Victory Over the V-Word
June 21st, 2012 © by Susan SwartzJust when you might have thought the war on women was calming down, the Republican leadership in the state of Michigan decided to go after the V-word. That being, vagina. In fact they came so undone when a female member of the Michigan House of Representatives said the word, they banned her from speaking again.
As a result, they got to hear the V-word shouted out 100 times from the capitol steps by thousands of vagina-friendly protestors who rallied in Lansing to support Lisa Brown, the silenced lawmaker.
Their action even brought Eve Ensler, creator of The Vagina Monologues, to Lansing to watch her famous play performed in part by several women members of the Michigan legislature.
I’ve seen The Vagina Monologues performed at least four times and it is a difficult, often painful experience. The difficult part, however, is not hearing the word vagina. What make you weep are the real stories of girls’ and women’s bodies being abused, exploited and politicized.
But in Lansing, Michigan the Vagina Monologues took on new meaning, the word unintentionally liberated by the very people who it offended.
“Vaginas are here to stay,” declared Ensler.
It all started when State representative Lisa Brown, a Democrat, spoke out in the Republican-run House against a hotly contested abortion amendment that would cripple women’s health clinics in Michigan. After denouncing the measure for taking away women’s rights and inflicting religious beliefs into a medical procedure, Brown summed up with, “Finally, Mr. Speaker, I’m flattered that you’re all so interested in my vagina, but ‘no’ means ‘no.’”
Well, that was too much for the speaker James Bolger who said Brown’s vagina talk was out of line, a breach of decorum and barring her from further speech. His scandalized cronies agreed, one stating that vagina is so disturbing a word he would never say it to a woman or in mixed company.
He didn’t explain what he might say instead. “Down there,” maybe?
It was ridiculous and silly. But also frightening because these are not just everyday men who get squeamish talking about lady parts. They have the power to not only dictate what a woman does with her body but also, apparently, what she can say about her body.
As Lisa Brown explained, “I used that word because we were debating a women’s health issue. Vagina, by the way, is the correct medical name of a part of women’s anatomy lawmakers want to regulate.”
Outside the capitol in Lansing the chant was, “If you can’t name it, don’t legislate it.”
Now, why would a bunch of adults in charge of running a state grab for the smelling salts upon hearing the word vagina? Did they miss junior high health class? Do they think that the bodies they’re so eager to put laws on belong to blow-up dolls and not real women? Are they afraid, repulsed, fanatic or just plain stupid when it comes to dealing with women?
Brown was not the only female Democrat lawmaker muzzled in Michigan. Barb Byrum was gaveled into silence after she introduced a bill on vasectomies that would require men to have to prove their lives were in danger in order to get one. Her obvious intent was to hold men and women to the same standards when seeking legal voluntary procedures in reproductive health.
As she told the Lansing crowd, she was silenced, “for standing up for women.”
Meanwhile, a group of Catholic nuns set off on a national bus tour to protest what federal budget cuts will do to poor families. They too would not stay silent. They too stood up to the male powers on high, as in the Vatican, one of those other V-words.
Tags: Barb_Byrum, Eve_Ensler, James_Bolger, Juicy_Tomatoes, Lisa_Brown, Michigan_House_Of_Representatives, Susan_Swartz, vagina, Vagina_Monologues
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June 21st, 2012 at 11:17 am
Brilliant, Susan. I wonder if someone used the word ‘penis’ in the Michigan House of Representatives, that someone would be banned from further speech.
June 21st, 2012 at 12:16 pm
well, yes … my guess is many of us have a little story about body parts’ terms. My obstetrician would tell me, “… o.k., now I’m going to examine you down below.”
And, a male relative (a Dad – not MY children’s Dad), was upset when I mentioned to him that his toddler daughter had asked me what her cousin’s penis was called. I told her, penis. He said, “you SAID that?” I replied, well, what would you rather I had said? Then I questioned whether I should have used one of the several terms I’d learned in high school …!!
June 21st, 2012 at 12:24 pm
Hi Judith: I’m thinking that all of those slang words are part of the denial about real bodies that kids grow up with… and extends into adulthood for some. Our grandkids, the ones old enuf to talk, have known the v-word and the p-word since they asked “what’s that?”
Maybe because their mother is a teacher .. and maybe because their mother is our daughter.
June 21st, 2012 at 7:43 pm
Bravo Susan!
I always enjoy your courageous and focused comments on the ignorant behavior of those Republicans ( in Michigan and other places) who continue to promote dense and moronic attitudes towards women and their cowardly insistence on creating regressive and hideously insecure legislative moves towards censoring and controling women~ who they are so very afraid of on all levels.
June 23rd, 2012 at 6:03 pm
Almost wouldn’t have believed all this if it weren’t captured on tape, and it’s great that you put it together so skillfully. Wonder if these he-men, when mumbling, ‘down there’ can’t help themselves from a shiver of what? distaste, shame, desire, blame of others, regret that all women don’t have Barbiedoll parts…all that together. I wonder if Susan Griffin has been writing on the subject as she, like you, really knows how to nail guys to their words and deeds.
June 24th, 2012 at 7:42 pm
Is this the issue that will unite us in the fight for women’s equality in the country where we were born? Pretty silly, but ‘ll take it!