Page 7 | No mention of 'girl' or 'female' on NHS poster about child pregnancy

Dominoodles · 2026-04-24T13:28:38+00:00

I've seen this photo on Facebook and had to share. This was seen in a doctor's surgery, explaining that even a girl as young as ten could be pregnant and what that means. It's a horrible subject but I get the need for it to be a discussion, given the state of things right now. But there is nothing mentioned on here about girls, or women, or females. A 'person' of child bearing age is not clear to little girls. A ten year old girl suffering sexual abuse is not going to realise this is for her. A ten year old boy is not going to realise it isn't for him, because it doesn't actually say. The visuals on the poster even show what appears to be a man as well as women. Not too mention kids who do suffer sexual abuse are not going to have had a comprehensive sex education, so they might not even understand what 'child bearing age' is without context. Ten year olds are not going to see this as the offer of help it was intended to be, and by obfuscating who this is meant for, those girls could be missing out on necessary help. It even uses the kid friendly word tummy, but can't use the word girl.

Cailleach1 · 28/04/2026 11:40

IsaacBenabram · 24/04/2026 14:51

The person of child-bearing age might identify as male.

And a 70 year old male could identify as a young person of child bearing age (the 10-55 mentioned).

Words mean what you want them to mean now.

Cailleach1 · 28/04/2026 11:56

‘A) surely no, hetrosexual (cis) boy is ever in a million years going to think they could be pregnant’. @KitTea3

So does that mean you think homosexual, or bisexual boys could think they are pregnant? Or are only heterosexual boys not deluded?

Also, what a way to not target the relevant group. Only females can get pregnant. Any campaign only relevant to females should concentrate their efforts on their target group.

Shortshriftandlethal · 28/04/2026 12:36

Iatethelastbiscuit · 28/04/2026 09:19

Hmmm, adults maybe gave it a name (just like they’ve given literally everything else in the world a name) but the feeling of gender dysphoria and the desire to be the opposite sex wasn’t ’invented’ by adults. For some people, a biological girl for example, they’ve insisted to their parents that they’re a boy from the age of 2, every single day until some parents may, understandably, relent and start saying ‘he’ and calling her by a boy’s name, at her request. This, although very rare, has been happening forever. It’s just now we have a name for it. It’s what happens with everything- people realised people who were sad for long periods of time were more than just sad so they named it depression. Names are helpful and necessary in allowing us to identify things. Whether you see ‘trans’ as a MH condition or a gender identity is not my point. You can’t deny the fact it exists though. Yes, it could be argued it’s a made up thing for a 14-year-old girl whose always identified as a girl to suddenly start proclaiming she’s trans because she’s been swept up in the trend, peer pressure, and media hype. But you can’t say it’s made up for the kids who’ve felt this way since toddler-hood.

It’s also unfair to criticise parents for validating something their child feels incredibly strongly about. You have no idea what it feels like to have a trans child, one who has felt that way since they were a toddler. Most parents don’t immediately say, “ok Charlottle, we’ll call you Charles from now on, whack you on some puberty blockers asap and chop all your hair off”. It’s a long, extremely difficult and emotional process, many seek multiple MH diagnosis, from multiple different MH specialists. For many, validating their child’s identity is their very last resort, and an agonising choice between having a severely depressed child and a happy child. It’s not for anyone else to say whether this is right or wrong.

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Yes, people have always imagined themselves to be all sorts of things, including imagining being the opposite sex. This is natural and inevitable during the intense period of self development that occurs in childhood and adolescence; but it is only in recent decades that queer theorists such as Judith Butler have been pushing their theories of self into the academy and beyond.

When I left teaching nobody had hear of 'gender identity' because as a concept it had yet to catch on. Pupils who wanted to experiment with self expression tended still to do so through music and youth sub cultures such as 'goths' and emos'. Nascently gay boys and lesbians have always tended to feel cross sex associations and sympathies, as have many others, when their natural inclinations and interests don't conform with heavily gendered expectations emananting from their family or their immediate cultural environment.

