The NYC health official "birthing people" vs "mothers" debacle

(AP Photo/Teresa Crawford)

It seems that the excessively woke, gender-bending liberals keep tripping over their own tongues when trying to navigate the treacherous waters they helped create with the transgender movement. Or in this case, they may be tripping over their own fingers when they go on social media. The latest victim in this ongoing series of self-inflicted wounds is the new Chief Medical Officer at the New York City Department of Health. Dr. Michelle Morse decided to use her official Twitter account to promote some health-related information to the citizens of Gotham this week. She was attempting to raise awareness of increased death rates among expectant mothers, particularly during the pandemic, and how these adverse medical outcomes are being seen disproportionately in minority communities. Sadly, like a struggling author who winds up mixing their metaphors, she decided to walk the gender tightrope and use the phrase “birthing people,” which has recently come into vogue. But when she tried to mix racial characterizations into the message as well, her attempts at woke tweeting quickly fell apart. (Fox News)

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A top health official in New York City is facing backlash after a series of tweets she posted calling White mothers “birthing people” while referring to Black and Hispanic women as “mothers.”

The comments from Dr. Michelle Morse, the chief medical officer at the New York City Department of Health, came in a series of tweets touting the city’s “birth equity” initiative to expand the “citywide doula program and midwifery”.

“The urgency of this moment is clear,” Morse wrote. “Mortality rates of birthing people are too high, and babies born to Black and Puerto Rican mothers in this city are three times more likely to die in their first year of life than babies born to non-Hispanic White birthing people.”

Amazingly, the tweet is still there, at least for now. (We grabbed a screen capture of it just in case.)

Before going further, allow me to first say that the problem Dr. Morse is addressing is very real. Mortality rates among expectant mothers have been rising, particularly in the cities, and that’s a problem. I further agree that the data indicates that this trend is exacerbated in low-income areas with fewer and less well-funded healthcare facilities. Sadly, these tend to be found most often in minority communities in our larger cities. So I’m glad someone is trying to address the issue.

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With that said, let’s get back to this Twitter debacle and see where the wheels began to come off. Morse made a reference to “Black and Puerto Rican mothers,” but followed that up with “non-Hispanic White birthing people.” I suppose we’ll forgive her for capitalizing “white” in the context, even though that falls outside the boundaries of the AP Style Guide on racial capitalization. Some of her followers quickly jumped on her for the implication that Black and Hispanic pregnant women are “mothers” while pregnant white women are not.

Sensing trouble like a watchdog, the city Department of Health responded to a request for comment from the NY Post. They offered a correction and an apology. They said, “we apologize for inadvertently gendering Black and Puerto Rican birthing people.”

No, that’s not a joke. That’s what the DOH spokesperson felt required an apology. They had “inadvertently gendered” Black and Puerto Rican “birthing people.”

This is apparently where we are today. Not only are you not supposed to “misgender” people by referring to them by their actual biological sex, but you’re not supposed to “gender” people either. Because, you know… you can’t be making assumptions. One never knows who might be offended by that. Further, not only are there not any more “women” in the world but there are no “mothers,” either. I suppose that makes sense, right? If there are no women, you certainly can’t have any mothers. All of our problems should be solved in the next 100 years tops because the birth rate has now clearly dropped to zero and all of the pesky humans who have been ruining the planet by raising cows and driving cars will be gone.

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Do these people actually hear themselves when they talk? That’s a serious question. Do any of them ever stop after they post a tweet and say to themselves, ‘Oh my God. I sound like a raving lunatic?’ This would actually be hilarious if there weren’t so many people taking it seriously (or at least pretending to in public) and trying to incorporate all of this nonsense into our laws and indoctrinate our children with it in the public schools.

People have to keep pushing back and bringing this up in every election around the country. We’re living through a real-world version of Idiocracy at the moment and the joke will definitely be on us if we can’t nip this madness in the bud.

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Ed Morrissey 12:40 PM | November 21, 2024
David Strom 11:20 AM | November 21, 2024
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