Barr argues
that millions of women have already suppressed their menstrual cycles
with years of oral contraceptive use. The “Know Your Period”
site eagerly repeats that the monthly bleeding women on the Pill
experience is “not a real ‘menstrual period,’
but actually a ‘withdrawal bleed’ induced by the withdrawal
of hormones during the pill-free or placebo week.”
Ironically, for years
health care providers and pharmaceuticals have glossed over the
fact of suppressed menstruation. I’m sure millions of women,
including myself, never fully understood how the Pill worked or
how it altered our body chemistry. We were generally just happy
to have a reproductive choice. But now, when the truth can be used
as a competitive marketing tool, Barr has decided to dispel the
myths about the Pill. Surprise ladies, you’ve already tinkered
with your “real periods” for decades. Now it’s
time to go a step farther, and stop that unnecessary monthly bleeding
once and for all—you silly girls!
While Seasonale® is
being promoted as a “breakthrough in women’s health,” in
actuality it represents a “breakthrough in pharmaceutical
marketing.” After all, as even Barr will point out, Seasonale® is
not a new drug. In fact, it is the same old oral contraceptive
being promoted and packaged in a brand new way, in order to gain
a considerable edge in an already crowded marketplace of competing
oral contraceptives. According to Barr Labs, the market is ready
and willing. The company cites a study indicating that “given
the choice, nearly two-thirds of women would be interested in reducing
the number of periods to four times a year.”
Let me just say that I
completely advocate the use of birth control, as long as it is
personal choice a woman makes with full knowledge of the health
risks involved. I am, however, a bit wary of Seasonale®, because
it has the potential to seriously obliterate ovulation and menstruation—two
otherwise healthy, normal, and natural bodily functions in women.
The National Women’s Health Network also mentions special
concern for teens, stating: “Introducing menstruation to
pre-adolescents and newly menstruating girls as a negative experience
to be avoided may affect the girls’ body image and relationship
to their bodies in negative and lasting ways.”
Ms. Paul considers the
marketing of Seasonale® as problematic. She states, “What
kind of message are we sending to young girls, women, and men about
the menstrual cycle when we continually push products that support
its eventual eradication? There is no doubt that many women struggle
with various degrees of physical and emotional discomfort around
her period, and these issues need the attention that they deserve.
But slowly erasing the menstrual cycle does nothing toward addressing
the roots of these issues.”
Already the Biotech Rumor
Mill website has posted an anonymous rumor that there is a concept
for advertising Seasonale® which includes TV spots combining
Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons” with images of spring,
summer, fall, and winter. It sounds beautiful—this chemical
alteration of women’s bodies—doesn’t it? And
so much for Barr's intention to market Seasonale directly to doctors
and not to consumers. I've already seen the distinctive day-glow
pink two-page ads for Seasonale popping up in many of the magazines
that I read. And in a quick perusal of national magazines at my
local drugstore just this morning I found Seasonale's ads in the
following: Marie Claire (Gwyneth Paltrow on the cover), Lucky (Hilary
Duff cover), InStyle (Charlize Theron cover), Parents (June
2004), and of course, Cosmo (Angelina Jolie cover).
Disturbingly, the alteration
of women’s bodies has become big pharmaceutical business.
And rather than investing in costly research and development, it
appears that marketing old drugs for new purposes has become the
new specialty of pharmaceutical companies. According to AC Nielsen,
the world's leading marketing information company, “Since
1997, when the Food & Drug Administration relaxed advertising
guidelines, pharmaceutical manufacturers have spent billions of
dollars encouraging people to ask their doctors about specific
Rx brands.”
Ms. Owen says, “The
Seasonale® marketing campaign looks like a cynical attempt
to manipulate women into thinking they need medication to circumvent
the natural process of menstruation, just as they have been manipulated
into avoidance of menopause through hormone replacement, the long
term effects of which are only just becoming evident.”
My greatest fear, is that
quietly and rather quickly Seasonale® ads will become as commonplace
in our magazines as those already pushing Botox, Prozac, and Adderall.
I fear that Madison Avenue will package and sell “lack of
menstruation” as if it were the must-have beauty product
of the new millennium. I fear that advertisers will imply that
menstruation is messy, inconvenient, disgusting, and uncivilized.
I fear that monthly bleeding eventually will be seen as something
only for hippies, indigents, the uneducated, and third world occupants.
I fear that as women, living in a high-tech, sophisticated world
that devalues women and our bodies, we are way too willing to deface,
demean, and diminish our natural feminine attributes. And after
personally enjoying the liberation brought to me courtesy of the
Pill, I fear that it sounds anti-feminist for me to ask for scientific
and technological restraint.
Because I admit that even
I initially found the idea of menstrual suppression immensely attractive
and inviting. But positioning normal menstruation as “something
that isn’t really necessary” trivializes our female
bodies and overlooks the importance of our natural functions.
Ms. Owen believes, “We
simply don't know enough about the subtleties of the menstrual
cycle to mess about with women’s bodies like this. We do
know that our evolution coincided with a shift to monthly ovulation
occurring at a separate time from monthly bleeding, that the evolution
of the human being is intricately wrapped up with the evolution
of the monthly menstrual cycle. And that this cycle has always
mirrored the orbit of the Moon around the Earth, the monthly flux
of time and tide that affects all of the creatures on this planet.
Who are we to imagine we know better than this fundamental rhythm
of life?”
Perhaps it is time for
us to start considering the cultural implications, and not just
the scientific applications of all drug approvals. Perhaps, as
a society, we need to rethink our attitudes towards taking pills
to “cure our ills.” At some point, we need to stand
up—as educated and informed women—and tell pharmaceutical
companies that we don’t want or need to “be cured” of
our feminine attributes. As feminists, we should proudly fight
for our bodies, rather than automatically succumb to societal pressure
to change them. As mothers, we should set examples for our own
daughters, who will someday soon be the target of glossy pharmaceutical
advertisements that promise to make their female lives perfect
and complete, as long as they ignore the fine print and the long
list of medical complications involved.
Some people (probably
pharmaceutical reps) have called Seasonale “liberating.” Liberating
from what? I didn't know we were prisoners to our female bodies.
Besides, no drug can truly liberate us as women, until we liberate
ourselves and stop hating our own bodies. | mmo |
mmo : July
2004
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