A man tried and failed to 'mansplain' vaginas to a female gynecologist on Twitter

• A man named Paul Bullen was mocked on Twitter after he tried to wrongly explain the difference between "vulva" and "vagina" to a female gynecologist.
• Bullen was replying to an article tweeted out by The Guardian about a project by photographer Laura Dodsworth called "Me and my vulva: 100 women reveal all."
• He doubled-down on his claims after being proven wrong, penning a 20-page thesis nearly three weeks later explaining why he believes he's still right.

A man named Paul Bullen found himself in the midst of a Twitter argument this week after explaining to a gynecologist that she was wrong about the word "vulva."

Bullen, who, according to his Twitter bio, is an "editor, writer, teacher, researcher; Ph.D. and M.A.," was replying to an article The Guardian tweeted out titled "Me and my vulva: 100 women reveal all." The article featured a photo series and interview with photographer Laura Dodsworth in which she shared "stories of 100 women and gender non-conforming people through portraits of their vulvas."

The project, according to Dodsworth, aims to overcome the shame many people with vulvas feel about their bodies, particularly because, as Dodsworth noted, "vulvas are rarely seen outside porn and childbirth."

Bullen tried to correct The Guardian's article stating they were wrong to use the word 'vulva'

Bullen replied to the tweet, "The correct word is vagina."

Gynecologist, Jennifer Gunter, was quick to show that Bullen was wrong

Dozens of women quickly took Bullen to task for appearing to "mansplain" female genitalia on Twitter, but it was Dr. Jennifer Gunter, OB/GYN, women's health advocate, and author of the forthcoming book "The Vagina Bible," who took point on combatting Bullen's stance.

Gunter introduced herself as "an international expert on both the vagina and vulva," and confirmed that the article in question referred to a vulva, and even included a Venn diagram from a 2015 post she'd written on her blog to show where the two overlap.

"I'm sick of people forgetting the poor vulva and referring to everything in the female lower reproductive tract as vagina,"Gunter wrote, before listing off why it's important to know the difference. "Female anatomy shouldn't be reduced to annoying euphemisms … vagina as a catch-all means it doesn't matter enough to get it right or that we can only talk about female anatomy in some silly way."

After first attempting to explain the term "mansplaining," Bullen defended his stance to Dr. Gunter by saying that he is using "ordinary language" whereas she employs "technical terms," and that since most people refer to the female "lower reproductive tract" as "vagina," he was correct to use it as a blanket term.  

The doctor didn't let it slide. "You said 'correct' not 'modern vernacular' or 'slang' or 'common use,'" she replied.

Even Dictionary.com got involved, captioning a link defining the word "vulva" with the words, "Well, actually."

Bullen then wrote a 20-page thesis on the topic and was still wrong

Bullen, meanwhile, apparently took the last three weeks or so to work on a 20-page, single-spaced thesis explaining why he was right all along.

In the words of Dr. Gunter: "Dude, give it a rest. This is egregious long form mansplaining." 

Dr. Gunter did not immediately respond to INSIDER's request for comment.

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