this post was submitted on 08 Nov 2024
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What is a good word to use for people who are female of any age including young children that are not old enough to be called women in addition to women?
'Women and girls' is pretty clunky when talking about something that is gender specific, but applies to all ages.
boys and men / girls and women sounds right to me
'Gendered violence against teenage women and girls' is really clunky. Especially if it needs repeating across paragraphs.
If there isn't something, that's fine.
"Gendered violence against females" on the other hand sounds a bit too clinical though... Like you're removing their personhood
If 'females' wasn't used by online sexists to treat women as objects would it sound that way?
Maybe! I don't know if "gendered violence against men" also has the same connotations.
Maybe this is indeed is a case of those people poisoning the term.
"Don't forget about gendered violence against boys!" would be a likely response to a statement about men.
It is absolutely a case of a term being poisoned, which does mean it needs to be treated more carefully but sucks when there isn't an alternative.
Women is probably fine to use when the ages can be gleaned from context. You can also make the noun non gendered and use female as a adjective like “female students” or “female patients”
I'm mainly asking when ages span from birth to old age and the goup would basically be "female persons" or "male persons" which is clunky.
Sometimes it can be rephrased, but it often requires multiple words to mean the same thing. Plus "women of all ages" will be read as not including children.
I'm mostly pissed that sexists ruined the only single word term we have for half of the population.
Honestly I don't think 'women and girls' feels clunky, but that's just me
It is important that when we are addressing issues of sexism, that we try to make sure that the ideas are easily understood by women, men, girls, and boys so that everyone understands how to support equality. If we only focus our effort on men and boys, without recognizing the influence also has on women and girls, then it will not be as successful. For example, the social expectations of women and girls to dress in certain ways is commonly enforced by men, women, girls, and boys even if the influence is only targeted at women and girls. Not to mention the toxic masculinity that is applied to men and boys by men, women, boys, and girls that are commonly reinforced by telling men and boys to 'man up' in stressful situations.
You are right, that is smooth as butter.
Just ask yourself if you'd use "males" in that context.
I absolutely would use males in that context. "Toxic masculinity has a detrimental affect on males of all ages" sounds perfectly fine to me because I don't know of a different label for the group and males doesn't have the same dehumanizing usage as females.
Male is literally the same kind of word just for the opposite sex/gender; the term specifically points out the ability to produce sperm (in many dimorphic species) for the purposes of reproducing with the opposite sex. It’s literally just saying “your distinguishing characteristic is your ability to inseminate another of your species” and is just as dehumanizing.
The reason you would use it in that context is because it’s “[gender specific noun] of all ages.” Where if you were to say “boys of all ages” or “men of all ages” it would imply either all ages under 18 or all ages at or over 18.
This is the same context in which you would use female as a noun, as girl/woman implies a restricted age range, just as boy/man, when you specifically don’t want one.
Doesn't "men and boys" have exactly the same meaning though?
I don't feel deshumanized for being called a male.
Disclaimer: I don't use the noun "female" because I know some find it offensive.