Living in India made me understand
that a white minority of the world has spent centuries conning us into thinking
a white skin makes people superior, even though the only thing it really does
is make them more subject to ultraviolet rays and wrinkles.
Reading Freud made me just as
skeptical about penis envy. The power of giving birth makes "womb
envy" more logical, and an organ as external and unprotected as the penis
makes men very vulnerable indeed.
But listening recently to a woman
describe the unexpected arrival of her menstrual period (a red stain had spread
on her dress as she argued heatedly on the public stage) still made me cringe
with embarrassment. That is, until she explained that, when finally informed in
whispers of the obvious event, she said to the all-male audience, "and you
should be proud to have a menstruating woman on your stage. It's
probably the first real thing that's happened to this group in years."
Laughter. Relief. She had turned a
negative into a positive. Somehow her story merged with India and Freud to make
me finally understand the power of positive thinking. Whatever a
"superior" group has will be used to justify its superiority, and
whatever and "inferior" group has will be used to justify its plight.
Black me were given poorly paid jobs because they were said to be "stronger"
than white men, while all women were relegated to poorly paid jobs because they
were said to be "weaker." As the little boy said when asked if he
wanted to be a lawyer like his mother, "Oh no, that's women's work."
Logic has nothing to do with oppression.
So what would happen if suddenly,
magically, men could menstruate and women could not?
Clearly, menstruation would become
an enviable, worthy, masculine event:
Men would brag about how long and
how much.
Young boys would talk about it as
the envied beginning of manhood. Gifts, religious ceremonies, family dinners,
and stag parties would mark the day.
To prevent monthly work loss among
the powerful, Congress would fund a National Institute of Dysmenorrhea. Doctors
would research little about heart attacks, from which men would be hormonally
protected, but everything about cramps.
Sanitary supplies would be federally
funded and free. Of course, some men would still pay for the prestige of such
commercial brands as Paul Newman Tampons, Muhammad Ali's Rope-a-Dope Pads, John
Wayne Maxi Pads, and Joe Namath Jock Shields- "For Those Light Bachelor
Days."
Statistical surveys would show that
men did better in sports and won more Olympic medals during their periods.
Generals, right-wing politicians,
and religious fundamentalists would cite menstruation ("men-struation")
as proof that only men could serve God and country in combat ("You have to
give blood to take blood"), occupy high political office ("Can women
be properly fierce without a monthly cycle governed by the planet Mars?"),
be priests, ministers, God Himself ("He gave this blood for our
sins"), or rabbis ("Without a monthly purge of impurities, women are
unclean").
Male liberals and radicals, however,
would insist that women are equal, just different; and that any woman could
join their ranks if only she were willing to recognize the primacy of menstrual
rights ("Everything else is a single issue") or self-inflict a major
wound every month ("You must give blood for the revolution").
Street guys would invent slang
("He's a three-pad man") and "give fives" on the corner
with some exchenge like, "Man you lookin' good!"
"Yeah, man, I'm on the
rag!"
TV shows would treat the subject
openly. (Happy Days: Richie and Potsie try to convince Fonzie that he is
still "The Fonz," though he has missed two periods in a row. Hill
Street Blues: The whole precinct hits the same cycle.) So would newspapers.
(Summer Shark Scare Threatens Menstruating Men. Judge Cites Monthlies In
Pardoning Rapist.) And so would movies. (Newman and Redford in Blood
Brothers!)
Men would convince women that sex
was more pleasurable at "that time of the month." Lesbians
would be said to fear blood and therefore life itself, though all they needed
was a good menstruating man.
Medical schools would limit women's
entry ("they might faint at the sight of blood").
Of course, intellectuals would offer
the most moral and logical arguements. Without the biological gift for
measuring the cycles of the moon and planets, how could a woman master any
discipline that demanded a sense of time, space, mathematics-- or the ability
to measure anything at all? In philosophy and religion, how could women
compensate for being disconnected from the rhythm of the universe? Or for their
lack of symbolic death and resurrection every month?
Menopause would be celebrated as a
positive event, the symbol that men had accumulated enough years of cyclical
wisdom to need no more.
Liberal males in every field would
try to be kind. The fact that "these people" have no gift for
measuring life, the liberals would explain, should be punishment enough.
And how would women be trained to
react? One can imagine right-wing women agreeing to all these arguements with a
staunch and smiling masochism. ("The ERA would force housewives to wound
themselves every month": Phyllis Schlafly)
In short, we would discover, as we
should already, that logic is in the eye of the logician. (For instance, here's
an idea for theorists and logicians: if women are supposed to be less rational
and more emotional at the beginning of our menstrual cycle when the female
hormone is at its lowest level, then why isn't it logical to say that, in those
few days, women behave the most like the way men behave all month long? I leave
further improvisation up to you.)
The truth is that, if men could menstruate,
the power justifications would go on and on.
If we let them.
By
Gloria Steinem
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