>

Are you indicating women are disabled or less capable of working just as well as men?
Can't we all just be allowed time off and reasonable accommodations for medical issues? Why get rid of this altogether when you could just approve it for medical issues for all? >

Some countries added period leave. I think it’s dumb because it should just be medical leave. If a woman can’t work because the period is debilitating and she can’t take off work on medical grounds — there’s something seriously fucked up about the medical leave policy. >

I could be wrong but I guess it’s more about virtue signaling than actual solving any problems. >

I see it more as one of those 'I shouldn't have to explicitly point this out... yet here we are' kind of issues. Like, yeah, a woman should be able to take medical leave if her periods are debilitating, but there's asshole bosses out there who don't believe in that shit so we have specifically put that on the books to take that decision away from the assholes of the world. >

Yeah, it's just a backwards way of addressing it.  
It would be way more effective to state something like, "Because apparently this needs to be explicitly stated: Complications, difficulties, etc. related to the menstrual cycle are included under 'medical conditions that prohibit effective completion of your job'.  Anyone who thinks otherwise is an ass."
It's the trifecta of honest, fair, and virtue signaling. >

Glad I live in a country were the employer can’t ask about the kind of medical condition. >

Oh, don't get comfortable.  They can't legally ask about it plenty of places here, but they can demand a doctor's note... because you know, we're children and can't be trusted to know when we're too ill to work.  Of course, they don't have to pay you enough to actually go see a doctor, which they also actively lobby in support of policies that keep the cost of high.
So yeah, just because they can't ask doesn't mean they won't try to find a way to deny it.  Hopefully your government isn't quite as bought and paid for as it is here in the good ole' home of ~~freedom~~ corporate oligarchy, the US. >

Doctors notes for employers here can not have any information about the diagnosis on them. Only day the note was issued, and expected date when the employee can be back at work. >

Here, that’s not really the issue. It’s more that you cannot afford to see a doctor. Not only do you miss a few days’ pay, but you have to give the doctor a couple weeks’ pay to get the note that allows you to keep your job. For a lot of people, that would then result in not making rent for that month, so they just go to work sick and then all their coworkers are put in the same position. >

Here, doctor is paid through mandatory insurance. So the visit itself is free. Sick pay is 100% from day 1. After 7 weeks continuous sickness it’s reduced to 70%, if the sickness is not work related. If it is work related (eg you broke your leg on the way to work, there’s complications and you can’t work for more than 7 weeks) you keep your full pay. >

That's a bit of a misleading article title, it's "discrimination risks towards men suffering from long-term medical conditions".
Really, it should be accepted that everybody has days when they are unable to function (mentally or physically) and it shouldn't have to "grin and bear it" and come in to work. >

So instead of starting the acceptance of such things by granting women more rights (causing a precedence for men with conditions to follow up on it) they just outright block the motion. >

Giving leave to one gender and not another is sexist. >

I disagree. Men and women have different needs. Men should be able to take time off for their medical issues too, but this law doesn't seem to be about general medical leave. >

Actually, the arguments are sound, however the reaction to the arguments was unsound. They said it would discriminate against men with long term medical conditions, which leads to the question of why every single medical condition needs an individual law and not just a blanket "medical leave when needed" law that includes all medical conditions that can cause long but not permanent absences from work.
This trying to keep everyone working and in competition with each other needs to end. >

I know a solution for that: amend those rights to everyone who needs them. Regardless of gender. Now I want to see their excuse for why this would be bad. >

That would be reasonable though, and corporations don't like reasonable. Better to just keep everyone competing against each other so they don't realize it's the CEOs fucking us all. >


Reacting to the response, the committee chair, the Conservative MP Caroline Nokes, questioned the government’s commitment to the issue of menopause.
In a letter to the health minister Maria Caulfield, Nokes said she was disappointed that “very little new work has been committed to by thegovernment” in response to the committee’s report, as she expressed concern that the government had ignored what she termed the “significant evidence base” for menopause being seen as a “protected characteristic”.

lmao she didnt think the tories would be against them >

Tories vote against expanding workers rights. Business as usual. >

Maintaining their tradition since the 19th century. >

The conservative party were the people who banned child labour in the 19th century. They wanted revenge against the liberals who abolished the corn laws, reduced food prices and annihilated agricultural rents. >

Well, no more Viagra!! Discriminates against women, no? >

When you look at the age distribution of the bulk of viagra sales you'll see that it lines up with the ridiculed hormonal shift men go through.
Because men go through a big hormonal change just as women do. Society just doesn't want to hear this and ridcules this time in a mans life by calling it a midlife crisis and making penis jokes. Because yes, one of the changes is a noticable difference in hardness and the endurence of erections.
It's difficult to deal with because of the taboo surrounding the male body and the ease with which society marginalises these issues in an attempt to cement toxic masculinity.
It's in this light that I see your remark where you propose to take away medicine provided by the NHS. It's a hatefull sexist remark since nobody is arguing that the NHS medications to aleviate menopause should be taken away are they?
This proposal is about facillities and provisions at work to help women who go through hormonal changes.
Some fear this might lead to discrimination. I fear it is. >

