Saturday 16 June 2012

the forbidden word!!

vaginas. i'm rather partial to them. my mother had one and i'm very happy about that fact. most of my work colleagues are in possession of a vagina, quite some percentage of our work centres around the wonky doings of the vagina and its associated workings - these would be things like uteruses and ovaries and the like. we don't tend to have much discussion of the vagina beyond that except perhaps for the effects on it (and everything else) of pregnancy and childbirth. in these cases, mostly, i am glad i don't have a vagina. that said, not being in possession of a vagina, it's my place to listen in a vagina based discussion. women, being the possessors of the vagina, should have the last say on its doings. i'm reasonably certain most men would feel the same way if the positions were reversed.

or would they? it appears, according to the guardian, that for some people, and specifically a charming sounding fellow called Mike Callton who says It was so offensive, I don't even want to say it in front of women, it is so much of a taboo that other stuff, like free speech and whatnot, should be abandoned in the face of its power.

at first i was willing, and wanting, to believe that maybe it was just the guardian gilding the lily but now lisa brown, the dirty birdy who was driven to utter the word vagina in a public place, has confirmed the story. further she alleges that this same mike callton has a degree in biology. how did that work? maybe it's different where he comes from but when i did mine quite a lot of attention was paid to reproduction. did they just avoid the word vagina? and if so what replaced it? and then what did they do with the likes of cloaca?

it's a funny world we live in these days and i shouldn't really be surprised by any fresh new madness but this took me aback. it's the sort of thing that makes me want to fly to michigan and run up and down the streets shouting vagina, vagina, vagina! even in the guardian there appear to be those who are trying to put forward the position that using the word vagina is obscuring the debate on abortion. i would suggest that in a debate on women's reproductive rights if you can't use the word vagina in public you haven't got the right to be there in the first place.

and while i remember. just for balance - penis

5 comments:

Marion McCready said...

ha ha! yes, it not just madness, it's plain weird. they don't like 'vasectomy' either, something about V words??

swiss said...

maybe they could just excise all the v words and replace them with...what!!!

i've never been so tempted to use the word phallocentrism in conversation as i am today!

Susan said...

Well put. This is old territory that I thought we had won decades ago. Whereas I did not like the nasty and suggestive way she slung "the word" at him at the end of her talk, where he went with his response and display of power is inexcusable. It's as if he said, "You say NO? Well, take this Bi***!" So I too am out there shouting: "Vagina. Penis. Body parts." and so on

swiss said...

yes, i think she's being a bit disingenuous regarding her finishing off speech there but call ton could've gone a myriad of other ways in his riposte!

maybe they should organise something in michigan where they can all gather together and shout the names of body parts at their legislature!

Anonymous said...

Here in north America we throw the word vagina around as casually as we might talk about tonsils. Its because of The Vagina Monologues, I'm sure of it. The man who is currently sharing my bed read the book, saw the show on tv and even though he is a good man, he admitted to being ashamed of himself for a bit... Just for being of the male species. Of course he shook his head and realized that he himself had nothing to be ashamed of, and then he went on his merry way, loving vaginas and the lady owners of them.