Guardian UK: 10 yr after the Vagina Monologues, the V-word is still abhorrent to contempory culture

[marmar]

Tyranny of the invisible


Ten years after the first Vagina Monologues, the V-word is still abhorrent to contemporary culture

Libby Brooks
Thursday February 7, 2008
The Guardian


On a recent trip to New York, I passed a pleasant afternoon watching a series of unsavoury males being violently separated from their penises. The movie Teeth, which will be released in Britain later this year, is an entertaining enough comedy-horror update of the myth of vagina dentata, or the toothed vagina. It tells the story of the teenaged Dawn, leading light of her local chastity chapter but struggling to contain her burgeoning desires, who discovers when an encounter with a suitor turns violent that she possesses a unique method of dealing with rapists.

It's certainly not recommended viewing for anyone with a castration complex, nor would I lead a stampede to claim it as a work of feminist consciousness-raising. But what's interesting about Teeth - incidentally, written and directed by a man - is what it doesn't say. For all the gorily chopped cocks, by my count the word "vagina" is uttered only twice, both times as part of the Latin term. Even in a film that's all about one, vagina remains a dirty word.

Next week sees the 10th anniversary of V-day, the international Valentine's fundraiser founded by Eve Ensler, the writer of The Vagina Monologues. Since its inception in 1998, the campaign has raised more than £25m for local groups working to end violence against women and girls, and has held events in more than 120 countries. This year there are 38 scheduled in England alone.

I saw The Vagina Monologues in the late 90s. Based on interviews with women, the pieces range from the dippy (if your vagina got dressed, what would it wear?) to the devastating (a survivor of a Bosnian rape camp). The premise was that women were uncomfortable talking about their genitalia, were encouraged to believe that they were ugly or smelly or shameful, and that this evening would allow them to reclaim a sense of sexiness and pride. It went on to become a global phenomenon.

Like most women I talked to at the time, I had mixed feelings about the enterprise. There was something terribly depressing about the idea that women's sexual confidence had advanced so little that we still got a thrill out of hearing the word spoken in public. Was this sanctioned naughtiness the best corrective for sexual shame? Wasn't it all too American, too 70s? ......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,2253530,00.html

[secularvoter]

1. So what?

Are we supposed to something think its a problem that certain words are not embraced? Good lord. Its a clinical term first of all, its not exactly the most sexual of words. The word is probably most often associated with "vaginal yeast infection", so its not like it has a great ring to it.

As for claiming that women lack sexual confidence these days, this person either must be from a different planet or else maybe in Britain women are different than America, but I really doubt it. Apparently they don't surf the amature porn on the internet enough :p

My experience in dealing with women, especially college age women, is that they are more sexually aggressive than men now, and not shy at all sexually. So, I think this writer simply doesn't have a clue.