A new culture wars scandal has broken out in Germany after Tagesschau, the country’s oldest and most watched television news service, tried to quietly drop the word "mother" from its approved lexicon.
In a news report last week about a draft law on a new two-week paid maternity leave for the second parent of newborn children, the outlet replaced the word “mother” with the phrase “person giving birth,” purportedly to avoid offending sensibilities. The word “woman” also went missing, with “maternity benefits” remaining as the only gender-linked phrase in the article.
The story was soon picked up by other German media and went viral, resulting in Tagesschau getting a good grilling for its editorial hijinks. An editor’s note has now appeared at the bottom of the original story saying “mother” had been put back in its rightful place following unspecified “misunderstandings.”
The German Ministry of Family Affairs clarified that the term “person giving birth” was not in the draft law which Tagesschau cited, which specifically mentions parental maternity leave “for a period of ten working days directly after the woman’s delivery.”
Tagesschau said that the initial decision to reject the word “mother” was made to avoid “discriminating against anyone.”
The story got over a million views on social media, sparking outrage from lawmakers and ordinary users alike.
“This can’t be serious, can it? This woke madness must be corrected by the ARD [an organization of German regional public broadcasters, ed.]. There should be no obligation to pay for such nonsense,” Bavarian Prime Minister and Christian Social Union party Chairman Markus Soder tweeted.
“Just crazy,” AfD Party lawmaker Gunnar Lindemann chimed in.
“How could things get so far? I’m just speechless about what’s going on in this country,” another person wrote. “A slap in the face for all women who can’t have children! A woman who adopts or has children through other means is also a MOTHER. To link this to childbearing is RIDICULOUS,” another suggested, criticizing not only Tagesschau’s reporting, but the draft law itself.
“People have been on the earth for 300,000 years, but unfortunately I have to live through the era of the greatest idiots,” one person quipped.
“The [coalition government] is already working on a new law where reproduction can only take place in a test tube. Then you won’t need the word mother anymore,” another darkly joked.
Tagesschau’s did find a few defenders. “It’s a more accurate description. Finally, fathers (trans men) and other parent 1s (non-binary, agendered) can also give birth. But that’s too complex for [your] readers,” one person wrote. “Honestly, that’s complete nonsense. Women have children and men don’t – period. If a man has a child, they will be a woman – that’s a certainty. And as a woman, I definitely don’t want to be called that [person giving birth, ed.]. ‘Mother’ is the most beautiful word in the world!” someone responded.
Germany is the latest country to fall victim to Orwellian-style efforts to create a new politically correct language as governments, corporations, and organizations across the West strive to accommodate minorities and avoid offending sensibilities.
These efforts have sparked a backlash in many nations, with some activists pointing out that efforts to accommodate wind up discriminating against the majority. Some observers suggest that various scandals surrounding "woke" initiatives are artificially manufactured, and deliberately designed to distract people from the important issues affecting the world, such as corporate greed, government corruption, international conflicts, and globalist efforts to herd people into a digital concentration camp.