I was talking to two of my friends from first semester–one cis male and one trans female–and, per usual of this group of people, we start talking about social issues. When the male friend started making disagreeable claims about women's rights (not reproductive rights–women's rights), I responded to him out of frustration and recklessness: "Hey, no uterus, no opinion!" To which my female friend says without skipping a beat, "Excuse me, I don't believe whether or not I have a uterus affects my rights in this respect."
This was one of those "Oh shit," moments. The moment she started speaking I knew I screwed up and hurt her feelings. And those words weren't something I could ever take back.
Because I'm trying to know better, these were my problems with the calendar when I saw it:
Male same-sex couples, especially those that want to be parents, by far don't need a uterus in order to raise a child.
Single working fathers–widowers, divorcés, adoptive parents–have to use their brains and their hearts to overcome the challenges of parenting on their own. (This isn't reverse sexism: this is attributed to the fact that women are grossly expected to be the "mothering" people in this world.) The single fathers, cis or trans, don't need a uterus to raise a child.
Women who are unable to conceive or safely deliver a child, who have had struggles with losing a pregnancy are capable and wanting to be mothers. There's hope with processes such as surrogacy and adoption, but they need this reminder: your organs that have so tried to hold a child but couldn't has nothing to do with your ability to raise one.
Trans women wanting children, whether through conception and birth, surrogacy, adoption–they don't need a uterus to raise a child.
When I've walked alongside the heartbreak of infertility, lack of trans visibility and so-close-but-yet-so-far adoptions, I get how this sentiment of uterus=woman=parent hurts. Think before you speak, my friends.
