[Cause]

So this is a big thing at the moment. Should Sanitary pads be free for women? The argument is that women on heir periods are forced to miss school and work and women cant choose not to have their periods. The price of Sanitary pads is quite high and the argument is they are too expensive for the poor and should be provided for free by government. In my own country their are regular charity drives asking people to donate sanitary pads to poor schools etc. We recently had a VAT hike for the first time in 24 years of democracy and this promted people to demand that sanitary pads like food staples should be zero rated. I was also recently shocked to see that a women in the UK is even getting a lot of attention for championing the cause and saying women in the UK cant afford them either. This was quite a shock to me because I figured women in a first world country like the UK should not have this problem.

Anyway yesterday a friend of mind posted on Facebook a man saying that Sanitary pads for women should be free rather than government providing free condoms for men. This to me was a ludicrous argument and I said so. If Sanitary pads should be free that doesn't mean we need to stop giving out free condoms. I pointed out that 1 in 5 South Africans has HIV and that free condoms are used to fight the spread of STDs, that abstinence only education is known to fail and that condoms are also important for family planning (especially among the poor). I pointed out that generally speaking for every man hacing sex their is a women having sex and that as a nature of biology women are more susceptible to getting STDs and that unlike men they cant ever escape the responsibility of falling pregnant. Condoms are free because giving away free condoms is cheaper than giving away ARVs for life. Mostly however I simply argued that its not a condom or Sanitary Pads choice. If sanitary pads should be free that's its own argument. [QUICK ASIDE: In SA you can get free condoms from any government hospital or clinic, Universities will have them in every bathroom. I think the police stations even have them. I think some workplaces have them. I believe free condoms is quite standard in most countries. Are they free in yours?]

I would agree that Sanitary pads should at the very least be zero rated from a vat or sales tax point of view. Id even be happy for the government to provide them for free if their is a true need. It seems to be a simple economic calculus, if providing free Sanitary pad to women will reduce school and work absenteeism then they should essentially pay for themselves in taxes?

I got annoyed yesterday because 2 women on Facebook yesterday eventually just said something along the lines of as a man I don't have periods and will never understand. Which annoyed me because I think I was clearly trying to understand and I think the points I had raised were all fair. SA needs free condoms! We don't need to cut of our hands so we can use the glove budget to buy shoes.

So I feel safer asking these questions here (Our Forum is a remarkable internet miracle where we actually seem to trust one another to have good intetniosn) than on Facebook. The disposable Sanitary pad is a fairly modern invention. It was invented in 1888 but didn't become mainstream for quite a while after that. Kotex's first ad for sanitary pads was apparently 1922, and wiki seems to be telling me they were considered too expensive for the average women. So for most of human history Women have survived without disposable sanitary pads. What's changed? Have women always been missing work and school because of their periods? Woman have had the use of alternates for centuries, why are they no longer usefull? If we ae going to make Sanitary pads for free must we provide the convenience of disposable Sanitary Pads or should we provide reusable cloth sanitary pads which are cheaper in the long-term? Is culture partly to be blame? Women on their periods are in many countries/cultures considered unclean. So even the UK has this problem but I wonder how much of its is a sanitary pad problem and how much of it is a cultural problem of fear of shame etc in places like Africa that have a strict taboo. Is pads the answers than or education?

[Andorion]

I don't see why this has to be an either/or issue.

Countries with STD problems or overpopulation problems should most definitely be giving condoms away for free and actively advocating their use.

Developing countries/countries with large segments of the populations below or near the poverty line should be giving away sanitary supplies like pads or tampons for free. In developed countries they should be entirely taz-free and schools and colleges should have arrangements to make them freely and easily available to students in need.

On the disposable vs reusable debate, I feel that the high level of taboo associated with periods in various parts of the world may hinder the use of reusable pads. However eco-friendly, recyclable pads should be made a priority.

