So tampons, yes tampons. I'm sure you boys out there reading this are rolling your eyes or going to skim over the post, since it deals with "women's issues". And by all means, skip the passage if you wish - I know the monthly bleeding thing makes many of you squeamish. However, the price of tampons really gets to me. For starters, why should something so necessary be priced at a minimum of $4 for a pack of 12-16 tampons. That amount will only get you through 3 or 4 days at most. Now that can sometimes be an average cycle for a woman, yet the strange-ling like me have a bleeding fiesta lasting up to 7 days, and I've met people who've had it for 2 weeks at a time. It means too that you have to buy a new pack every month, maybe two or three packs. Nothing seems to last two months, and they don't make many ranges of tampons in bulk 30+ packets - well not any I'd trust anyway. And on top of that, there's 3 different types of tampons for different flow types. That means, on average, a woman will use probably 2 different types of tampons, and therefore will spend an excess of $4 to be able to be comfortable during her visit from Aunty Flo. At my local supermarket, the cheapest tampons are $5.15 - is it due to inflation or just because they can up the price?
Now the thing that really gets to me is I don't see why these necessities, and yes they are for us girlies, should be so steeply priced. In Australia, tampons carry a 10% Goods & Services Tax (tax) on top of the price, which was introduced in 2000. Yet other necessities, like condoms for example, don't carry a tax at all. I find this amazing since us woman have no control over the fact we have to bleed endlessly for days on end, once a month for the next 40 odd years of our lives. Yet things like condoms are a choice in contraception, where there are many different options to choose from. Also, I'm amazed that our Howard regime government wants people to use contraception as good ol' Howard has pretty much pushed a rise in population here, with the subtle motto of ' have 3 kids - one of each sex for yourselves, and one for the country.'
Which leads me to my next point - who runs the tampon ring. Men do! Ironic, no? There is only one female owned and run tampon company, and the only one I support, and all its competitors are run by men. The government is mostly run by men, and yes the liberals women can be seen as men since they look so inhumane. (You'd have to be to be part of the Liberal party here) So why are they allowed to tell us, the ones having to do the bleeding, what we should pay and what we should use to help with surfin' the crimson wave every month when they themselves have no concept of the agony us femmes have to go through? That grinds my gears.
Lastly, we have two options of products to deal with during menstruation. Tampons and pads, otherwise known as 'sanitary napkins' - doesn't that just sound peachy. Personally, I don't want to have a bulky nappy like "napkin" of cotton stuffed into my undies, and it's not the most comfortable thing to have placed between your legs. So tampons are the more hidden, discreet option. Yet both had their pro's and con's. Now a lot of people out there, women especially, don't realise what tampons actually have in them. Yes, it is mainly compressed cotton but some companies also add, believe it or not, minute amounts of asbestos in their tampons so you bleed more, and in turn buy more of their product. No joke on this one, I researched this years ago for a Year 12 essay. So then there is the problem of buying wholly cotton, organic-esque tampons which have the higher price. It's a vicious cycle.
So in conclusion, I'm sure I speak on behalf of women around the world when I say no one enjoys their period. We get moody, bloated, sore, achy, emotional... you name it - we just go out of service for a week. And I'm sure there's not many woman out there who enjoy having to shove compressed cotton into our beavers, for lack of a better sounding word, regularly every month just to fit into society's demands. The only time I can think of one enjoying a period is after having a sexcapade accident, fretting being pregnant and eventually finding relief when the bleeding starts - but that's about the only time. So cut us some slack, lower the price of tampons and maybe we won't be so bitchy for one week of every month.
On that note, I'm going to ease my bitchiness with some comforting chocolate. At least chocolate understands a woman's needs :)
<3 Blackberry Moose
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