WATCH: Gretchen Whitmer refers to women as 'people with a period'

The Democrat Governor of Michigan called women ‘people with periods’ in a video explaining a bill to repeal sales tax on essential menstrual products.

In a video posted on TikTok, Governor Gretchen Whitmer explained how the “tax cut will help reduce the economic burden of the cost of menstrual products, especially for lower income Michiganders, saving people with a period from paying taxes and up to $4,800 in spending over the course of their lifetime.”

In the Nov 4 press release, the word woman features just once, while there are several gender-neutral attempts at replacing the word with phrases such as “those who menstruate” and “menstruating Michiganders.”

"It has taken many years and many bill reintroductions by legislators old and new, but we have finally reached the finish line to repeal an unfair tax levied on those who menstruate," said Senator Winnie Brinks.

According to the press release, over the course of a lifetime, the average “menstruating Michigander'' has 456 periods, totaling 6.25 years, and uses 17,000 tampons or pads. The typical cost for these products is $7 to $10 per month, which adds up to between $3,360 and $4,800 over the course of a lifetime. Therefore, repealing the tax will drive down costs for millions of Michiganders.

"Today, Michigan finally took a huge step forward in joining the ranks of states who have eliminated the "tampon tax," said Senator Mallory McMorrow. "While it's a small savings per purchase, those taxes have historically added up over a lifetime for one half of Michigan's population, and not the other. It's a small change with a big impact." 

The only Democrat with the courage to use the word woman was Representative Tenisha Yancey, who said: "This victory is the culmination of a years' long effort to treat women's health seriously. I'm proud of all the hard work that has been done to push this vital package across the finish line.”

The erasure of the word woman when discussing menstruation has been going on for some time. In 2020, world-renowned author JK Rowling caused a Twitter storm for objecting to women being referred to as “people who menstruate.”

“‘People who menstruate.’ I’m sure there used to be a word for those people. Someone help me out. Wumben? Wimpund? Woomud?,” she famously quipped.

Since then, there have been numerous attempts to describe menstruating women without using the term woman. The University of Calgary Faculty of Nursing recently asked for menstrual products for the homeless by saying “Help Support Bleeding Bodies.”

While those who advocate for women to be reduced to body parts and bodily functions claim such language is necessary to be inclusive of females who do not identify as women, there is little evidence to support that. Men are still referred to as men, not ‘people who ejaculate’ which suggests that the so-called inclusive language only goes one way, to ensure that the word woman is never used unless it includes males who identify as women.

When President Biden tweeted about women’s reproductive healthcare in 2021, a trans-identified male corrected his language, asking that the President use “healthcare for people who get pregnant and bleed” instead of the word woman because the individual claimed to be “a (trans) woman” who did not need those services.