People who have the condition are born with ovaries?!

[Confusedovaries]

I have just read a Guardian article about polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS). In the article, it says that “people with the condition were born with ovaries”, as well as two of three other features.

This sentence doesn’t flow particularly easily, so I re-read it a couple of times to try and clarify the point. Tell me - is it using this phraseology in order to avoid saying “women”? Throughout the article, it refers to “people” with PCOS rather than “women”.

I don’t usually contribute to this board, but this has troubled me. How can it not be possible to talk about women’s health, without using the word “women”? Please tell me I’ve misinterpreted!

PCOS article

That terrible article seems to have been pulled from the guardian's US content (you can tell from a couple of americanisms - 'hollered', 'behavior' and of course the extreme erasure of women).

I had been surprised when I read on here of the appalling way in which it is written, as I have noticed recently that the guardian is (shamefacedly) stepping up a bit in its coverage of a range of women's issues, and blatantly naming our sex accurately.

I initially thought that perhaps a rogue subeditor had forced through some ideological edits. But, no, it is just the american authorship that has produced the lunacy. Not that that excuses the guardian.

BTW, I checked the source the author provides for that "8%-13% of menstruating adults" claim, and sure enough, the source itself says "Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) is the most common endocrinopathy affecting reproductive aged women, with a prevalence of between 8 and 13%". So the journalist has misrepresented the source (since not all reproductive aged women menstruate)

And also, I'm sure mine started before I was an adult.

The piece does use the word 'women' a couple of times including . “Women, and particularly PCOS patients, endure injustices of medical gaslighting, unnecessary surgeries, inaccurate and harmful medical advice and ineffective treatments that only compound the mental health burden of the condition itself.”

No kidding.

But even more often in those born without eyes!

[Pedantic autistic]

The author slips at one point and writes “women’s bodies”. And yes, this is for the Guardian’s US audience.

It’s a big country but there is a certain class of American white, middle-class, wannabe progressive women who must be the most self-torturing creatures in the world. Always having to be careful to use the ‘right’ words, knowing you’re lying,

How does a person know that a person is a person of reproductive age? 🤔

They generally fail, though, as they have here. It's so instinctive to use the words we have been using for centuries that one almost always escapes the censor's blue pencil.

What do you expect from that newspaper? People on here are always slagging off the Daily Mail, but IMO The Guardian is the vilest newspaper.

Op. It's always worth dropping an email to the guardian (you can find contacts on the website) and say you find their use of language ridiculous and confusing. I think we're more inclined to come on here and talk about it than push back. It's always worth firing off some emails when we feel particularly cross about something.

What makes me most angry about this trend for avoiding the word ‘women’ is that no publications do the same for the word ‘men’. I don’t agree with erasing ‘women’ to placate a small minority, but the double standard that ‘inclusive’ language doesn’t extend to men really beggars belief. All inclusive language actually does is EXCLUDE biological women.

I would assume it’s out of consideration of transgender women who have ovaries but want to be referred to as “men”?

What? This confused me more

Transmen and non-binary-people-who-were-observed-to-be-female-at-birth are a very tiny minority of female people (cunty kind).

TMANBPWWOTBFAB with PCOS are an even smaller group.

TMANBPWWOTBFAB who have PCOS and get upset if people don't write articles erasing sexed language in order to be "inclusive" of them, even tinier.

It's not inclusive. It's stupid.

Use women/girls/female and ALSO mention that TMANBPWWOTBFAB get PCOS if you think they will feel excluded.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/aug/21/wildfire-risks-pregnancy-fetus-development

Oh look, I've found another one.

I recently had to ring 111 for an infection on my C-section/ endometriosis/ broken pelvis from childbirth surgery scars. The call handler asked me what I identified as and what gender I was at birth. She must have heard my tone because she said “sorry it’s a silly question when you have been through so much with gynaecology”

it was nice to speak to someone With common sense

"Not once do they use the word woman".

Did you read the article?

Unfortunately it's also for women who believe that they are men and are happy for us all to lose our identity as women.

What I mean is, by referring to the physical, biological sex characteristics they are explicitly EXCLUDING male-bodies people who may identify as women. But INCLUDING people with actual female biology who may identify as male or non-binary. I agree it’s tortured language, but it is actually explicitly taking trans women out of any notion that this article is inclusive of them.

https://www.autism.org.uk/advice-and-guidance/topics/physical-health/menopause

I give you 'autistic people' going through menopause...

They really are insulting fuckers aren't they.

Also how does a person know if they are a person with ovaries

Maybe if a campaign happened with letter writing en masse something might possibly happen but I wrote to them to cancel my monthly subscription when The Guardian published an article using the term ‘menstruators’. I told them how sexist and dehumanising and disrespectful it was to describe women in that way and I never received a response.

I did however write an email to Hadley Freeman to tell her that as much as I enjoyed her (and Suzanne Moore’s) writing, and as much as I admired and commended her for taking a stance within The Guardian on women’s rights, I couldn’t continue to pay for The Guardian after reading that word in an article about women. Hadley very kindly replied and thanked me for my support and wished me well.

Sadly, I think The Guardian is a lost cause 🤷‍♀️

Or, to put it another way, if they believed TWAW then they’d just say Women’, wouldn’t they?

Well I must admit I wondered when I started growing a beard at the age of 14. (Two children later I was fairly certain I was female.)
But I am not happy about being female because it's shitty having pcos. Finally at 18 I asked a doctor if anything could be done about the hair - he said zapping it with a heavy dose of radiation. This was 1970. I had never heard of pcos, I think the doctor was equally ignorant. Started pulling it out with tweezers (ouch!)
And it's genetic. Pretty certain my grandmother had it, my daughter has it. Desperately hoping my grandaughter doesn't.

that was my thought on reading this. having PCOS is confronting enough about your adequacy as a woman - reduced fertility, unwanted hair growth etc - to be told that you aren't a woman because you're not menstruating...
luckily the experts were professors of women's health - surprised the Guardian could mention that

Yes, but they're also separating these things from the concept of "woman", into a collection of attributes that anyone can have and that don't indicate female any more.

And from that verbal sleight if hand follows:

Valentina and his penis in the women's paralympics.

Audrey and his testicles in the bed next to you in the women's ward.

Isla and his xy chromosomes "at it" in a women's prison near you.

Because woman becomes a feeling and not a biological reality.

So they've got us both ways, and given our old friend patriarchy, it's not a stretch to assume that the argument for inclusive language is there for this purpose as well as the transmen that no-one's talking about (although they don't get off the hook as facilitators of all this).