post on that thread expressed their bafflement with that and any talk about 'womanly' given that the woman interviewed explained how sex based differences (boot sizes etc) caused her issues but that she had no particular issue being referred to as a fisherman, rather than fisherwoman (or fisher I suppose?) which was essentially the focus of the article. The article (and discussion) were around the gendered term fisherman. It quite clearly demonstrated that there is no 'audience' as you seem to imply.

And the deletion message for that thread -

www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/4557844-woman-wins-fisherman-of-the-year

😄I missed the thread. Thanks for the clarification.

But we do understand the rationale behind the change. It is the re-definition of the word “woman” it involves, which takes it away from its commonly accepted meaning, we take issue with.
it is no answer to that point to say “ but the word woman is still there.” We know it is. It is being used to mean something different. I object to that in principle, others object to it in the grounds that it makes the language of important health information less clear.

It isn't redefined at all. It's there, meaning what it means. It's then followed by other terms that are in addition not instead of. They are ensuring that people who do not define themselves as women, still recognise that they are at risk from this disease. Just as the prostate cancer section does for men, AND those who don't identify as male, but have a prostate.

And if anyone is interested, the articles about the woman who won the Fisherman of the Year can be read here -

Fisherman of the Year title given to a woman for first time
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-norfolk-61498112.amp

www.theguardian.com/business/2022/may/22/first-woman-wins-fisherman-of-the-year-award

I think her point is that she doesn't really care if she's referred to as a fisherman (or in fact prefers it to 'gender neutral' terms) but she's really bloody good at what she does. It's actually a shame that a troll tagged onto this article for their own devices as it's a wonderful example of a woman kicking ass in their chosen profession.

So once more, I know that the word is still there. It is the addition of the other terms that calls into doubt the meaning which the word is being given.
if what they mean by the word “woman” is “biologically female person”, they don’t need to add the other terms. They have captured everyone to whom the message applies. Adding the other terms means -can only mean - that the word “woman” is not being given that meaning. We are entitled to wonder what meaning us being given.

I personally see no massive issue with this wording here, so long as the men get the same treatment.
But I can see what other posters mean still.
Woman as a stand alone word should mean ahf.
And that alone is just fine, because whatever gender you are, your body still has a sex.
Adding extra words means woman is being used as gender, why else add the extra definitions?
Woman covers it all if its being used as sex.

Penile cancer has been updated. Vulval cancer hasn’t. Perhaps you should have checked like I did. Or just read the OP

Thank you Sara

This, exactly, as I wrote in my comment on page 1. The 'inclusiveness' turns everyone's gender into an abstract identity, and that includes 'women.'

But I don't have that identity, so this new 'inclusiveness' invalidates my definition of myself as a woman, as I have no desire to agree to sexist stereotypes about femininity and no love of traditional gender roles for women.

In this new system there is no way of stating that I am just biologically female and not part of the gender identity ideology.

Yes. Why can't they just say 'women and anyone who's biologically female'? I'd be okay with thqt.

It tells me they think the population are so stupid that people who have penises and ovaries need to be listed out of people will think 'oh, I must not have them then'

It totally undermines any credibility the NHS and medical establishment had, which is very little.

I personally don't mind language being added such as 'women and ....' . Given the double standards, I am glad to see that this is finally* being applied to both * language relating to women as well as language relating to me (though I don't see condoms being marketed to 'ejaculators' in the same way as sanitary products are marketed as being for 'menstruators').

This all must be a recent change in Scotland though. As recently as 6 months ago, the cervical screening programme was aimed at 'those with a cervix'. No mention of women at all.

Typo - language relating to men.

I don’t have an issue with additional descriptors being used alongside ‘women’. it’s the complete replacement I didn’t like, this seems a sensible compromise. Though in all honesty wouldn’t male/female work? I know there will be females without ovaries, but if you were born without them or had them removed I’m sure you know.

the one thing I do question is the way “inclusivity” is bandied around.
adding multiple additional words, referring to “people with uteruses” and the like might make the information less accessible for people with cognitive disabilities or difficulties with language or reading.

I don’t see the aggression

< lurker here >

But it is the definition of WOMAN that has become a political football. I don't see the same happening with respect to MEN.

By adding all kinds of qualifiers and subsets, the meaning of what it is to be a woman is being diluted, and our rights are being eroded as a result.

There is absolutely no need for this. It just causes confusion and disadvantages the less literate and people who are not fluent in English.

As a PP said, Woman covers it all if its being used as sex. Though I could live with adding 'biologically female' to include others born female who identify as something else.

Just say women. With, if you must, a footnote saying “this word is being used in its biological sense.”
do the same with “men.”
job done. It’s dead easy.

On another thread a poster says they got a doctors invitation letter for a smear test (?) and the wording says that if they are registered at the docs as a trans man or man they won’t get an invitation letter.

So some people would die rather than just use the correct biological term? This is crazy - what would happen if the surgery took it upon themselves to observe a persons sec and send them an invite - would they get hell for that?

Why hold me to a different standard?

Others with your apparent perspective are still saying the word women has not been changed, repurposed, despite the many articles being posted where precisely that has happened.

I make a wry point and you leap on it.

Look to the beam in your own eye, maybe!

My friends younger sibling is a trans man. I discussed this sort of thing with her (the older sister) and she said her sibling wouldn't realise they still need to have smear tests. In fact the sibling didnt get the screening letter so would have been missed if older sister hadn't called up GP to explain (younger sibling tends to need help with things). Most people do know their sex really but the trans sibling in this case has some problems understanding things, I'm not sure of the full diagnosis but autism and was always in a special school to help with learning difficulties. So as much as it is a mouthful saying 'women, trans men and non binary people with a cervix' is probably the best way to be inclusive. I definitely think including woman or female is essential though.