The Word is Woman #45
Documenting the erasure of women from language and life.
Welcome to the Issue #45 of The Word is Woman, a weekly section of my substack where I document examples of the erasure of women from both language and public life.
For the past three years, ever since I spoke out about language changes in maternity such as ‘birthing people’, I have been sent hundreds of examples of convolutions of language in which the word woman is erased and replaced in the name of so-called ‘inclusivity’. Uterus owners, menstruators, non-men, bleeders, birthers, and even bodies with vaginas…the list of names we have been called and continue to be called is a seemingly endless catalogue of offence.
At the same time, we are seeing male people taking the place of women on sporting podiums and in public roles, and also being applauded as the ‘first woman’ to achieve a certain award or accomplishment, or the ‘best female’ or ‘woman of the year’ in their field.
The Word is Woman is a place to keep track.
So here is this week’s The Word is Woman for the week ending 27th September 2024.
Would you like to read an article about vaginal prolapse?
Would you like to read an article about vaginal prolapse that manages to pull off the extraordinary feat of NOT MENTIONING WOMEN ONCE?!
I thought you would!
I’ll let you read it, the link is here. Women are referred to as, ‘those coping with prolapse’, ‘individuals with prolapse’, ‘prolapse sufferers’, ‘individuals managing menstruation’, ‘people experiencing vaginal prolapse’…the list goes on but never, ever WOMEN!!
Their whole website is also erasure central, for example…
The average menstruator…
A typical tampon user…
Those who bleed…
The W word is entirely absent. Maybe ‘Nixit’ actually means, ‘completely erase’, as in, “Shall we put the word woman anywhere on our website?” “Nah, I think we should just nixit.”
Still on periods, this new ad campaign from Bodyform is really, genuinely great and worth a watch.
Period companies, as is well documented here at TWIW, often really get their knickers in a twist over language. Always, as you might remember, even got my own quotes for an article about periods changed to ‘desex’ them.
Rather than take out the word ‘woman’ entirely, Bodyform seem to have opted instead for ‘woman+’, as you will find on their website page about the new campaign.
Err…everyone who menstruates IS a woman, unless you change the meaning of ‘woman’. The more I see the concept of ‘gender identity’ being shoe-horned into every. single. area. imaginable, the more cynical I become. It’s extraordinary how this cult-like thinking has taken hold. I highly recommend listening to the new Julie Bindel podcast on this, if you haven’t already.
Somerset Maternity and Neonatal Voices are appealing for 6 to 8 ‘people’ to be part of a focus group.
Are they wanting a mixed sex group? It’s not really clear.
And finally, another Maternity and Neonatal Voices group, this time in Luton, made a little edit to their facebook post. Initially they referred to women simply as ‘the birthing person’.
Following a backlash they updated the post to the usual ‘women and birthing people’, which is a slight improvement, I guess, but still changes the meaning of the word ‘woman’ - because if it meant what it has always meant (a female person) you wouldn’t need to add anything else.
The group made this comment, which was also missing a word: '“Sorry”.
Have a wonderful weekend everyone!
I could not keep painstakingly documenting this erasure without the support of paid subscribers. If you are one, thank you! If not, please consider signing up, you’ll get all kind of marvellous perks and my eternal gratitude. If you can’t afford it, please do take out a free sub so you never miss a post.
My next book is all about ultra processed food and women. It’s out next February but you can preorder it already!
If you’ve enjoyed this post, please click the like button. Not only does it massage my ego, it also helps with the algorithm apparently! You can also share it!
I’m so curious. Is this happening in men’s health too? Thinking of the article above on vaginal prolapse. Are there men’s health articles saying “people with prostates…”
Additive language serves the purpose of erasing women. https://lucyleader.substack.com/p/the-problem-with-adding-more-ink Because it is often using clunky extra words, it can be confusing to understand, so rather than including the barely measurable outlier population, it excludes women who may not have the literacy to understand that they are included.