[Aptorian]

Can't we just force feed women estrogen until their period stops? What? That's a health issue? Pshah!

Are tampons or pads really that expensive? From what I recall working retail if you're not buying expensive brands it's relatively cheap here in Denmark. Like the eqivelant of 5-15 USD here. Which admittedly could be significant enough if you're on welfare.

It's a strange issue that, like you say, I'm not sure men really fully grasp. I'm so very happy I am not pushed to buy makeup, hair products, hygiene products and what else women carry around in that pocket Warren they call a purse.

Funny enough I was just listening to a Planet Money podcast that demonstrated that, at least in the US, on a lot of brands, female products are often much more expensive then male brands. Price descrimination they call it.

Edit: here's a link. It's 10 minutes:

https://www.npr.org/...th-the-pink-tax

This post has been edited by Alternative Goose: 16 November 2018 - 12:30 PM

[Cause]

Yip. A lot of things are sold for more than they are worth. Its worth what they will pay for it but women are definitely targeted with regards to make-up and shampoo. I have in my shower a 3-1 wash shop that promises I can use it on my body, my face and to wash my hair. Women are instead told they need to use a different moisturizer around their eyes as opposed to their cheeks. I have seen images on 9GAG I think that often just shows that the male version is just the female version wrapped in a different label on top of the old female label.

Of course the marketing is also targeting men. Men don't want to be women, so they like their shampoos to come in black packaging that clearly states its a man shampoo. Shampoo is after all just shampoo!

Anyway back on point. Many of my countries poorest live on maybe 3-5 dollars a day (if they survive on a government grant). So I guess 5-15 dollars on sanitary pads is for them a lot. I have no idea what they cost. Will look it up now. I also don't know how many one uses a month. Still there has always been poor people what did they do in the past, what are they doing now? Is this a problem that must be fixed or a problem that would be nice to fix. After all their are also poor people in my country who cant afford to eat, buy winter clothes etc.

[Mezla PigDog]

On the poor people front don't forget that for the poor and historically women's horizons are quite limited. If your daily life is to be confined to domestic duties then disguising the fact you are on your period is less of a problem. Once women are allowed out into the big wide world or girls go to school then period poverty really kicks in.

I think it should be free because for as long as there is a social taboo about periods then "hiding" it is a tax on being female. Plus there is a health issue because I think many ye olde ways of dealing with it were less healthy than disposable stuff or modern reusable stuff.

Cause you are completely correct that it isn't an either or question! Condoms vs sanitary products are totally separate discussions. You can get free condoms in the UK from family planning organisations.

[Puck]

It's a multilayered issue, I think. To be clear, I am of the firm belief that if you cannot afford sanitary products, you should have a way to get them for free. Same goes for condoms.

I am in the lucky position that in Germany, unless you beeline it straight to the brand name stuff, you can get a 20-piece pack of pads for under 1 Euro in any supermarket/drugstore (1 Euro being 1,13 Dollar atm) even though there's a 19% tax attached (necessities like food are taxed with 7%). That's dirt cheap. As far as I am aware, though, that is a rare thing and I don't understand the reasoning behind other countries having such troubles with providing reasonably-priced sanitary products. As has been mentioned, it's not like we can choose to not have a period.

I believe we are not aware enough of the fact that 100 years ago, disposable pads were expensive and a rarity, and today it's the other way around: throwaway products have become so common it's difficult to get anything reusable and we consider it a hassle to have to deal with them, because they need to be taken care of, boiled after every use and so on. Especially people who are actually in need of free sanitary products (say, in the west it's homeless women) often have no opportunity to take proper care of reusable pads or moon cups or whatever. One off products are more convenient. And in poorer countries, there's this stigma attached to periods, which needs to be adressed along with the availability situation. There's just so much misinformation about periods going around, ugh.

I do, however, believe that in the long run, we would do better to return to reusable products considering how much trash we are producing.

