How it should be is "female" is an adjective and "woman" is a noun (outside science).
"Female programmer" sounds theoretically possible, where "woman programmer" sounds wrong.
"Busty woman" sounds attractive, where "busty female" sounds weirdo.
The reason is because in English "adjective noun" and "noun of adjective" are mostly synonymous, like Department of War and War Department; "women programmers" are "programmers of women".
This makes no sense. Less then usual. Female is a biological term, you can't identify as female. You are either a female or you are not.
I know they did it to get around the circular logic of a woman is someone who identifies as a woman.
Looking at the cambridge definition of a female, it looks to mean either the biological term or "belonging or relating to women".
So their definition is either false or circular.
Take a tip from the last 2 years and stop looking towards science to preserve common sense any more.
You mean the slippery slope people were arguing about back when troons co-opted gender? How could we have seen this coming?!
How it should be is "female" is an adjective and "woman" is a noun (outside science).
"Female programmer" sounds theoretically possible, where "woman programmer" sounds wrong.
"Busty woman" sounds attractive, where "busty female" sounds weirdo.
The reason is because in English "adjective noun" and "noun of adjective" are mostly synonymous, like Department of War and War Department; "women programmers" are "programmers of women".