Nothing could be more unreasonable to imagine than blood in blue color, and yet it evokes collective embarrassment on spotting sanitary napkin ad on the television screen. No sooner the visuals pop on screen; the channel gets a hasty switch over. This is how our society tackles self-inflicted shame imposed on menstrual periods, head on. Despite half of the world’s population menstruating for large periods of their lives, menstrual-negative culture of shame and taboo has been allowed to persist. Feminists argue that part of the blame must rest with women who have hidden their perfectly natural bodily function, and have in the process punished themselves for being women.
Breanne Fahs, a professor of gender studies at Arizona University, is outraged at the lack of a culture of menstruation. She raises two valid questions: why is this biological activity viewed as a disgusting aspect of women’s daily lives, and why it remains a subject less worthy of social and psychological inquiry? Isn’t the missing public discourse on the subject a reason for menstruation being tagged secretive, hidden, taboo, and somewhat silly? There is little denying that there have been many improvements in gender inequities in recent years, but little has changed in common perception about women’s bodies and sexuality. In effect, it may only have worsened.
Fahs loathes at the idea of feminine hygiene, presented with aplomb in a recent movie Padman, because it only seeks to fix women’s leaky and troublesome bodies. The products to counter unhygienic fixation seem scary as these only give additional cultural momentum to the prevailing notion about menstruation. Contrast it with products for men (e.g. razor, deodorant, aftershave) which directly refer to their individual functions, without being clubbed together under a descriptive phrase like masculine hygiene products. Such linguistic distinctions, feminists argue, hold immense implications for projecting another sex as clean and powerful.
Using her academic research and drawing lessons from clinical sessions, Fahs forcefully argues for a new culture of menstruation where it gets viewed as an event of joyous rhythms. Only by doing so we could undermine the institutions that deplete and eradicate the natural cycles of human life by favoring sexism and profit. Authoritative, intense, and controversial, Out for Blood takes reader into the world of menstruation where coming-of-age narratives are beginning to challenge the entrenched notions of silence and shame. Only by bringing in new stories on defiance and rebellion can the long history of panics surrounding menstruation ever be rewritten. Else, it will remain trapped within the boundaries of patriarchy. It is a man’s world after all!
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| Padman: Fixing leaky and troublesome bodies |
Out for Blood is lively interdisciplinary interrogation packaged in a dozen odd chapters which move through feminist theory, social science, psychotherapy discourses, cultural studies, sexuality and gender studies in challenging the gendered notion of feminine hygiene as a fait accompli for women, and demonstrates the expansive potential for menstruation as a radical form of feminist resistance. From menstrual art to menstrual stunts, and from menstrual zines to menstrual graffiti, the book provides provocative case stories that examine menstrual activism, and a possible playful menstrual future.
The strength of the narrative lies in it being explicit about equating the taboo of menstruation with womanhood, detaching body physiology (sex) from gender identity. The book is a call for women to emerge out of the ‘menstrual closet’, and engage in what activists’ term the notion of the menstrual party. Will such a transformation be a reality in near future?
From women being ostracized during ‘that time of the month’ to young girls shying away from school to avoid any ‘embarrassment’, restricting the unavoidable bodily function to just a case of menstrual hygiene will serve a limited purpose. Fahs argues that unless menstruation disrupts the boundaries of patriarchy, and underscore the realities of misogyny, the case for writing a new story to destroy conventional narratives of women bodies will remain to be written. It is a book that clears all the misconceptions about what essentially defines womanhood.
Out for Blood
by Breanne Fahs
State University of New York, New York
Extent: 139, Price: $25.95
A short version of this write-up appeared in The Tribune, issue dated Dec 19, 2018.
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