Edit: Forgot to mention the eternal pads vs. tampons debate. I remember watching a documentary about organizations giving out free pads to homeless women in the UK, I think, and said women were complaining that there weren't tampons instead and rolling their own from the pads they wee given, which is not a sanitary thing to do. I have to admit to being puzzled.

This post has been edited by Puck: 16 November 2018 - 01:20 PM

[Cause]

Okay not sure if the cheapest but looks like here you can buy a pack of ten for a dollar. How many does a women need a month? That doesn't seem particularly expensive? Though you can also buy 3 condoms for a dollar and we provide those for free.

[D'rek]

I'm no economist, but as far as I can tell I think there's a lot of merit to the whole economic impact argument and therefore yes, some form of period hygiene products should be given freely to those who need them. Even without the economic argument, I still feel that way, just for compassion's sake. Same for free toothpaste and brushes, free soap, etc. None of these things are enormously expensive, but for someone struggling to make ends meet (or worse) who can't quite afford those on top of food/shelter/etc, I don't want them to have to go without.

Should people who can afford them still get them for free? At first glance that seems cool but I don't really have any idea how that would affect things overall. Would the government mass-producing and handing out for free the cheap, basic sanitary pads and tampons dry up the industry and lower the amount of choices for more specialized versions? I have no idea. In any case, I have no issue with people who can afford them having to buy them, not the end of the world. Food is the same way, after all?

Much like condoms, it probably also makes sense to have programs/places where they hand them out to everybody for free just to make them more readily available, too. Most university students can afford condoms, but universities still make them readily available for free on campus because that's a population that should really have them readily available and may not have the foresight to have gone and purchased some ahead of time. Same idea for period hygiene products - could have them freely available at schools and other helpful places, even if the people there could technically afford them and have already thought to buy them.

Cause, on 16 November 2018 - 10:14 AM, said:

Anyway yesterday a friend of mind posted on Facebook a man saying that Sanitary pads for women should be free rather than government providing free condoms for men. This to me was a ludicrous argument and I said so.

Definitely ludicrous.

Cause, on 16 November 2018 - 10:14 AM, said:

[QUICK ASIDE: In SA you can get free condoms from any government hospital or clinic, Universities will have them in every bathroom. I think the police stations even have them. I think some workplaces have them. I believe free condoms is quite standard in most countries. Are they free in yours?]

There are lots of places that have them for free here but not as rampantly as in SA. Lots of hospitals and clinics will definitely give them for free, especially to young people, though it probably won't be displayed prominently and you'd have to ask. College/universities will have lots of places that give them like the campus health clinic and various offices, but not in every bathroom.

Always men's condoms, though, I've never seen somewhere giving away women's condoms.

Cause, on 16 November 2018 - 10:14 AM, said:

So for most of human history Women have survived without disposable sanitary pads. What's changed? Have women always been missing work and school because of their periods? Woman have had the use of alternates for centuries, why are they no longer usefull?

AFAIK, disposable pads have almost always existed in some form or another. Some places used blood moss as toilet paper and probably as period absorbant, too. Europe seems to have favoured reusable cloth rags (sometimes called a "menstrual apron") tied to their girdles/garters/other under-things most of the time, but for travelling long distances or just being rich and fickle you could buy expensive disposable rags. After the invention of paper, it eventually became common in eastern Asia to have a sort of reusable loincloth thong sort of thing which held in place disposable pads made of paper. I've also read some historians saying it wasn't uncommon in some places to just "let it go" into your ordinary clothes, particularly in cultures where women would be wearing a lot of layers. Tampons are also hundreds of years old in some places, too.

I'd say the big difference is that all these older versions - whether reusable or disposable - tended to be much bulkier as they'd be made of heavy cloth or else be a big contraption. Not an issue in older days when ordinary clothing was also bigger and bulkier - no one can tell under those 12 layers of petticoats whether you've got a menstrual apron on or not.

