Am I being offended unreasonably?

[BananaramaDefence]

Because the fact that this poster, in the female toilets at my work has an asterisk next to the word women has put my back up!

It's better than the poster referring to people going through the menopause

I'm just totally bored, but not especially 'offended', by these ridiculous caveats. Have you got a nice fat black Sharpie so you could cross out the nonsense words, OP?

Bloody hell you're not wrong to be offended no. Men, however they identify, don't go through the menopause and it's offensive to suggest they should be included which I assume is what the word salad at the bottom 'clarifying' the word woman means.

The first thing the NHS needs to do to help women with menopause is to have fecking single sex toilets and changing rooms for their staff. SEX not gender. So they can deal with the consequences of the menopause as Sandie Peggie had to without the presence of a man.

Not massively reassuring that staff in the NHS can provide proper medical care if they can't jump over the first basic hurdle of knowing there are two sexes in all mammals.

No I can live with that, cis gender in the explanation less so. I do think any transmen and non binary who are being included in the word women (correctly) may be upset by it.

As the MN audit shows, basically no NHS trusts have single sex toilets.... not sure if anywhere is following the law yet? It seems at best a massive waste of money to have an online training course for menopause when they don't even have legally required single sex spaces for patients and staff.

At worst it's extremely offensive to women that money is being wasted on this when they don't even know what a woman is and are not complying with the law around women's human rights.

I did think to do this but the office stationary cupboard appears to hold no permanent markers of any kind.

Cisgender in the explanation of the word woman pisses me right off.

It is annoying, but a lot better than we might have expected a year ago. I'm guessing that a voice of reason insisted on appropriate use of the word woman, but that the politics of the meeting in which the wording was decided required this consolation prize at the bottom to be awarded to the voice of ideology.

Honestly I think wording like this is the best possible outcome. Despite some people on this thread clearly not liking it, its a fact that transmen a) exist and b) may still be affected by the menopause. Specifying that its primarily relevant to women (and using that word rather than people/menstruators/AFAB/cervix havers or whatever) but acknowledging that it may also be relevant to some people who might not identify themselves as women is fine in my book.

Particularly in this specific instance - its not a limited opportunity where a transman attending would take away a spot that someone else could use, it's not even a lecture or discussion that's supposed to be a "safe space" where women could possibly be discomforted by the presence of someone who looks male in appearance or whatever - its an online course that all staff (men AND women) are encouraged to complete even if they arent actually going through the menopause themselves - which I think is a good thing as many women will be have male managers they need support from, and they shouldn't be allowed to get away with "urgh wimmins issues" anymore.

"Correcting" it would only look petty and unnecessary.

They haven’t erased women but the use of cisgender is dreadful. I would bring in a sharpie from home and remove that.

Women can't identify out of the menopause, that's the fucking point. Even if they trash their young bodies with testosterone.

On a positive note, my bloke bought me a horsey magazine recently ("free catalogue with that colour-co-ordinated tack stuff you like looking at"). There was an article on riding through the menopause from a sports psychology point of view. The first paragraph explained that menopause is female-specific, and that the writer was not a medical doctor and as a male has no lived experience.

'Also younger women can be affected by the menopause'

I don't know why this bit in particular annoyed me so much? At least the younger women aren't 'cis'. Except as many TiF may suffer a drug or surgically induced early menopause and they're likely to be younger it's a bit of a transphobic oversight. Perhaps because early menopause can be a tragedy, it being reduced to a literal footnote seems callous. Especially as the wording is a bit 'erm ackshually', but that might be just me.

I'd be tempted to take the hole punch to 'cis'.

Buy a marker and scratch through 'ciswoman' or 'cisgender' or any kind of 'cis'. Truly offensive and annoying.

Looks like it is in the perfect place to just snip it off

I disagree. This is not a therapy or crisis setting and women includes everybody female. It doesn't need an asterisk. Women who claim to have a special identity are women. Humans of the female sex.
We cannot leave embedded the idea that woman is a gender identity word or we will be fighting this nonsense for the next 100 years. Cisgender is just offensive nonsense.

I'm guessing that a voice of reason insisted on appropriate use of the word woman, but that the politics of the meeting in which the wording was decided required this consolation prize at the bottom to be awarded to the voice of ideology.
This is a very plausible guess as to how the wording on this poster came about.

If you can say something, do, OP. You are not at all unreasonably offended. It's the equivalent of making all new toilets unisex, or rebadging women's toilets as inclusive, isn't it? Presented as a compromise solution but is as bad as what went before and over-complicates a straightforward situation.

Relegating the gender junk to a footnote is progress at least.
crossing out the ‘cisgender’ would make the statement untrue - the issue does only affect women, regardless of ‘gender identity’.

Yes, the wording of the main text should be inclusive of all ages of women affected by the menopause - many of whom are below and above the range mentioned.

Personally, I dont see much wrong with this. Does a transman not go through menopause?

Because a transman is a woman.

I think Naomi Cunningham said in one of the court cases that using this language is not a neutral act, it's using the language of GI and contributed to the discrimination of her clients. Rather than calling women who don't say they're trans "cisgender", a better way to have phrased the note would be some people who go through menopause don't call themselves women but the information and event applies to them too .

The asterisk and its explanation annoy me. There are only women. No-one is 'cis-gendered' or all the other rubbish listed. If the NHS is employing people who think any of the non-binary etc identities exist and they have one then the NHS is employing people who are mentally ill - which goes some way to explaining its problems, I guess!

My local hospitals all have single sex toilets for patients - at least in waiting areas.

Well yes, exactly. So a transman would experience menopause symptoms. The impression that I got from the poster was they they were just trying to be sensitive to that.

So there is no need to list women who claim to be men separately.

A different point, but not all women (yes, I know what a woman is) experience menopausal symptoms. So the maths isn't right.