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Essays reflect solely their author's point of view. We ask only that they respect our Principles.← Back to all essays | Author's essays Liberal Feminism and the Holy Birth
by Local Gay Communist - LGC
Published: 2026-05-07 (last update: 2026-05-07)
1-5 minutes
Author: LGC
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It is often the case that liberal feminists take as a point of pride the perceived womanliness of the ability to give birth, and use it as a defining factor for the female gender. This essay tries to understand why this is the case and examine the practice critically. A lot of this theory (especially in the part where I criticize it's effects) can also be applied to the similar intertwining of womanhood/femininity and periods/menstruation.
Author: LGC
Why do Women give birth?
Women give birth because they are women. What does this mean? It means that the concept of a woman is intertwined with birth, the idea that we can cleanly divide society into "man" and "woman" emerged out of property relations: men own property, while women make more men to own property. From this origin it makes perfect sense to heavily ground man and woman in biology, per this definition, only a man can create more men, with women existing as a tool for that creation, the title is passed on from man to man, through women.
A woman in that sense then is birthed of the necessity to track property rights. A woman, per that definition, is property, a tool for the creation of more men. A woman is, then, a womb, nothing but the act of birth, in fact. A woman, then, is but the preeminence of reproduction, the woman is other-ed because, to maintain the concept of property patriarchy is to other the woman.
From this definition, then, the modern concept of woman is borne, and hence, the liberal feminist, who views gender as static, and who cannot fully comprehend of the trans individual homogenizes the woman AS birth, the woman is still birth, then, they are the womb, still, this is the product of upholding capitalism, where women fulfill the dual purpose of patriarchal reproduction, and social-reproductive labor. The liberal then must either uphold the woman as tool of patriarchy, but "empowered" through ownership of her subservience to patriarchal property relations, or abolish "man" and "woman" in favor of an alternative model, by transcending capitalist relations, de-liberalization, then, is the alternative.
The effects and issues, a critical view
It should be obvious by now, then, that the firm grounding of womanhood in the ability to give birth, and vice-versa, is a detriment to many a woman. For, womanhood is still a label used by those who fall outside this view. The sterile woman, the trans woman (and man!), the woman who simply wishes not to give birth, the non-heterosexual woman, the non-binary, all of these do not fit neatly into this idea. The only people who actually are served by the grounding of womanhood in birth and pregnancy, are cisgender, non-sterile, heterosexual women. All others are directly harmed by this idea, the trans person has their gender identity invalidated either by being a woman incapable of birth, or a man capable of birth (or neither!), the sterile woman is cut out, potentially reawakening trauma, the queer woman is silenced, who has a far lower chance of becoming pregnant by choice.
Furthermore, the view that birth is a woman's thing aides patriarchy, which uses this very same talking point to reinforce the very property relations which birthed it.
Fundamentally, then, The whole concept of the "biological woman" beyond neurochemistry and hormones, is patriarchal and exclusionary to those who do not fit within the narrow definition of the archetypal non-sterile cishet woman.