LITTLE ROCK, Arkansas (LifeSiteNews) — The Republican Governor of Arkansas, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, signed an executive order last week that requires all government officials and departments to use sex specific terminology when referring to women, banning “woke” language that does not acknowledge the distinction of the two sexes.
The “Executive Order To Eliminate Woke, Anti-Women Words From State Government And Respect Women” was signed on October 19, making Arkansas the leading state in combatting so-called “gender fluid” or “gender neutral” language in official government documents and state business.
Affirming the basic scientific facts of sexual differentiation that are denied by woke “transgender” advocates, the order declares. “Women are women; an XX chromosome is an XX chromosome. The science is clear and real; there are things only women can do, like perform the miracle of birth.”
The order goes on to declare that government policy and use of language should reflect and affirm the distinction of the sexes, rather than adopt terminology that “erases women.”
“Government should reject language that ignores, undermines, and erases women,” the new law states. “Government should celebrate gender distinctions between men and women – not erase them; and it is the policy of this administration to prohibit the use of woke, anti-women words for official state government business.”
The executive order is “effective immediately” and applies to “all state offices, departments, boards, and commissions,” which “are prohibited from using exclusionary, sexist language in official state government business.”
Delving into specific terms and phrases that are prohibited from government documents, the law stipulates that instead of referring to “pregnant people,” “pregnant person,” “body fed,” “person fed,” “chestfeeding,” “human milk,” “birthing person,” “laboring person,” “menstruating person” “menstruating people,” “birth-giver,” “womxn,” or “womyn,” government officials are to use the terms “pregnant women” or “pregnant mom,” “breast fed,” “breastfeeding,” “breast milk,” “birth mom,” and “woman.”
Speaking on Fox News, Sanders slammed “woke” “gender-neutral” language as “insanity.” “The Left continues to push this woke agenda, basically trying to erase the differences of women versus men, ignoring all of science and biology, and completely ignoring the fact that women have a unique perspective,” she said.
“Only women can actually give birth. No matter how many different ways they say it, that fact is completely based in science and reality. And we’re no longer going to allow them to redefine terms that weaken and frankly demean women here in state government documents and here in the state of Arkansas,” the conservative governor affirmed.
On signing the law, Sanders told reporters that the order is “banning a number of all sorts of ridiculous words from state government documents.”
“We’re taking a stand against wokeness. We’ve had enough… Enough trying to erase women and girls, enough denying our biological differences from men, and enough of the craziness that is taking over our country.”
Sanders said that what “started as a fad” among “woke” university students is “demeaning to women and it needs to stop.” “Some on the left will accuse us of being nitpicky, that Arkansas should just lay down and accept the cultural revolution without complaint. I say it’s the exact opposite.”
“It’s the left that decided that ‘woman’ is a dirty word,” she declared. “It’s the left that decided we needed to toss out basic biology and basic grammar along with it. I think they’re just mad that conservatives are starting to fight back. And they better get ready, because we’re just getting started.”
Sanders has shown herself to be a staunch opponent of “transgender” ideology and its infiltration into government policy, slamming President Joe Biden as “the first man to surrender his presidency to a woke mob that can’t tell you what a woman is.”
Sanders has opposed biological men competing in women’s sports, writing in May that “strong, conservative governors will never allow women’s sports to be destroyed by a woke mob that can’t even tell you what a woman is.”
In March 2023, Sanders signed into law SB 199, which empowers anyone who underwent surgical or chemical “transitioning” as a minor to file malpractice suits against the physician responsible for up to 15 years after their eighteenth birthday, rather than the two-year window afforded most malpractice claims.
In March she also signed a bill that prohibits students, faculty, and staff at public or charter schools from using bathrooms or locker rooms that do not coincide with their biological sex, as well as a law to formally prohibit Critical Race Theory and LGBT indoctrination in the state’s public schools. In February, Sanders signed a bill to prohibit minors from attending drag shows and other sexualized performances.
As LGBT advocates seek to entrench their ideology in legislation and school curricula, Sanders has shown herself a staunch political opponent, defending women and children in the Natural State.
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