Uh, realities that men and women have different biological with different issues is the discussion. And society can not provide one thing for one sex without doing it for another. For societies benefit. So, Viagra is not for women, but just for men,  to continue a sex life which is not in society's benefit. So, to prevent having something just for men, as this story is against benefits of physiologic change that just occurs with women, Viagra should not be covered. And to suggest that a gradual decrease in testosterone is equivalent to menopause is to denigrate the great change women go through. No, men do not go through the drastic hormonal,  functional, psychological change that women do. 
You suggest that women not be considered a special class in some  medical needs. Where does  it end for you? Does society need female labor, or not? >

this is not how men work
Andropause is real. It's a medical condition that needs intervention.
And I'll teach you another new taboo thing about the male body. We have a hormone cycle which severely impacts mood and emotions. Testosterone drops significantly from march to may. Symptoms include moodiness, muscle cramps, emotional instabillity, depression, lack of sex drive and irritabillity.
These symptoms are so severe that suicides spike during those three months. In april testosterone is at its lowest. Guess what month always has the highest suicide rate. Yup april. >

Everyone's first instinct is to say "PC gone mad" when the real story here is politicians keep writing shitty laws without doing the hard work to see what effect they have on other laws. 
The last 25 years are just a series of "something must be done" knee jerk reactions and frantic law writing without the actual work of governance. >

That's sorta the conservative party's MO, regardless of what country we're talking about. >

Labour party were just as guilty of this in the 00s it became a trend to satisfy media headlines.
The lords for all their faults were actually a good backstop on this as they would knock law back that had issues. There was institutional knowledge and no need to cover their arse because they don't have to answer to an electorate. 
The problem though,is governments got sick of the lords "getting in the way" and packed the place with donors sycophants and idiots. Once the taboo of putting anyone you wanted in was broken it became and shithsow just like the rest of the system. >

Edit: seems I misunderstood what this law was actually about. and was more based on accommodations at work rather than what is and isn't allowed to get time off of work, so my post missed the point.
The idea that specific protections for those experiencing menopause are discriminatory is utterly insane. >


The idea that specific protections for those experiencing menopause are discriminatory is utterly insane.

It's the conservative party. Their goal is to stop the improvement of any worker protections. Then they justify it after the fact. That's why their justifications are always terrible. >

Okay, I'm confused. How does making a law to protect women going through menopause(which men do not go through)  equal discrimination against men? If being accountable to the law for talking or acting in a stupid hurtful manner is discrimination, then discriminate away. >

this is not how men work
It equals discrimination because men go through andropause at that age.
Nobody knows about andropause because we choose to ridicule men that go through any kind of discomfort and bodily change.
You may know andropause by it's derogatory names: midlife crisis and grumpy old men.
It's a very big adjustment that is usually accompanied by depression, emotional upheaval, moodswings, muscle cramps, loss of sex drive, erectile dysfunction and loss of muscle mass.
Andropause lasts 15 - 20 years.
While men go through it they continuously have to listen to jokes about getting old, not being able to get it up or the classic: every break from a brown suit wearing life with zero enjoyment is now a midlife crisis for everyone to joke about.
These combined factors are why suicide rates are highest among middle aged men and in broader strokes, this societal mentality is the reason why men almost quadruple the suicide stats when compared to women.
So yes. This proposal constitutes discrimination because it is needlessly gendered.
Another example of needlessly gendered initiatives are the provisions towards the hormonal swings that women go through. Men also have a hormone cycle that strongly impacts how their body and mind functions. It's a yearly cycle and the downturn lasts from march to may. Yes, you read that right. That's three months of feeling down, wanting different things, muscle cramps, being emotionally unstable and not being able to perform as normal.
You can see these three months in all sorts of statistics like suicides which peak during march until may. Most suicides happen in april because that's when testosterone levels are at their lowest.
There is also zero awareness about this being an issue despite the fact that half the world has to endure a three month long mood swing that's so severe that it's a driving force  between the suicide differences between men and women. >

Holy shit. Thank you. Not only does this explain the why for me, but I now have all the terms and info I need to further my own research. 
Also...wtf... this explains some of the stuff I've been going through the last few years. I thought I was either nuts or it was a weird cyclical depression or something. All the doctors would do was prescribe antidepressants which made me actually depressed(no clue how that works), so I gave up on that and have just been dealing with it. >

Sick leave for disabled people (when experiencing a moment of particular difficulty with their disability) is discriminatory against typically abled people! Back to work, cripples!