Menopause bin fire - ACAS this time.

[GCWorkNightmare]

State of this. I feel a campaign coming on.

(a colleague shared this from an ACAS Menopause webinar.)

“Trans women” are mentioned, but no mention whatsoever of the common-or-garden women who actually go through the f#$ing thing.

Ok, so the only actual mention of the word women on this handout is referring to 'trans women' or 'intersex women'. Nothing about actual women.

So what am I then - no longer a woman, I am now 'different people'

How inclusive of them to exclude the very people who are affected by the menopause. Let’s give them a hand. Who does the menopause affect? Answer: WOMEN. It affects women, regardless of any gender identity they may have. It affects the FEMALE SEX. Stop erasing women in your botched attempt at inclusion, ACAS.

Them’s the rules, Rosie: The word “woman” may never be used to refer to the 51% of the human race who are female. A “gender neutral” term must be used for them. Even if doing so is confusing, misleading or makes a nonsense of statistics used in that particular sentence. The word “woman” may only be used for the less than a quarter of one percent of the population who are male and self describe as a member of the opposite sex. And any woman who questions an institution following these rules is committing the sin of being “exclusionary” aka an evil bigot who must be denigrated, silenced and certainly doesn’t deserve the respect of an honest and accurate reply to her question.

Pseudo scientific bollocks

I have to say as a late 40s woman I’m ambivalent about the current obsession with the menopause, particularly the mention of psychological symptoms

maybe the reason I’m sad/stressed/angry is because something bad has happened/I have too much work/you’re being a dick

it sort of feels a bit like the new ‘she must be on the rag’

I have to say as a late 40s woman I’m ambivalent about the current obsession with the menopause, particularly the mention of psychological symptoms

it sort of feels a bit like the new ‘she must be on the rag’

I agree. One of the menopause books I read said something along the lines of your distress could be related to menopause but it could also be a rational response to all the stuff you’re dealing with at that stage in your life.

It also worries me that employers will use it as another excuse to avoid hiring women once they no longer have the excuse of ‘she might get pregnant and go on maternity leave’.

Its like "women" is a curse word. A word excommunicated by a religion.

I always wonder, even the professional leftist women who have sold their souls to this beta cuck led cult...are they really happy installing themselves high up in the new caste system by jettisoning "women" from policies and documents like this?

Does their newly enhanced social status obviate the natural human reaction of disquiet and disconnect?

They may feel they're getting rid of The Man, ie traditional anti women patriarchy...but they're replacing it with the same patriarchy, just one wrapped in the soothing colours of the Pride flag and the inclusive language of Stonewall.

Never have so many educated and apparently informed professionals been shown to be so shallow and stupid.

Its quite something to witness real time evidence of the unfitness of so many to be in charge of clearing away dirty plates let alone societal public policies.

Me too.

I am all for employers being sensitive to whatever kinds of health or personal problems their employees are going through. I think it's part of what being a good employer requires. That can include any number of health or other things that go on in a person's life, it's really kind of an infinite list.

But I also don't like this increasing tendency for workers to present themselves and their personal issues to an employer or organisation as if it's the job of said employer to manage the worker's life. Largely, it isn't it's up to workers to deal with their personal life and come to work and be a professional person.

I absolutely do not want my boss looking at me and thinking, "hmm, Ms. Neck there is a middle aged woman, I'd better be aware that should might be having menopause symptoms. Maybe that's why she is grumpy today, better let it go."

ACAS should stick to the day job. Get on with ending all the bloody train strikes please rather than lecturing us about our menopause without using the word “WOMEN”.

I think they may have received public money to produce this absolute pile of bolleaux.

Well that was a joy 🙄 to read!!!

Yup. Also the cynic in me just thinks menopause is another way to bang on about trans and that none of these people care about women and what we go through. They just want to use women’s issues as a way of signalling their virtue by incorporating trans inclusive language into the literature. If they cared about women they would name us.

Agree totally with piggy backing on issue of menopause as way to virtue signal. Yawwwwwn.

It’s just another cheap way of being inclusive innit?

no need to close the sex based pay gap or get dinosaur managers to get their heads around part time working
no need to sort out wheelchair accessibility or other reasonable adjustments that would allow more people to work

just bang on about the menopause for a bit and hey presto! You’re one of the good guys

Acas are shockingly bad on sex/gender. Have been for a long time. Very disappointing.

Agree.

Then they go to court to state they are not medical experts. 🙄

I think they may have received public money to produce this absolute pile of bolleaux.

ACAS are an NDPB - a non-departmental public body (what used to be referred to as quangos, and are sometimes called arms-length bodies as they are public sector bodies but operate at arms length from government/ministers).

So yes, their funding comes from the UK Government.

https://www.acas.org.uk/about-us/how-we-are-governed

It’s fair enough that ACAS are encouraging employers to support their employees. The problem is that Stonewall spent years targeting the whole of the public sector and giving them badges as a reward for removing all reference to women from their corporate policies.

Do you mean in terms of work policies etc? Or discussion in the media in general?

if it’s the latter, I would have to disagree because I am personally grateful that menopause is being taken more seriously these days. Especially by GPs.

if you mean in terms of work policies, then I’ve no objection to HR policies stating that management of menopause symptoms could be one of the supporting factors for asking for flexible working practices and/or reasonable adjustments. But I have no intention or interest in discussing my symptoms with my colleagues, it’s between me, my boss and HR. Much like I wouldn’t expect to hear about any other colleagues’ personal and medical issues. And I personally see no need for “menopause awareness” days or whatever. It should be covered under general “don’t be a dick to/about your colleagues”.

Same with pronouns. Costs employers precisely zero in money / time / effort to instruct their employees to put pronouns in their signature.

Tackling a long hours culture which disadvantages those with parental or caring responsibilities or with a health condition which means they can work normal hours but not excess hours? Well, that’s a different matter entirely.

Yeah, I have to agree with this. Although I am not yet menopausal so perhaps I might feel differently when I am.

But if we spend 20 years or more at risk of discrimination in employment because we might get pregnant and go off on maternity leave at any time, I don't particularly want employers to get the idea that women over 45 are also a risk because we might need unspecified support with the menopause.

It's just another thing contributing to the perception of uterus owners women as being less reliable employees.

Well this is really concerning, because it tells me that if I get into trouble at work for, e.g. not wanting to declare my pronouns, ACAS will not help me. When their job is to help me.

It's so prevalent.

I'm in a parenting group on WhatsApp and they have a list of women expecting new babies and their due dates entitled "pregnant people".

There are about 40 women in this group and not one of them to my knowledge identifies as trans or non binary.

Who is this performative erasure of the word "women" for?

Or is it just so ingrained in certain demographics that it comes naturally to them now?

Oh FGS when will this nonsense stop ?🙄

Given that they're a public body, is this worth raising with Kemi Badenoch as this falls squarely in her remit?

Same with pronouns. Costs employers precisely zero in money / time / effort to instruct their employees to put pronouns in their signature.

Which has been shown to disadvantage women. Why would you cheerlead that?