We're Getting "Father" from the Truth.

• Position: On fatherhood and culture

Some woke activists have suggested that Mother's Day be called "Birthing Person's Day." After all, some "pregnant persons" identify as men (or nonwomen) and do not like being in a place called a "maternity ward." If the birthing person's pronouns are "he/him," that person might identify as the child's father though not contributing the paternal genetic material. Should "he" get a Father's Day card?

What should we call the person who contributes the paternal material? In Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, family words like "mother" and "father" are viewed as obscenities. We are not quite there yet, as babies cannot yet be grown in a bottle and decanted, but we can try to make progress in our language.

What would be the equivalent term for father? "Sperm donor" is even less personal than "birthing person." The child never will call him "Daddy" and will have great difficulty finding out who he is. He might have been picked from a catalog, with anonymity promised. He probably does not know of his child's existence.

In 2017, there was a proposal to rename Father's Day "Special Person's Day"--or perhaps we should follow the precedent of President's Day, which replaced Washington's Birthday and Lincoln's Birthday. We want to obliterate the memory of George Washington's defeating the British Empire and becoming the Father of Our Country, or of Abraham Lincoln's abolition of slavery and desire to unite our country. Just lump them in with others who managed, by whatever means, to get inaugurated as president, no matter their effect on our nation.

How about Parent's Day?; or Caregiver's Day?; or, better yet, Caretaker's or Custodian's Day? Such persons might not be special. They might not have a name or face, being interchangeable at a bureaucrat's whim. They might be of any one of 50 or more genders. Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DIE, no, DEI) is invading the family as well as the school, workplace, and church. The family itself is perceived to be the problem, and radicals are targeting it for extinction.

Being orphaned traditionally is considered tragic. A beautiful, haunting song, from a genre that used to be called Negro Spirituals, is "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child." There might be fewer sentimental tributes to fathers, but many Bible verses tell us to care for the fatherless, and a 19th century Christian hymn promises aid to "the widows and the fatherless."

Is it fair for some children to have the privilege of having a mother and a...