Caroline ffiske writes to the editor of The Lancet objecting to the use of language that dehumanises women. Published 27 September 2021

Dear Sir,

I am writing to express my dismay at the latest cover of The Lancet magazine which describes women as 'bodies with vaginas'. The cover seems designed to shock and dismay, reducing women as it does, to mere body parts. If it were just an insult, we would be appalled that the world's oldest and most well-known medical journal would gratuitously insult half the population. However, we know that the cover is not intended as an insult: rather The Lancet is pandering to gender ideology. It's pandering to the idea that we all have gendered souls; and that 'how we self-identify' is more important for how we live our lives and organise our world, than biological sex. It's pandering to the idea that not all 'bodies with vaginas' belong to women. Gender ideology is immensely harmful. It undermines women's rights, the safety of vulnerable young people, science, language, free speech, and our very understanding of reality. Below I set out the harms done by gender ideology. I wonder which of these you and your readers would disagree with.

1. Gender ideology eliminates the boundaries between the sexes, eroding women's single sex spaces and services. If, as, for example, Stonewall says 'trans women are women' then we might as well drop the 'trans'. Anyone is a woman who says they are a woman. At a stroke, this eliminates the boundary around spaces that have been created to keep women safe and maintain dignity and privacy between the sexes. Men can self-identify into women's prisons, refuges, toilets, changing rooms, and hospital wards. If trans women are women, there is also no mechanism whereby women, including elderly and vulnerable women, can request sex-segregated intimate health and social care. 

2. Gender ideology is promoted heavily on the internet, in online social forums. Vulnerable teenagers are persuaded that they will find their 'true self', and a resolution to the difficulties in being human, via seeking an 'inner gender identity' unrelated to their biological sex. Then, as they progress to enforcing new names and invented pronouns, they can find themselves at loggerheads with those who love them the most, and provide their best security in the world - their family. Some of these teenagers go on to buy cross-sex hormones online. Some go on to have surgery that renders them medicated and with wider, self-inflicted, medical problems for life, potentially sterile, and without sexual function.

3. Gender ideology undermines the legitimacy of same-sex attraction. Young women and men face being called 'transphobic' if their sexual preference is exclusively for women or men. They're supposed to be open to 'any gender identity'. Men are self-identifying into spaces created by and for lesbian women. Gender ideology leaves these women powerless to object.

4. If trans women are women, that is the end of sex-segregated sport. Globally, we already see an emerging pattern of men self-identifying into women's sports and taking prizes.

5. Gender ideology attacks free speech. Because of its flimsy unscientific foundations (biological sex is binary and immutable, and there is no science behind the idea of an 'inner gender identity') it relies on an ongoing attack on free speech to maintain its ascendancy. The flimsy foundations must not be challenged because they will be exposed in all their emptiness. People can now be reported to their local police for 'hate' if they point out the truth.

6. We are drifting towards 'compelled speech'. Women have been instructed in Court to refer to violent males as 'she'. Prison officers are informed that they should use female pronouns for a male criminal who requests it.

7. Gender ideology undermines the integrity of the press. Newspapers print stories that are literally not true. (Lies?) We now read newspaper stories about violent and sexual crimes committed by women. It turns out these crimes have been committed by men. This changes our perception, our understanding, of our world. This is dangerous for women and for younger people, learning to navigate the world. How do they feel, when they discover our newspapers literally publish false stories? And isn't a young women's safety compromised if she hesitates as she walks through a park at dusk - should she walk quickly to catch up with the woman in front... - or perhaps not?

8. We are eroding the integrity of statistics and data gathering. Until it was challenged in Court, the Office of National Statistics planned for the 2021 Census to allow people to record their sex according to 'gender' markers on documents such as passports. How many people in this country even know that you can change your passport to record your gender identity, not sex?

9. Gender ideology erodes the integrity of science. Biological sex is binary and immutable. We know this, but we are denying it. There is no science behind the concept of a gendered soul. Foundational scientific knowledge and the integrity of science and science journals is being undermined.

10. Gender ideology undermines shared language. Woman is the word we share for an adult human female. Yet people who should know better; reputable publications, shy away from the word. This slowly undermines one of our most foundational human attributes: our ability to share language and communicate. 

11. Gender ideology undermines reality. We can accurately sex each other within seconds. This really matters for women’s safety - and our broader elementary understanding of who we are with at any given time. Gender ideology wants us to distrust our very senses.

12. Gender ideology undermines our democracy. No democratic remit said yes to men self-identifying into women's prisons, or yes to the 2021 Census attempting to undermine the concept of biological sex, or yes to police forces recording our online discussion about sex and gender as hate, or yes to schools introducing mixed sex toilets, or to any of the above.

These are the reasons that women are annoyed to see a cover of The Lancet 'disappearing' the word 'woman'. I hope you will agree that we are not over-reacting.

Caroline ffiske