1 Thinking about women’s health today
Before you start, you’ll watch a video featuring OU academics, Dr Sara MacKian and Dr Sharon Mallon, as well as OU employees discussing issues in relation to women’s health.
Activity 1 Issues in women’s health
Watch the video and as you’re watching consider your response to the question ‘If you could click your fingers and solve a problem to improve women’s health’ what problem would you solve?
Download this video clip.Video player: Video 1
Transcript: Video 1
[MUSIC PLAYING]
WOMAN 1
Women's bodies are always controlled, and they're the ones that are controlled with reproduction. So the pill is the female pill.
WOMAN 2
We still don't have a male pill.
WOMAN 1
We still don't have a male pill. And if we did, would we trust them to take it? That's the kind of argument. So let's trust the women to do it because we know the women are reliable, kind of thing. And because we embody the child as the child grows, then naturally, we're the one who then carries it around all the time after it's been born. And so I think it has all kinds of knockon effects for just putting women in a particular place.
MAN 1
Yeah, if there's only a reliable male contraceptive pill, I think- yeah, I think men would take the pill. Because they want to have sex without pregnancy, I think.
WOMAN
I actually think that's terrifying. I think having the pill, even though it's not a great option, sometimes, I think it's one of the areas where women feel they have some kind of control over their body. So if that wasn't an option for women, I think that's a real kind of scary power shift.
WOMAN 2
I think about the menopause. I've been reading about that recently. And this natural process that happens to women has been medicalized for decades now. It's been the subject of much attention from pharmaceutical companies, because they can make a lot of money out of hormone replacement. So you get things like, our ovaries are failing, and things are in decline. And actually, it's just a normal biological process. It does have some symptoms for some women that are very unpleasant. But this idea that it's unnatural and needs to be controlled, is something that's very powerful.
WOMAN 1
And again, personally, I'm experiencing leading up to the menopause at the moment. So I'm going through this. And it's something that, even though it's kind of like now we can medicalize it, we can treat it, we can, as you say, treat this natural event, actually, what would be more helpful is to have wider understanding about the impact of it.
WOMAN
We don't really want to talk about periods. That's why period adverts or sanitary towel adverts have-
WOMAN 1
Blue water.
WOMAN 2
-blue blood, not real blood. And there's this sense that it's this hidden, scary thing, I think, still. I was listening to Women's Hour, and they were talking about gushing. And I had never heard that being talked about in a kind of public forum. And there is this idea that women's health is unspeakable and kind of hidden and shameful still. There's still aspects, Although we're much more open in many ways, there are still particular aspects of women's bodies that we don't talk about. And I think the problem that I have is then that doctors have so much power over us, that they have the specialist knowledge about our bodies, and we don't actually even understand our own bodies very well. Because it's not taught to us very well. And our hormonal cycles are a source of great knowledge, if you understand them. But if you don't, they're just something very scary and something that can be held up against you by a man. Well, you're behaving like that because your hormones are crazy today. Your real emotions very much dismissed. So if you could click your fingers and solve something today for women and women's health, what would it be?
WOMAN 1
Do you know, I think one of the best solutions to- it's all to do with the patriarchal society that we live in, isn't it?
WOMAN 2
Mm-hmm.
WOMAN 1
And I think one of the best solutions would be just to somehow magically give all men periods, as well. And then they would experience it. They'd experience the pain. They'd experience the disruption. They'd experience not being able to wear certain clothes or go to certain places or not being able to leave the house if they're gushing. The world might change quite radically.
WOMAN 2
I was watching Fleabag recently, and she talks about how women's bodies are sites of pain from very early on. And I think we should celebrate the fact that we're kind of free from bleeding every month. And actually free from male sexual attention might not be such a bad thing.
WOMAN
I think if it was men that had periods instead of women, I think for one, it would be seen as less of a sign of fertility and more of a sign of power. And it would be used in competition with other men and a way to compare themselves, as opposed to other women, as well.
MAN 1
There would be a leave for the men, like say, four-day leave for your period. And that wouldn't be part of your sick leave. It would just be leave for that purpose.
MAN
I reckon if men had periods, particularly around them being young adolescents, it will be kind of a rite of passage, a bit like the bar mitzvah. It will be like the equivalent of you becoming a man. And it'll be something that would be, I think, among the youth, something that you might be actually quite proud of and you'll talk about a lot. And it will be really celebrated. They'll be parallels between, oh, it's the blood coming out of you, and like war, and really kind of masculine, traditional ideas of violence and power from the past. So I think if men had periods, it would be kind of moving towards that way of thinking.
WOMAN
If I could click my fingers and solve something today for women's health, I think it would definitely be mental health, in relation to body image and diet culture. I think there is a lot to be said for that. And I think if that could be improved, I think that would change people's lives.
MAN 1
Just in the media, less objectifying women as a whole, and just appreciate who they are beyond how they look.
WOMAN
If I could click my fingers and solve one thing to do with women's health today, I would basically change the access to abortions. I think at the moment, we have to speak to two doctors. There's a big social stigma around it. It should be as easily accessible as, say, the morning-after pill.
MAN
If I could click my fingers and solve something with women's health, I would make more affordable options for couples that couldn't get pregnant.
WOMAN 2
I think for me, it's still about reproductive control, and being from Northern Ireland, the fact that women in Northern Island still do not have the right to access abortion. Even for cases extreme that are about foetal abnormalities that mean the child will not survive, you still have to travel to England or Scotland to achieve that. So I think we still have a long way to go. And the control that is exerted over women's bodies is something we need to fight against.
Video 1
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Discussion
In the video several ‘click your fingers’ examples are provided in relation to women’s health, for instance:
- If men were magically given periods, they would experience the pain and disruption that these cause and the world is likely to change quite radically for the better as a result.
- In terms of mental health, addressing toxic diet culture and unrealistic expectations in terms of body image would make a major difference to the mental wellbeing of women.
- Appreciating women for who they are, by no longer objectifying them and focusing on how women look – this would be extremely beneficial.
- Improving access to abortion (especially in Northern Ireland) and addressing the stigma attached to abortion.
- Providing affordable treatment options for women who cannot get pregnant.
In the video there are other key messages. For example, Sara and Sharon highlight that women’s bodies are often controlled by others, especially in relation to reproduction. There can also be a medicalisation of nature processes, such as menopause, which is frequently pathologised in an inappropriate way, given that it is a normal biological process. There is a need for a wider understanding of women’s health and issues, because keeping these ‘hidden’ or ‘unspeakable’ is clearly problematic.