lactating birth givers are losers.

[Gob]

Replacing words like “women” and “mothers” with terms like “birth-givers” and “pregnant people” in research risks dehumanising women and would harm decades of work to improve the visibility of women in medical literature.

That is the conclusion of 10 prominent women’s health researchers from Australia, the US, Europe and Asia who will argue in a paper published next week that replacing words like “breastfeeding” with terms such as “lactating parents” risks “reducing protection of the mother-infant [bond]” and “disembodying and undermining breastfeeding”.

The authors acknowledge words are changing to ensure inclusion of those who give birth but do not identify as women, but they argue against removing references to the sex of mothers in research and medical information.

“Desexing the language of female reproduction has been done with a view to being sensitive to individual needs and as beneficial, kind, and inclusive,” they write in the paper. “Yet, this kindness has delivered unintended consequences that have serious implications for women and children.”

Official changes to terminology to be more inclusive of trans people has become a contentious issue in Australia and overseas. The paper acknowledges that “the penalty for non-conformity with gender roles can be high”.

Governments and institutions are grappling with how to approach gender terminology. The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald can reveal that a Federal Health Department guide for pregnant and breastfeeding women regarding COVID-19 vaccination and its impact on pregnant women was edited last year to remove the term “women”, introducing errors into the scientific accuracy of the material in the process.

The source information compared disease severity of COVID in pregnant women with non-pregnant women, but when the department removed the word “women” it compared “pregnant people” with “non-pregnant people”, changing the meaning to incorrectly include men.

The department released three versions of the document, the last of which reinstated the word “women”. A spokesperson for the department said the updated guidance was published following clarification of advice from the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation and was approved by the department.

A co-author of the new paper and former president of the Australian College of Midwives, Jenny Gamble, a midwifery professor at the UK-based Centre for Care Excellence for Coventry University and the university hospitals of Coventry and Warwickshire, said sex-based language “is important due to sex-based oppression”.

more here...

[Bicycle Bill]

Replacing words like “women” and “mothers” with terms like “birth-givers” and “pregnant people” in research risks dehumanising women and would harm decades of work to improve the visibility of women in medical literature.

That is the conclusion of 10 prominent women’s health researchers from Australia, the US, Europe and Asia who will argue in a paper published next week that replacing words like “breastfeeding” with terms such as “lactating parents” risks “reducing protection of the mother-infant [bond]” and “disembodying and undermining breastfeeding”.

The authors acknowledge words are changing to ensure inclusion of those who give birth but do not identify as women, but they argue against removing references to the sex of mothers in research and medical information.

“Desexing the language of female reproduction has been done with a view to being sensitive to individual needs and as beneficial, kind, and inclusive,” they write in the paper. “Yet, this kindness has delivered unintended consequences that have serious implications for women and children.”

Please, would someone provide me with evidence, anywhere in the long history of humanity, of any time that it can be shown beyond a doubt that a male — and I mean an actual testicle-bearing, Y chromosome-carrying male, not some whackadoodle who claims that 'they feel they are a man, so that makes it so' — has conceived, gestated, and given birth?  The simple biologic truth is that the female of the species gives birth, and just because one calls oneself something other than female doesn't change that fact, any more than calling a St. Bernard a dachshund would make THAT so.

Official changes to terminology to be more inclusive of trans people has become a contentious issue in Australia and overseas. The paper acknowledges that “the penalty for non-conformity with gender roles can be high”.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again.  So-called 'trans-gender' situations are 95% or more all in the mind.  For those other rare cases where someone displays male characteristics while remaining a biologic female (or vice versa), they are oddities, anomalies, and outliers on a par with the bearded lady, the dog-faced boy, or the Siamese twins in the sideshow at the circus.

-"BB"-

[Big RR]

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. So-called 'trans-gender' situations are 95% or more all in the mind.

So what? Our state of existence is in our mind, as it pain, hunger, or anything else. Without the brain/mind we would see/hear/feel nothing. I can't see saying something is "in your mind" makes it any less real--the only reality we have (or can experience) is in our minds.

[Scooter]

blah blah blah

Tell us you are an intellectually and emotionally stunted waste of space and oxygen devoid of any semblance of insight or capacity to learn without telling us.

[BoSoxGal]

blah blah blah

Tell us you are an intellectually and emotionally stunted waste of space and oxygen devoid of any semblance of insight or capacity to learn without telling us.

With almost every post, I’m guessing.

