Sir, – Where will this nonsense end? What nonsense, you may ask, as there is so much around at the moment.
In this case SNP ministers asking “anyone with a cervix” to come forward for a smear test.
Why do I think this is nonsense? Is it all to do with what some would call the woke culture? No, it is much more important than that.
Many women don’t know what a cervix is due to lack of knowledge of their anatomy, due to the culture of the society they live in where such things are not spoken about or due to language barriers.
Any medical message needs to be clear and concise. “Anyone with a cervix” is posturing to a section of people who are trying to redefine words.
Smear tests are for women. There are women who no longer have a cervix and they will know that it does not apply to them. It is much more important that a woman gets the message that she needs to get a smear test than risk someone not feeling or knowing that the message applies to them.
This madness needs to stop now before someone is missed from the smear test schedule due to this playing around with words.
Jane Lax, Pine Lodge, Craigellachie, Moray.
Time to take look at bus services
Sir, – Aberdeen City Council are inviting members of the public to take part in a public consultation to assist in setting Aberdeen’s future transport strategy. The consultation will run until November 14 and the survey consists of 17 questions.
Of course there are a number of transport problems which could be solved in less than a week, if the council could get their act together and get Aberdeen buses routed back on to Union Street, and get the public back into town.
The “pedestrianisation” of Union Street is an absolute disgrace, done and paid for from the gift of £1.78m to provide “spaces for people’’, no longer required since we are now at Level 0, imposing fewer restrictions on the public. Mind you, there is enough money ring-fenced to clear Union Street.
It would help if the area from Market Street to Bridge Street was reopened to public transport using Aberdeen’s new fleet of non-polluting hydrogen buses.
The current bus routes which have to divert off Union Street then up Bridge Street are causing traffic problems on Guild Street.
I think the council convener for transport should check on the service from Bridge of Don to Garthdee – the 1, 1B and 2. This route has a bus stop on Union Street at the corner with Market Street, and the next stop is on Union Street opposite Huntly Street, not very convenient.
If this bus could stop in Guild Street it would be so handy for people from Bridge of Don to do shopping at Union Square. Our transport convener could take this in hand for consideration.
It would help if Aberdeen City Council could publish the list of 17 questions that are of importance for this public consultation.
Ken Watmough, Broomhill Terrace, Aberdeen.
Wandering got me wondering
Sir, – While wandering round the graveyard of the Old High Church in Inverness I came across a headstone which told of a day in February 1861 when a 16-year-old drowned while skating at Muirtown.
The inscription said he was a youth of great promise, the favourite of his school and the joy of his afflicted parents.
The loss would have been immense but what grabbed my heart were words inscribed at the close: “Mother when shall it be morning”.
Maybe as a wee guy in the night hours he’d asked that of his mum, and maybe she’d kept these words in her heart.
Wouldn’t it be something if we knew morning came for him and by some means the family were reunited?
We’ll never know, and of that domain there’s much we don’t know, but it seems to me love has something in it which could be a whole lot stronger than death.
Keith Fernie, Drakies Avenue, Inverness.