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The Midwifery Council in NZ wants to cancel any mention of women. ‘Midwife’ is to be renamed ‘Midthingamy’. You’ll also be astounded to hear their response to the simple question “what is a woman?” But they’re not the only wokesters in the health field.
TRANSCRIPT:
MIDWIFE NOW TO BE CALLED MIDTHINGAMY
Have you ever heard of a midwife? Yeah, I know – dumb question – we all have. But the midwifery council in NZ wants to cancel women. Yep – don’t mention the word women. Midwife is to be renamed midthingamy.
According to the International Confederation of midwives which celebrated its 100th anniversary two years ago in 2022,
“From the Stone Ages to modern day, midwives have shown up to stand with women… midwifery is an ancient profession that is as natural and critical to humanity as birth itself, upholding and reflecting the cultural practices of women and their families.
https://www.internationalmidwives.org/icm-news/the-origins-of-midwifery.html
In Te Ara – the encyclopedia of NZ, Te whanau tamariki – pregnancy and birth
Maori women traditionally gave birth in specially built shelters. There were rituals to observe and karakia to recite. Mothers sang oriori to their babies – lullabies which told whakapapa, legends and tribal history.
https://teara.govt.nz/en/te-whanau-tamariki-pregnancy-and-birth
According to Wikipedia,
The word derives from Old English mid, “with”, and wif, “woman”, and thus originally meant “with-woman”, that is, the person who is with the woman (mother) at childbirth.
In 2022 the Midwifery Council of NZ wanted to revise its midwifery scope of practice guidelines to entirely remove the words “woman” and “mother”. On its website, the Midwifery Council said revising the wording used in the guidelines has been in the making for at least two years in response to “strong signals about the need for a radical transformation of the health system, including midwifery”.
Well – radical is correct. Biologically tone deaf would be another word. Woke stupidity would be the other adjective I would use.
Let’s look at the changes
Here’s the original –
And I’ve circled all the mentions of the word “women” – women and her family, and also “breastfeeding” – not chestfeeding or some other woke term.
Here’s the new woke version
‘Women’ has been cancelled for ‘whanau’ who are planning a pregnancy, pregnant, birthing, and postnatal.
So it’s the whanau that are pregnant and giving birth now.
- Promoting whanau health
- Consults with whanau
- Whanau feedback
- Varied health needs of whanau
So the focus is no longer on the pregnant woman – because remember – and this will possibly get this mcblog episode removed from Facebook or Linkedin – only women can get pregnant. Radical eh?
Women have been cancelled. It’s now “whanau”. Look – whanau are involved. Family are involved. But the midwife works with the woman primarily.
And remember what Maori themselves have said – and continue to say
Pregnancy and birth
It was important for tribes’ survival that women gave birth. If a woman could not have children, special karakia were said over her. Women gave birth in specially built shelters. After the birth the shelter and all the things in it were burnt.
So the Midwifery Council sent out their proposals at the beginning of last year and got rightly slammed – including by McBlog. According to Ashburton midwife Deb Hayes, only 3.7% of respondents who submitted feedback in March 2023 agreed with the new scope – 90.8% were negative responses. (That sounds a little like the responses to the abortion legislation too.)
They said
“The purpose of the revised Scope is to acknowledge that wahine/women/pregnant people and their babies exist within the context of their social connections. Their wellbeing is interconnected. Some people have raised concerns that the words ‘woman’ and ‘baby’ were replaced by the word whanau and that this could negatively impact on women’s access to maternity care choices. As ‘whanau’ can encompass many connections and relationships, for the purpose of the Scope of Practice and its application, whanau means the pregnant wahine/person and pepe, in their social context, enabling care as it relates to pre-conceptual care, pregnancy, childbirth, and newborn care”
They just can’t bring themselves to repeat the word “women” twice, can they? And as I said earlier, whanau are involved. Family are involved. But the midwife works primarily with the woman.
Now Chris Lynch Media asked the Midthingamy Council that devilishly difficult question to provide a definition of a woman.
The response was – are you ready for it?
