The triumph of “gender neutral” terminology (and ideology) continues apace. Malta – little Catholic Malta! – is now planning to ban “husband” and “wife”, “mother” and “father” from its proposed legislation introducing gay marriage. All in the cause of “gender neutral” lingo.
This is just as London Underground is ceasing to address its passengers as “ladies and gentlemen” – using, instead, the neutral “everyone”. The idea is that transgender people might be offended by “ladies and gentlemen”.
Yet there’s a topsy-turvy logic here. Couples in same-sex unions are often particularly keen to use words like “husband” and “wife”. Sir Elton John refers to his partner David Furnish as his “husband”. The children call both of them by a different version of father – “Papa” and “Dad”.
Katherine Zappone, the minister for children in Ireland, was recently bereaved by the death of Anne Louise Gilligan, whom she described, most emphatically, as her “wife”.
So if gay couples themselves use the terms “husband” and “wife”, why should lawmakers take it upon themselves to extinguish such descriptive titles?
As for “ladies” and “gentleman”: if someone transitions from being a man to being a woman, why wouldn’t he/she (or “ze”, as directed in Canada) wish to be called a “lady”? And vice-versa? So why abolish courtesies like “ladies and gentlemen” which add to a sense of respect for the person?
I suppose that intersex individuals must be considered. Biologically, this is an extremely rare condition. But then, biology is very much out of fashion these days. We are told that “sex/gender” is “socially constructed”. This is the new orthodoxy, and anyone who dissents may be “no-platformed”, as Germaine Greer indeed was.
I’m all for tolerance, and live and let live. If someone decides they were born into the wrong body, then I respect their personal feelings. The Church of England is preparing to offer a special service to welcome transgender people into their new identity, and I dare say this is based on kindness and Christian charity – even if it does somewhat contradict the Book of Genesis about “male and female He created them”.
But I also think that a lot of damage is being done to younger generations now by the way in which nature is being written out of the script. It’s all very well-meaning to be tolerant; and removing “husband”, “wife”, “father” and “mother” from statute books is no doubt done in the name of tolerance. But it’s ignoring the fact that all across human and animal species, successful mating has been between a “mother” and a “father”, and the template for such begetting has been a marriage between a “husband” and a “wife”.
I listened to a radio discussion at the beginning of the week centered on the issue of fertility, and how today’s young women (and young men) need to be educated about the subject. The fertility specialists lamented that young women, and couples, often know very little about fertility and how it waxes and wanes. Well, they are probably taught that it is a “social construct”, rather than a power emanating from that source we mustn’t mention – nature.
Interesting, indeed, how language is affected by social and political change. A “divorce settlement” is coming to mean the financial deal which will have to be arranged between Britain and the EU after Brexit. Another new phrase is the quaint-seeming “Henry VIII clause”. It sounds like a Hilary Mantel novel, but apparently it’s a protocol that goes back to 1539, when Henry had the power to legislate by proclamation. Very Tudor!
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Matthew Taylor, who produced the government report on modern working practices, seems to be suggesting that we should, as far as possible, get rid of cash – because cash transactions can cloak tax evasion. Instead of putting money on the plate at church, we could be expected to scan in our bank card, turning church attendance into a business-like financial transaction. And what would become, then, of the widow’s mite?
Charities depend on the spontaneous reaction of dropping a couple of quid into a collection box, and small shops need to deal in cash. For this reason, the cheque was saved from abolition. Let’s hope we can preserve the coin of the realm too.
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