'Trans' is nothing but a modern framing device - complete with terminology such as 'cis' as 'non binary' - but importantly one which has led young people to believe that they are actually the opposite sex and that their discomfort with gender roles needs to be medicalised and treated, potentially with puberty blockers, cross sex hormones and even radical surgeries.

There are certainly parents who foist a trans identity onto their child; and there are certainly parents whose own desire for a child of the opposite sex profoundly impacts upon the child's developing consciousness ( See 'La Petite Fille' the documentary about the French boy whose mother encouraged his transition - against his father's and the school's wishes) There are plenty of parents of gay or autistic children who have become caught up in the whole business - and quite a number post here. Validation is not the only device for coping with an unhappy or questioning child.

Iatethelastbiscuit · 28/04/2026 13:30

Shortshriftandlethal · 28/04/2026 12:36

Yes, people have always imagined themselves to be all sorts of things, including imagining being the opposite sex. This is natural and inevitable during the intense period of self development that occurs in childhood and adolescence; but it is only in recent decades that queer theorists such as Judith Butler have been pushing their theories of self into the academy and beyond.

When I left teaching nobody had hear of 'gender identity' because as a concept it had yet to catch on. Pupils who wanted to experiment with self expression tended still to do so through music and youth sub cultures such as 'goths' and emos'. Nascently gay boys and lesbians have always tended to feel cross sex associations and sympathies, as have many others, when their natural inclinations and interests don't conform with heavily gendered expectations emananting from their family or their immediate cultural environment.

'Trans' is nothing but a modern framing device - complete with terminology such as 'cis' as 'non binary' - but importantly one which has led young people to believe that they are actually the opposite sex and that their discomfort with gender roles needs to be medicalised and treated, potentially with puberty blockers, cross sex hormones and even radical surgeries.

There are certainly parents who foist a trans identity onto their child; and there are certainly parents whose own desire for a child of the opposite sex profoundly impacts upon the child's developing consciousness ( See 'La Petite Fille' the documentary about the French boy whose mother encouraged his transition - against his father's and the school's wishes) There are plenty of parents of gay or autistic children who have become caught up in the whole business - and quite a number post here. Validation is not the only device for coping with an unhappy or questioning child.

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Re your first paragraph - I think there’s a massive difference between a child imagining they’re a cat or a baby dinosaur or whatever on and off for a few days (my 4 yo likes to be a newly hatched bird sometimes and will only communicate in tweets, even swears he becomes a bird when she goes to sleep) and a child protesting that they’re the opposite sex, day in and day out for years, ever since they were old enough to talk, a protest that causes them severe distress when they are corrected. Normal kids don’t have the attention span and dedication to imagine they’re a cat or a dinosaur for years on end, day in, day out. This is different. Not saying the answer is always to ‘change’ sex, but it’s absolutely not the same as normal childhood imagination and shouldn’t be dismissed as such.

As a gay woman myself, I can tell you that I never felt any “cross sex associations and sympathies” growing up. I felt lesbian associations and sympathies but these were distinctly different from any male associations or traits. I didn’t feel any association or kindredness with boys at all..and I wasn’t particularly feminine either. This was obviously a couple of decades ago, but would I feel the same if I was growing up now? I think so. I do agree though that the whole trans movement is potentially encouraging some more vulnerable teenage lesbians (and gay boys, although less so in the UK) to think they may be the opposite sex rather than gay. I don’t think it’s happening on the scale some people are imagining though.

