Erasing womanhood

In their quest for transgender inclusivity, LGBT advocates are reducing women to “people who menstruate” or “individuals with a cervix.” The transgender agenda increasingly seeks to erase biological womanhood—and mainstream media outlets seem ready to comply.

On July 30, CNN referred to women as “individuals with a cervix” in a promotional tweet for an article about cervical cancer screening recommendations. The article also used “individuals who are 65 and older” about other female gynecological procedures. Its language mirrored a recent report from the American Cancer Society.

Matt Dornic, CNN’s head of strategic communications, said the network wanted to include nonbinary and transgender individuals such as biological women who identify as men but still need a cervical exam.

The article drew immediate backlash, including comedic parodies of famous songs inserting “individual with a cervix” in place of “women.” But critics offered more serious feedback, as well.

“Individuals with a cervix? You mean women? Only women can have a cervix,” tweeted Kristan Hawkins, president of Students for Life of America. In a follow-up email, she said, “Clearly there are those who are working to erase people’s ability to notice or comment on biological realities.”

Some of the most outspoken opponents of this growing dismissal of biological womanhood are women themselves, ranging from pro-life advocates such as Hawkins to radical feminists and prominent figures like author J.K. Rowling. The Harry Potter creator caused a stir in June when she criticized the website Devex for an opinion column that referred to women as “people who menstruate.” “If sex isn’t real, the lived reality of women globally is erased,” Rowling tweeted.

Some see an inherent contradiction between the claims of feminism and transgenderism. The new transgender agenda allows men to “don the mantle of femaleness simply by asserting that it is their birthright,” Alexandra DeSanctis wrote in National Review. “There has never been a more patriarchal claim.”

In sports, public restrooms, advertisements, and media, biological men who identify as women demand not only inclusion but also that others acknowledge them as female.

“The most militant of the transgender activists say that there is nothing special or unique about being a woman other than a dress code,” Hawkins said. “They want to erase women’s experiences and physical realities, replacing it with the idea that being a woman is as simple as what you are wearing and how you feel.”

For the Christian, womanhood and manhood extend beyond one’s biological makeup and functions, as evidenced in the first chapter of Genesis: “in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:27).

“We’re not just creatures, but intentional creatures … founded on the fact that we’re made in God’s image, of which the distinction and complementarity of men and women is a central part,” Carl Trueman, a professor of Biblical and religious studies at Grove City College in Pennsylvania, wrote in June for The Gospel Coalition. “This Biblical view of man and woman also gives us a significance that transcends this world.”