What issue? I'm not even directly talking about the usage of the word female. I'm talking about the lack of understanding a lot* of English speakers show when "others" use their language.

To use male/female as an example, my language doesn't even have direct translation for male and female, we only have the equivalent to man/woman when speaking of humans. I could totally understand that someone who aren't terminally online may be confused of when to use woman and when to use female, especially as female may seem more formal and thus be confused with being the polite option, just as an example.

*far from all of course