I don’t think most parents encourage the transition of their child. I think those are isolated cases. I do think in the recent past they were more likely to be encouraged to validate it before considering other reasons like autism & mental health, but I think that’s getting better after the Supreme Court ruling and the fact under 18s can’t get puberty blockers anymore. All good things I think. Every possible reason for gender dysphoria should be explored before transition, but for a small minority of parents, it is the only answer. And what the reason for that is probably doesn’t matter to those parents (whether it’s that they were “born in the wrong body” or have a mental health condition or numerous other reasons). For them, they’re probably just happy that transitioning has stopped their child being miserable (social only, which thankfully is all that’s legal now). Some might grow out of it, some might not, but society does need to make space for them…which I know comes with a huge amount of challenges and I have run out of mental energy now! But I can see both sides basically

Emilesgran · 28/04/2026 13:50

Iatethelastbiscuit · 28/04/2026 13:30

Re your first paragraph - I think there’s a massive difference between a child imagining they’re a cat or a baby dinosaur or whatever on and off for a few days (my 4 yo likes to be a newly hatched bird sometimes and will only communicate in tweets, even swears he becomes a bird when she goes to sleep) and a child protesting that they’re the opposite sex, day in and day out for years, ever since they were old enough to talk, a protest that causes them severe distress when they are corrected. Normal kids don’t have the attention span and dedication to imagine they’re a cat or a dinosaur for years on end, day in, day out. This is different. Not saying the answer is always to ‘change’ sex, but it’s absolutely not the same as normal childhood imagination and shouldn’t be dismissed as such.

As a gay woman myself, I can tell you that I never felt any “cross sex associations and sympathies” growing up. I felt lesbian associations and sympathies but these were distinctly different from any male associations or traits. I didn’t feel any association or kindredness with boys at all..and I wasn’t particularly feminine either. This was obviously a couple of decades ago, but would I feel the same if I was growing up now? I think so. I do agree though that the whole trans movement is potentially encouraging some more vulnerable teenage lesbians (and gay boys, although less so in the UK) to think they may be the opposite sex rather than gay. I don’t think it’s happening on the scale some people are imagining though.

I don’t think most parents encourage the transition of their child. I think those are isolated cases. I do think in the recent past they were more likely to be encouraged to validate it before considering other reasons like autism & mental health, but I think that’s getting better after the Supreme Court ruling and the fact under 18s can’t get puberty blockers anymore. All good things I think. Every possible reason for gender dysphoria should be explored before transition, but for a small minority of parents, it is the only answer. And what the reason for that is probably doesn’t matter to those parents (whether it’s that they were “born in the wrong body” or have a mental health condition or numerous other reasons). For them, they’re probably just happy that transitioning has stopped their child being miserable (social only, which thankfully is all that’s legal now). Some might grow out of it, some might not, but society does need to make space for them…which I know comes with a huge amount of challenges and I have run out of mental energy now! But I can see both sides basically

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The reality is that boys who want to be girls, even if that has been the case since forever, are still unhappy boys, and not girls. It’s not doing them a favour to join in their pretence.

Suzie Green of Mermaids did a Ted Talk where she said that her little boy loved sparkles and My Little Pony, and that after her husband removed all his “girly” toys and tried to get him to be more “boyish”, the child announced that he was in fact a girl.

He was only about 3 or 4 at the time.

I mean, maybe it was just a coincidence that he decided he was a girl when that was the only way he could see of being allowed to behave in the ways he liked, but even his mother saw that an alternative explanation was that he was a slightly “effeminate” little boy who might well turn out to be gay.

IOW we don’t know why those children have felt that way for years, but there used to be a rather dark joke among staff at the Tavistock Clinic that there would soon be no more homosexuals Im future generations, as they would all have been transed - and several members of staff who were themselves gay were accused of homophobia when they tried to have it recorded in clinical notes that some of their patients’ seemed to have gender dysphoria caused by familial or even internal homophobia, rather than being innately transgender.

Eastereggschocolateisthebest · 28/04/2026 15:41

MrsOvertonsWindow · 28/04/2026 09:42

It hasn't existed forever. Those of us who've worked with children and teenagers for decades can confirm this was just not a thing. It's a social media generated contagion for most children. It's really unhelpful to spout such easily evidenced untruths.

Yes parenting is hard. 2 year olds / young children routinely believe they're animals, the opposite sex, helicopters etc. That's normal.