[Bicycle Bill]

Let me see if I've got a handle on this.  According to BSG and others, I'm supposed to be tolerant of all this whackadoodle nonsense about gender perceptions and people relabeling themselves depending on the mood they're in that particular day; I'm supposed to be tolerant of permitting a lactating birth-giver to terminate a pregnancy for whatever reason; I'm supposed to be tolerant of people renaming themselves with made-up words like Latinx to self-segregate themselves in the name of 'pride'; I'm supposed to be tolerant of other people's feelings and sensitivities and triggers on literally any subject or topic under the sun, including which way the toilet paper is supposed to hang off the roll or whether pineapple should or should not be on pizza; and I'm supposed to be tolerant of changes, modifications, and outright elimination of historical fact in the name of inclusiveness or some obscure manner of making up for past actions that, under the light and lens of today's 'wokefulness', are seen as misdeeds, persecution, colonialism, classism, sexism, racism, or any other '-ism' you care to name — none of which, by the way, I was responsible for in any way, shape, or form — just to list a few.

But I don't get the same courtesy.  Indeed, the same liberal, tolerant, and 'woke' people who are behind the litany I just outlined above will instead demonstrate their own intolerance of others by marginalizing, minimizing, or cancelling anyone who isn't as tolerant as they profess themselves to be.  A classic example of "do as I say, not as I do."

-"BB"-

[Scooter]

Does anything in that whine fest litany do any tangible harm to you, or anyone else? Then why are you expending energy to get your panties bunched over it?

On the other hand, antediluvian prejudices as you regularly espouse are at the root of substantial harm to the people in question. Are you getting why there is no comparison? Didn't think so.

Carry on wallowing in your "victimhood" while you persist in victimizing others. But don't expect anyone to commiserate when they bite back.

[Gob]

We're not allowed an opinion on a current social matter then?

[Big RR]

Your own opinions? Certainly. But that needn't involve name calling and marginalizing others because they are different. And arm chair "psychological" diagnoses of people with whom you have very little, if any, experiences is chief among the marginalizing. It's honestly not that hard to be tolerant of others.

[Burning Petard]

Lactating birth givers are whatever they are. Meantime, old geezers like me prefer the terminology of Webster's Unabridged, 2nd edition. As a cis-male, I still resent I cannot describe my emotional state as 'gay', or fly the yellow Gadsden flag without signaling a completely wrong assumption about my personal politics.

Meanwhile, the latest fashion in anti-offensive vocabulary is just not important to me. I have a rainbow plus pin on the cap I wear most commonly now and it has six horizontal stripes and six more diagonals on the left side. I have no idea what each is supposed to mean and I don't particularly want to know.

snailgate

[Big RR]

Some people take things to extremes, but for the most part it is pretty easy to avoid offense by addressing people as they choose to be addressed and keeping your opinions to yourself. If you want to fly the Gadsen flag, go right ahead; some may judge you negatively, but that is their problem, not yours (hell, I know people who won't fly the American flag for the same reason).

And, FWIW, I personally do try to refrain from wearing symbols and slogans that I am not certain the meaning of (woops, ending with a preposition, sorry). I think I may have told this story before, but an Asian coworker came in with vacation photos, and his 10 year old son wore a shirt that said "Save a tree, eat a beaver"; he really didn't understand what the slogan meant (and was pretty upset when I told him), but he honestly thought it meant killing (and eating) a beaver would save a tree (I'm not sure if the kid knew better, but I wouldn't be surprised. We can all send the wrong messages quite innocently.

[Scooter]

We're not allowed an opinion on a current social matter then?

You're free to hold and express whatever opinions you wish. What you don't have is immunity from having others express their opinions about your opinions.

[Jarlaxle]

We're not allowed an opinion on a current social matter then?

Only the correct one. Anything contrary would be WRONGTHINK.

[Gob]

You're free to hold and express whatever opinions you wish. What you don't have is immunity from having others express their opinions about your opinions.

So do you have any opinion on the actual points being discussed?

[Big RR]

What actual points are they? That people cannot express their opinions on this site? That transgender persons are oddities or have something "in their mind"? Or the point raised in your OP? There is a lot of movement re topics in this thread.

If you are looking for a response to the points raised in your OP, this is the first that I have read anything raising those concerns. The authors may be correct, but I haven't seen enough evidence to embrace their views; time will tell.

[Scooter]

What's to discuss, the usual suspects getting butthurt over inclusive language. It's interesting that the same ilk who used to go ballistic over gender neutral language that was inclusive of women ("firefighter" instead of "fireman", etc.) are now having fits over trans inclusive language by claiming that it erases women.

[Big RR]

True Scooter, but then the link Gob posted refers to opinions of purportedly prominent academics; as I said, it may be BS or it may have some validity, but I would not dismiss it out of hand. Their conclusions may be a consequence we have to put up with in the future (or it may not) but so far as I can see there is no reason to dismiss it. Actions always have consequences, and we should proceed realizing that.

[Gob]

What's to discuss, the usual suspects getting butthurt over inclusive language. It's interesting that the same ilk who used to go ballistic over gender neutral language that was inclusive of women ("firefighter" instead of "fireman", etc.) are now having fits over trans inclusive language by claiming that it erases women.

Apart from these imaginary people and what you imagine them doing, do you have anything to say on the OP?