Women are often told to not do certain things while they are menstruating. These things vary from not going to a temple, not entering the kitchen, to being treated like an untouchable. There are many homes where they have separate rooms, utensils for women menstruating. Nobody enters the room nor do they touch the things used by them. You might find it hard to believe but these things still happen and what’s worse is they are “normalised”.
Menstruation is normal, every woman goes through it every single month. So, why is it still looked down upon? Menstruation has been around for as long as the very existence of human beings. But still, people treat it like a taboo. Here are some things that prove that periods are still taboo.
Why do the commercials of sanitary products show the period blood blue?
It is considered fine to show blood in movies during a fight but when it comes to period blood it is suddenly “sensitive content”.
Why in schools did we hide the sanitary napkin like it was something illegal?
This one time in school a female teacher during a bag checking, picked my sanitary napkin and asked what’s this?
Why are sanitary napkins packed in newspaper, or a black bag like we are hiding something?
Why do we have to hide the fact that we are menstruating from our brothers or father?
Why are menstruation products still so expensive for the women?
In a lot of places women still have to use newspapers, cloths, rags, hay, or leaves because they cannot afford the sanitary products. The world has come so far yet it fails to provide necessities to the women who cannot afford them.
- In India, 88% of women don’t have access to menstrual products.
- 23% of the girls drop out of school after they start menstruating.
Some girls don’t even receive education on menstruation because it is an “uncomfortable” topic to talk about.
The women go through a hard time while menstruating. A lot of women get very painful cramps, that even pain killers do not help. While women go through this, society decided to treat women as impure and dirty while they are already dealing with so much.
I fail to see the justice in that. Society needs to be supportive and not make the girl hate herself for getting her periods.
I know that not everyone suffers from the issues I talked about. But, the majority of the women are going through this. So, it is our responsibility to raise awareness. We need to start talking about it, raising awareness, supporting films like Padman and advertisements like bleeding red: where Radhika Apte shows period blood as red instead of blue.
Let’s normalise menstruation and help the women out. Raising awareness will bring more and more light to the issues and that is how we will be able to create change. This article is not just for women. It is also for the men, as a men make sure that the females in your family, or your partner, or your female friends know they can talk to you about menstruation. It should be a normal topic and not an uncomfortable taboo.
Breaking taboos is hard but it is something that is needed to be done.
I may not be able to change the mindsets of the people who are older and like to stick to old norms. But, I know I will be able to change the mindsets of the future generation.
Eduindex News 