Why is it "women bishops"?

[flowery]

Rather than "female bishops"?

[southeastastra]

er isn't that the least of their worries atm

[flowery]

I'm sure it is, which is why I am asking here in pedants corner rather than bothering a female non-bishop about it.

[Lilymaid]

Good point of pedantry - though we should be first asking why we allow C of E bishops to be members of our legislature when women cannot be bishops and this discrimination is permitted by law.

[flowery]

Yes, and those questions are being asked and debated on several threads in the appropriate places, which is good, and which I am participating in.

I was just mildly curious as an aside as to why it's women bishops rather than female.

[MamaMary]

Dunno but I think it sounds better - stronger - than female bishops. No idea why.

[TheDoctrineOfSnatch]

It often is flowery, I think it should always be female as the adjective, not woman, which is a noun. Eg woman soldier or similar.

You don't see eg man model. It's "male model".

Grr.

[monsterchild]

I think many people feel "female" is less polite than women, and less specific. Since it could be female cat bishops, right? You want to make sure what sort of females they are. Women are the type of female bishops they are talking about.
male is always ok.

But guys don't carry male purses, they carry man purses. hmm.