“There is no specific definition of a woman. All midwives (must) provide midwifery care to anyone who requires that care no matter how they identify.”
Now this woke policy is due to be implemented in June.
So midwife Deb Hayes who obviously understands biology and isn’t woke has started a petition and you can sign this. It’s already got 5,000 signatures. I’ll put the link in the description.
https://petitions.parliament.nz/6e261231-b54c-4a00-a98c-08dc109c0ada?fbclid=IwAR2Ip_TiSYsWoLZ56AEslrYn9s_OAWe6tKr09qZf-3bc78n4a2xFvCHlWaY
She has seen a growing trend to use “gender neutral language” in health services, but she says that sex-based language is essential to midwifery. She says – “As midwives, our practice is based on a partnership with women during pregnancy, labour and childbirth, and the six weeks postnatal period. This includes supporting the establishment of breastfeeding and monitoring the health of mother and her baby.”
In a press release by the Womens Rights Party, former College of Midwives Chief Executive Karen Guilliland says midwives provide care to individual women, also encouraging the participation of whanau in each woman’s care and promoting health of whanau. However, Ms Guilliland says it is the woman who defines her whanau and decides how others will be involved in her care. She says “This is a very important principle because it upholds women’s rights, so long fought for and, as we can see in many parts of the world, so easily lost through political or other contextual changes.” Ms Guilliland says the interchangeable use of the word “midwife” with “kahu pokai” appears to exclude both the woman and the midwife as it could be applied to any care-giving workforce.
And here’s the interesting bit. The former College of Midwives Chief Executive said
“I remember the New Zealand College of Midwives Kaumatua Mina Timutimu’s advice that traditional Maori interpretation of pregnancy and birth highlighted the woman-centred and sacred nature of childbirth and the word ‘midwife’ as the care giver does this. Her view was that hapu women hold a sacred place as it is only pregnant women who have the power to carry the new generation.”
Remember – the midwifery council is not the first woke government department playing fast and furious with biological terms.
Up until the 5th of April 2022, the Ministry of Health understood biology. Only women give birth. This is November 2021
- Immunisation for pregnant women
This is April 2022
See down the very bottom – a non-pregnant woman!
But that all changed on the 6th April 2022.
No longer is it pregnant women giving birth and needing protection from COVID. It’s pregnant people.
No longer is it pregnant women giving birth and needing a flu jab. It’s pregnant people.
Mark your diaries. It was the 6th April 2022 that the Ministry of Health got hit by a bout of Stupid. Hopefully, the new Minister of Health Dr Shane Reti can heal the stupid.
But on 6th April 2022 biology effectively left the room at the Ministry of Health.
And the stupidity virus has also hit La Leche league.
Here’s an ad for a meeting last year of the Wellington branch of La Leche league
They invite all “breastfeeding, chestfeeding, human milk feeding, and pregnant parents to a breast feeding meet up.”
Are cows and goats invited also? I’m pretty sure they’d be keen.
Does this matter? Of course, it does. It’s what I call linguistic gymnastics. It demeans women. It demeans mothers. It cancels mums. It denies nature and biology.
To say pregnant people and to deny mothers giving birth is to perpetuate a dangerous lie and deny biological reality in order to appease a radical sexual and gender ideology. A cultural Marxist ideology intent on destroying the natural family.
But the truth doesn’t change – only women can give birth. Women are mothers. Men are fathers. Radical eh? Biology tells a story – but the state seems dead-set on distorting that story, and we should be concerned about the direction being taken. These issues matter because they concern our understanding of fundamental human nature, who each of us is as male and female.
Just one final point.
Midwifery – have they realised that that word contains that terrible triggering misogynistic right-wing word WIFE?
I suspect that they might actually like my suggestion of Midthingamy. Or Midperson.
Let’s not cancel mothers.
Only women can get pregnant.
Only women can breastfeed
That’s Biology 101.
Let’s just ignore the stupidity and wokeness of the midthingamy council, the Ministry of health, and La Leche League. For the sake of our awesome mums.
And for the sake of truth.