No 2 year old or child is born in the wrong body ever. Parents struggling with this deserve compassion and support. What they don't need are transactivists interfering and issuing advice that counters fundamental child development / child psychology principles. Hopefully there's now more balanced and evidenced support for parents and with those schools caught up in transactivism being warned to stop meddling in matters they're unqualified for via safeguarding guidance , the levels of social contagion amongst children will start to ease.

Selling children the lie that they've been born in the wrong body and a sex change is the solution is the most destructive thing to have happened to so many families.

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But they are - I’ve known about it since time and I’m in my 50s so it got though somehow - because I heard people talking about it - and somehow heard people speaking about their journeys - it was told by friends who knew they knew the person

biology doesn’t always go to plan you know - there are anomalies - not that those experiencing feeling in the wrong body appreciate being called an anomaly I’m sure

trans people are campaigning because like people with disabilities they don’t see themselves as the “less than” option but legitimate in their own right - they feel right as they are

and I agree obliterating the term “women” isn’t the way to go

Eastereggschocolateisthebest · 28/04/2026 15:54

I’ve just remembered yes - there was a man in our community who went from Michael to Michele 40 years ago - that’s one of the ways I knew people existed who felt in the wrong bodies - my peer group who’d point him out - I never even heard anyone say “they are talking rubbish” and nobody ever had a problem with calling him she - we just accepted it

I’m so aghast at people who say this is made up modern stuff - look at some other cultural histories and you will see trans people not only existing but being idolised

Shortshriftandlethal · 28/04/2026 20:15

Eastereggschocolateisthebest · 28/04/2026 15:41

But they are - I’ve known about it since time and I’m in my 50s so it got though somehow - because I heard people talking about it - and somehow heard people speaking about their journeys - it was told by friends who knew they knew the person

biology doesn’t always go to plan you know - there are anomalies - not that those experiencing feeling in the wrong body appreciate being called an anomaly I’m sure

trans people are campaigning because like people with disabilities they don’t see themselves as the “less than” option but legitimate in their own right - they feel right as they are

and I agree obliterating the term “women” isn’t the way to go

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Feelings are not the same thing as reality. Even if you feel something it does not make it objectively true. Nobody is born in "the wrong body". They are born in their body. In many ways our body is our fate, in that the body we have ( with its particular characteristics) is what we have been dealt. You can chop and change some superficial things, but you cannot change your sex, and your sex effects you in more ways than you might imagine.

No matter what you feel, you are the sex that you are; and ultimately it is probably better for mental well being to reconcile yourself with that fact. You can be whoever you are in the sex that you are - certainly in our culture.

Wearenotborg · 28/04/2026 21:01

Eastereggschocolateisthebest · 28/04/2026 15:41

But they are - I’ve known about it since time and I’m in my 50s so it got though somehow - because I heard people talking about it - and somehow heard people speaking about their journeys - it was told by friends who knew they knew the person

biology doesn’t always go to plan you know - there are anomalies - not that those experiencing feeling in the wrong body appreciate being called an anomaly I’m sure

trans people are campaigning because like people with disabilities they don’t see themselves as the “less than” option but legitimate in their own right - they feel right as they are

and I agree obliterating the term “women” isn’t the way to go

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So if we accept that someone is “born in the wrong body”, does that mean for every trans identified female there must be a trans identified male? Are you saying you believe in gendered “souls”? Who puts these “souls in the wrong bodies?

Catsarestillflumpy · 29/04/2026 22:43

Wearenotborg · 28/04/2026 21:01

So if we accept that someone is “born in the wrong body”, does that mean for every trans identified female there must be a trans identified male? Are you saying you believe in gendered “souls”? Who puts these “souls in the wrong bodies?

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I believe it may have been Noel Edmonds.

pepayfelix · 29/04/2026 22:48

I find this absolutely ridiculous and offensive. What is wrong with using the word GIRL?

They have made an important message for young girls unclear and confusing, and all to appease a tiny minority of right-on adults. Shameful.

ForCosyLion · 30/04/2026 01:59

Have Women and Children departments in hospitals been renamed People and Children departments yet?? (I ask because when the Lucy Letby case was in the news, there was a photo of a hospital entrance with the words "Women and Children" above the door in big letters, so I assume some depts still have this wording instead of, say, Labour and Delivery.)

