Guardian perimenopause explainer

[WhereAreWeNow]

Is it just me or does this read like the author or an editor is trying really hard to avoid saying "woman"? www.theguardian.com/society/2023/feb/16/what-is-perimenopause-and-what-are-the-symptoms-and-treatment-nicola-bulley?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

It mentions female one (estrogen is a female hormone) but apart from that it's weirdly gender neutral, as if perimenopause is just a thing that affects some people, of either sex.

I despair of the Guardian these days.

There are obvious ….. moments were it seems pretty clear that the word “women” was there and has been removed, eg SOME….. , MOST…..
grrrrrr I feel the (menopausal woman) rage now.

It's hard to read due to the missing word.

We talk about a cashless society and I wonder whether the word women is going the same way. I can imagine 'inclusive' brands promising to phase it out by 2025.

Agreed it's been neutralised.

Tbf it looks like something you'd get the work experience kid to write anyway the one who's related to at least two members of staff so the author might be 21 or so and deeply imbued with the idea that there's no such thing as a female sex class.

Agree. It does read like the word "woman" was there but has been edited out. This kind of writing pisses me off as a feminist but it also grates as it's so clunky and unclear. It's an affront to the English language as well as an affront to women!

I'm left confused as to who experiences this menopause of which they talk. Shall I ask them to clarify? perhaps my husband should watch out for it.

The Guardian seems to have a style guide not to use the word woman when talking about things unique to women. (Quite happy to use men when talking about prostate cancer)

I first noticed it in a article about the removal of abortion in the US. The only use of the word woman was a quote from a republican saying that women's bodies can prevent a pregnancy caused by rape.

It was very jarring and now I can't help but notice their reluctance to use the word woman.

What an awful paper

Wow, that was clear as mud.

Fuck me. The byline is Ian Sample, the SCIENCE CORRESPONDENT. I feel like I’m through the looking glass, I really do.

Science EDITOR in fact. I just can’t believe this level of nuts from The Guardian.

I see the word "female" snuck in there at one point. Perhaps they couldn't find a way to remove it and still make sense.

Ian Sample is, as mowly77 pointed out, the science editor. He's usually pretty good. Such a disappointment. And yet I've seen other articles where the Guardian has used "woman" throughout, so perhaps it varies from journalist to journalist, or editor to editor. They're a complete mess.

Maybe Ian Sample did use the words 'woman' and 'women' originally but one of the Graun's sensitivity editors took a bladed instrument to the piece.

Is it worth complaining/writing to the editor or is the Guardian a lost cause?

I wonder if it varies due to which country the article is aimed at eg US, Australia or UK

I'm of the opinion it's a lost cause, but really this stuff should be challenged every time.

You could complain to the readers' editor, but it probably is a lost cause.

I wrote a lengthy complaint about their reporting of the Wii Spa case, and never heard back.

Couldn’t write “woman” but managed to force their stubby little fingers to write “people”…….

Also loving that they say one of the ways to help the person’s symptoms is to get a good night’s sleep. What were those symptoms again? Awful piece in general as well as the failure to mention it’s women who are affected by menopause.

As I always say, it is worth complaining and or asking. 😉

I also think the weird link to the very recent disappearance of a woman at the beginning felt both forced and tasteless

I've called him out on Twitter, fat lot of good that will do. I'm a journalist myself & used to write for Graun regularly, I'm appalled at what's happened to the paper. I will complain to reader's editor. It seems pointless, like complaining to the BBC, but I do think the more women call things out and make our voices heard the better. We're not going away & we're not taking this shit!

Yes, though of course it's also the only reason the piece is there. The police mentioning Nicola Bulley's perimenopausal symptoms has been the prompt for commissioning editors everywhere to demand "800 words on the perimenopause, please" from their journalists. It's fairly clear that Sample's piece was based large on stuff taken from the internet and knocked off in under an hour. That's not to denigrate Sample, who is usually a very good science writer, but it's just how this stuff works unfortunately.

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I agree Sample is usually great which is why this is extra baffling. Even if he knocked it up from the internet in an hour, he could still type the word "woman". If he did indeed include "woman" (It does read like the word got simply taken out ..."some ..." for example instead of "some women") & it got butchered by an editor later, & I had written it, I would be raging, & having words. It makes him look deranged, as science editor.

'Perimenopause is when the body starts the transition to menopause.'
What or whose body is that? Any body?
Also has the word 'transition' been shoehorned in here? I don't think it's usual to say we (women) transition to menopause....

'Transition' is a word used in biology, if memory serves. You get it in descriptions / discussions of larvae becoming pupae for instance

That's one of the reasons, IMO, that gendersists use the word (spuriously) to try to make "changing sex" seem like a normal natural biological process.