Clothing and fashion have changed so drastically since then and we now commonly wear much fewer, thinner layers, and our clothing in general is much more disposable. The old menstrual solutions wouldn't likely work with our modern fashion, but technology has adapted along with it. There's ultra-thin pads to fit with modern women's fashion on the disposable side, and there are still reusable versions of these, too. But also on the reusable side there's silicone menstrual cups, which IMO really deserve more popularity!

[Mezla PigDog]

Cause, on 16 November 2018 - 01:55 PM, said:

Okay not sure if the cheapest but looks like here you can buy a pack of ten for a dollar. How many does a women need a month? That doesn't seem particularly expensive? Though you can also buy 3 condoms for a dollar and we provide those for free.

Depends on the combination of woman and product. Could be half a pack or 2 to 3 packs once every 4 weeks so it's a significant amount of money when you're on the breadline. And after childbirth significantly more for significantly longer!

God is definitely a man.

[Una]

I wouldn't mind it being free for low-income women. I always sort of lumped it into the same part of the household budget where you put things like soap and toilet paper. If you have the money, just pay for it FFS! It's just kind of the cost of living. But if you are poor enough that you qualify for assistance, then yes, as a necessity, it should be accounted for in your benefits. I think that is perfectly fair. The condom argument is a red herring.

We had a fun debate up here where they got rid of sales tax on sanitary products. IIRC, it was an opposition motion, which the ruling majority Conservative party would normally reflexively oppose just for the sake of it. It went back and forth a bit and the press latched on. Word on the street is that the female MPs on the Conservative side threatened to revolt if they opposed it, so it passed unanimously.

How many pads you need a day depends on how heavy your periods are. Some women have light periods and are done in 3 days. When I was in high school, I would have heavy flow to the point were I needed to change between almost every class for the first 2 days, then every 3-4 hours for the next 4-5 days. I stretched my supply by lining my pad with toilet paper, and just changing the toilet paper. I would change the pad only if the whole thing got completely soaked and stiff from dried blood. I don't think the pad companies like you doing that. I have an IUD now. It's great! But it was $400.

I think cloth pads should make a comeback, but you'd have to wash them and I don't think many people would do it, so I don't see it catching on. I don't think it could be that much worse than washing cloth baby diapers, which I HAVE done and are definitely making a comeback. I hate the amount of waste that disposables generate.

For countries that are more rural or where access to products is an issue, allotments of cloth pads make a big difference.

[Puck]

I'm starting to think that giving out menstrual cups and educating women on how to use them may be a great compromise between accessability and avoiding waste. As a general rule, even if you live somewhere away from civilization you are able to boil water to sanitize the thing once a month, and it reduces the need to have products awailable at all times and close enough by. It's also less visible than throwing out pads if that's an issue.

[LinearPhilosopher]

I have an objection to providing pads and other basic hygiene products for free.

I do not however have an objection to providing them at pure cost. So if you drugstore pays 1$ for a box of pads, thats exactly what the store charges, with no VAT.

An alternative is the goverment covering the cost so the gvt buys PADs and distributes them for free. Itd be an admin hurdle however.

This post has been edited by LinearPhilosopher: 17 November 2018 - 04:20 PM

[Cause]

LinearPhilosopher, on 17 November 2018 - 04:18 PM, said:

I have an objection to providing pads and other basic hygiene products for free.

I do not however have an objection to providing them at pure cost. So if you drugstore pays 1$ for a box of pads, thats exactly what the store charges, with no VAT.

An alternative is the goverment covering the cost so the gvt buys PADs and distributes them for free. Itd be an admin hurdle however.

I'm not sure I follow. My understanding is that it would be the last option you describe. That's how it works with the condoms I am sure. The government found a manufacture who said they could deliver the minimum quality for safety condom at the cheapest price, the goveremnt buys a minimum each month and distributes them to the clinics, universities etc.

No one is expecting the pharmacies to absorb the cost?