• snooggums@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    6
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    edit-2
    10 hours ago

    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.

      • snooggums@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        10
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        9 hours ago

        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.

    • xtr0n@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      12
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      10 hours ago

      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”

      • snooggums@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        9 hours ago

        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.

          • snooggums@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            6 hours ago

            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.

      • snooggums@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        5
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        10 hours ago

        ‘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.

        • SavvyWolf@pawb.social
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          14
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          9 hours ago

          “Gendered violence against females” on the other hand sounds a bit too clinical though… Like you’re removing their personhood

          • snooggums@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            6
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            9 hours ago

            If ‘females’ wasn’t used by online sexists to treat women as objects would it sound that way?

            • SavvyWolf@pawb.social
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              6
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              9 hours ago

              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.

              • snooggums@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                3
                arrow-down
                1
                ·
                9 hours ago

                “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.