Gov. Sanders signs executive order against ‘woke nonsense’

JONESBORO, Ark. (KAIT) - Saying she was “taking a stand against woke nonsense,” Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders signed an executive order Thursday eliminating “woke, anti-women” words from state government use.

Prior to signing the order, the governor called such language “demeaning to women and needs to stop.”

She cited the Arkansas Department of Health as one of the government entities that has used what she called “woke language,” like “pregnant person.”

Terms that must be replaced with what the governor calls “accurate, female-affirming alternatives” include:

• Rather than “chestfeeding,” use “breastfeeding.”
• Rather than “human milk,” use “breast milk.”
• Rather than “birthing person” or “laboring person,” use “birth mom.”
• Rather than “menstruating person or people,” use “woman or women.”
• Rather than “womxn” or “womyn,” use “woman.”

“It’s not that they’re offensive; they’re scientifically wrong,” the governor said of the words. “It’s not just political correctness.”

All state offices, departments, boards, and commissions are “prohibited from using exclusionary, sexist language in official state government business, effective immediately,” according to the document.

Sanders stressed that the executive order is “specific to state documents.”

The executive order reads in part, “Government should reject language that ignores, undermines, and erases women” and should “celebrate gender distinctions between men and women--not erase them.”

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