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Titiana McGrath, the avatar of a great satire writer, coined that phrase, ”bipedal gestation units,” and made me smirk. It was in response to the notion that gender inclusiveness demands we stop calling it Mother’s Day and start referring to it to ”birthing persons day” so as to not offend and exclude all the non females who give birth. Apparently the term ”mother” is exclusively female and therefore gender oppressive towards ”people who give birth” and other assorted chest feeders.

One shouldn’t even bother to address such things, but these notions tend to get a ridiculous amount of traction within our mad, mad, culture. For example, NARAL, which is prochoice America, sent out a tweet supporting the notion. They  happen to believe that ”reproductive freedom is for every body” and barriers to birth control fall harder on ‘marginalized groups,’ such as those without the reproductive design or biological characteristics that make giving birth an objective reality?

Long ago I lamented with some feminists over the fact that women were being dehumanized and erased for the sole purpose of paving the way for artificial wombs and artificial intelligence. It was a quite productive discussion on account of the fact that I managed to get myself erased which demonstrated the point I was making perfectly.

I am not the least bit interested in rehashing a gender war or anything but for the sake of amusement or comedy or whatever, it is never men who we suddenly label ”bipedal egg fertilizers.” Men are still men, er, perhaps ”women,” but I mean human. Men are still human. Men are still called ”persons.” In fact they are so, so human we must now defend and protect their right to not be offended by….. blatant biology and obvious science? Once again it is women who must step aside, and it is mothers who must surrender our very identity to make way.

Surrendering our very identity, an amusing notion due to the fact that motherhood is already a bit like being completely erased and rendered a non person. Someone smart once compared motherhood to a particular breed of spider who lays her eggs and then lies down to die so the baby hatchlings can nourish themselves for weeks off of her rotting carcass. That may sound like a rather bleak analogy, but that image cheered me up immensely over the years. Also, it’s a marvelous boundary to set, I’ll give you everything I can, but thou shall not feast off my rotting carcass.

Anna Jarvis spent half her life petitioning to get congress to acknowledge Mother’s day, ”a day of sentiment and not profit.” Then once the government and consumerism were properly involved, she spent the second half of her life trying desperately to get the whole notion reversed, rescinded. It was a battle to the point of arrest and eventual placement in a sanitarium where she died, rather penniless.

A woman after my own heart, I tell ya.

Anna Jarvis never had children of her own which brings me to a larger point. Motherhood is not about giving birth at all, nor is about having an identity. It is actually about reflecting our Creator, our Savior, practicing the fine art of sacrificial love, and nurturing eternal souls. We are all ”birthing persons” in that sense, giving birth to a vision and an ideal, to a future and a hope. I know this truth because I have more spiritual mothers in heaven now than I can even count. They are my treasures stored up in heaven and a bit of their treasure is still stored in me.