SwirlyGates · 30/04/2026 10:35

Wearenotborg · 28/04/2026 21:01

So if we accept that someone is “born in the wrong body”, does that mean for every trans identified female there must be a trans identified male? Are you saying you believe in gendered “souls”? Who puts these “souls in the wrong bodies?

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That's quite the question.

If souls are different from bodies, that's pretty much a religious perspective, is it not? And if you are religious, and think that a god is in control, you're saying god has made a mistake.

Is there another interpretation that I've missed? Can you believe in souls but not in a god?

ArabellaScott · 30/04/2026 10:52

BertieBotts · 24/04/2026 14:34

I mean, I kind of see your point but I don't think it matters that a boy won't realise it's not for him, because it's just warning you that this might happen before you are surprised and upset by the question from the radiographer. And they're not going to ask a boy if the patient's sex is visible on their record, which I assume it is.

The NHS are supposed to now ask everybody whether they might be pregnant. Many patients, understandably, are upset and confused and sometimes enraged by this question.

'Gender identity'. Fucking things up for everyone.

Edit: Also, the NHS may have changed it now, but there was certainly a time where they recorded 'gender identity' but not biological sex.

ArabellaScott · 30/04/2026 10:53

pepayfelix · 29/04/2026 22:48

I find this absolutely ridiculous and offensive. What is wrong with using the word GIRL?

They have made an important message for young girls unclear and confusing, and all to appease a tiny minority of right-on adults. Shameful.

Yes. And as ever, the people harmed by this decision will be female.

ArabellaScott · 30/04/2026 10:56

Eastereggschocolateisthebest · 28/04/2026 15:54

I’ve just remembered yes - there was a man in our community who went from Michael to Michele 40 years ago - that’s one of the ways I knew people existed who felt in the wrong bodies - my peer group who’d point him out - I never even heard anyone say “they are talking rubbish” and nobody ever had a problem with calling him she - we just accepted it

I’m so aghast at people who say this is made up modern stuff - look at some other cultural histories and you will see trans people not only existing but being idolised

How do you know he 'felt in the wrong body'?

Are you sure he wasn't a transvestite fetishist? This has nothing to do with dysphoria, in fact the exact opposite.

A diagnosis of 'gender incongruence' requires excluding paraphilias.

https://icd.who.int/browse/2026-01/mms/en#411470068

ICD-11 for Mortality and Morbidity Statistics

https://icd.who.int/browse/2026-01/mms/en#411470068

KilkennyCats · 30/04/2026 16:25

The wrong body malarkey makes me laugh.

These blokes have absolutely no concept of what a female body feels like; being uncomfortable in your own skin is not an indicator that you actually belong in someone else’s.

IDontHateRainbows · 30/04/2026 16:39

ArabellaScott · 30/04/2026 10:56

How do you know he 'felt in the wrong body'?

Are you sure he wasn't a transvestite fetishist? This has nothing to do with dysphoria, in fact the exact opposite.

A diagnosis of 'gender incongruence' requires excluding paraphilias.

https://icd.who.int/browse/2026-01/mms/en#411470068

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Oh for the olden days when you had the word transvestite in existence which we can't say anymore

ditalini · 30/04/2026 17:03

It's worth considering the purpose of posters like this:

Is this a poster whose purpose is to lower the number of pregnant young girls who are exposed to ionising radiation?

No, this is a poster to allow a tick in the box to say they have complied with the guidance.

A pregnant trans identifying girl who would ignore a poster using the word "girl" because she thinks she's a boy, will almost certainly also lie about something like the likelihood that she could be pregnant - if she even knows she could be. Her baby will not be saved by this. She will not be identified as a possible victim of sexual abuse by this poster (nor probably by any questioning).

The designer of this poster has ticked the box saying that they have a poster, and ticked the box saying that it's "inclusive". There was no box to tick re: effectiveness.