Bloody Women

Earlier this week we celebrated International Womens’ Day, which always presents the perfect opportunity to reflect on how far women have come and how far we have yet to go in the long march to equality.  Whilst it is true that we have much to celebrate; we now have the vote in many countries, we have prominent females in many sectors including politics, business and science and womens’ issues are now being pushed up the international agenda, there is still an awful long way to go before we can truly say that we enjoy equality with men.  Nowhere is the lack of equality between the genders more apparent than in society’s attitudes towards women and their bodies.  

 

Women are constantly being appraised, not for their abilities, but for their body shapes and their general appearance.  It is not considered enough for a woman to appear neat and tidy; she must also appear aethetically pleasing and match some impossible cultural ideal, which nobody has a cat in hell’s chance of ever attaining or maintaining.  Women and girls who openly refuse or rebel against this are jeered at and made to feel inferior.  

Girls are taught to feel ashamed of their bodies from a young age.  Menstruation is still never really discussed or represented beyond sex education class and even when it is, it is normally referred to either in jest or using half arsed euphomisms, such as “the curse.”  You certainly never see or hear of it being referred to in popular culture.  It is almost as though this very normal part of female biology just does not exist.  We are certainly discouraged from openly discussing anything concerning our menstrual cycle in public, lest we embarress anyone.  It often feels as though women’s bodies are strictly for the purposes of hetero-male titilation and that any discussion or representation of anything that would challenge this is actively discouraged. 

Since the age of sixteen, I have suffered from horrendous pain, fatigue and dizziness.  It afflicts me for at least one week out of every four and yet social etiquette dictates that I must not discuss this in public, even if somebody asks why I am keeled over and screaming in pain.  Thus, when somebody does ask why I am doubled over I must fabricate some vague lie so as not to embarress them or myself.  Not that I am embarressed.  Fourteen years of explaining these symptoms to various medical professionals is enough to make anyone forget their embarressment.  I am a woman and lots of women menstruate.  We should not have to feel or act ashamed of our bodies, simply because society says so.  Only when we can stand up and say, “this is me and this is part of my life and my biology” will we ever be truly liberated!