Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site sjuvax.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!sjuvax!jss From: jss@sjuvax.UUCP (Jonathan Shapiro) Newsgroups: net.women.only Subject: Re: pain relievers and periods Message-ID: <731@sjuvax.UUCP> Date: Tue, 11-Dec-84 19:54:19 EST Article-I.D.: sjuvax.731 Posted: Tue Dec 11 19:54:19 1984 Date-Received: Thu, 13-Dec-84 02:28:19 EST References: <978@phs.UUCP> Organization: Saint Josephs Univ. Phila., Pa. Lines: 37 [Aren't you hungry...?] This one is asked largely out of ignorance: Is it true that the male medical practitioners have been perpetrating the myth of the horrors of menstruation? Or is it rather the case that until recently the studies on pain killers were not far enough advanced to produce things like Motrin? Perhaps I am naive, or perhaps I simply find the accusations against the medical profession incredible because I can't conceive of people being so stupid (people == the medical professionals), but if such accusations are baseless perhaps they should be reconsidered. I am attending Haverford College, which has a room/course exchange with Bryn Mawr College (in some cases major departments are split between the two). For those of you who may not know Bryn Mawr, it is a good, small, all female school. In any case, I spent a year living at BMC, many of my friends are there, and I have had a chance to observe some of the goings on there in a way I believe most of my peers have not. One of the things which has troubled me about womens groups there (and elsewhere) is that they are devided into at least two distinguishable groups: One which is comfortable with itself, whose members do things because they want to, and another which is simply hung up about the world in general, and reacts by trying to strike back. There are those who have referred to BMC's women (some of the speakers from BMC), as "Castrating Bitches." As much as I find the term distasteful, it is in some individual cases applicable. What I am getting at is that the people who are striking out out of insecurity jeopardize what the Women's Lib groups stand for - equality, not dominance. Maybe we all need to be careful about the line between vituperation and criticism. I am curious what others out there feel about this, and this seems an appropriate place for the question. Jon Shapiro