Down with “Down There!”
How many images have I seen and articles read where a woman’s vulva is called “down there?” Does vulva sound too much like vulgar? “Down there” is so vague—lost like the keys we can’t find at the bottom of our huge purses among the flotsam of dirty breath mints, ponytail ties trailing hair, and torn and crumpled credit card slips.“Down there.” Where exactly? I don’t know. It must be “down there” somewhere!”
Somewhere? “Down there?” So non specific—as if giving it a proper name acknowledges we know the terrific pleasure it engenders—the keys to our pleasure we continually seek at the bottom of something so big we can’t speak its name, like the name of God we are never to pronounce for fear of instant annihilation.
A man would never say, “I have a rash down there” because he’s not afraid to name his sexual organs, and he never wants to put the word down and a word that substitutes for penis in the same sentence.
Photo by James Lee on Unsplash
“I Love the Smell of My Vagina
Many women are sensitive to their own scent. But I am among the minority of women who actually enjoy their own scent.”
By Stacey Herrera, August 19, 2019. (https://medium.com/candour/i-love-the-smell-of-my-vagina-adcdb546bdc8)
“Down there” also throws everyone off the scent of us as women. I have found only one article (above) so far where a woman says she loves the scent of her own wetness, but—get this—lots of ink on how not to stink and how men think about how women smell. Some say they love our scent. Others, not so much.
Oh hell, why do we keep going to their poisoned well for validation when the water of life is within our grasp? Hail to the woman who wears the scent of her wetness as her unique l’eau de parfum! Drink a toast to the woman who doesn’t cover her scent with those hell bent on making a name for themselves—Chanel, Lancome, YSL—while keeping her from finding hers.
For there are connections, are there not, among feeling ashamed to love the scent of your own arousal, not being able to say the names of your sexual organs aloud, and not being able to name yourself and find your identity?
“Not this skin—that skin!”
In a recent TV ad for a female incontinence pad, a woman looks at her face in the mirror and says, “Ever wonder why I feel so awesome? It’s because I take care of my skin. No, not this skin” (she pinches the skin of her face), “That skin!” (and she casts a furtive look downward).
This ad makes me very angry. Why can’t a woman say,“The skin of my vulva!” aloud on TV? Why must she continue to pretend to be too ashamed of it to say its name out loud?
Contrast this ad with a TV ad for a drug to treat a male problem—Peyronie’s diseased. A male doctor looks directly into the camera and explains that Peyronie’s disease occurs when scar tissue builds up on the skin of the penis. Here we see a stark contrast between a man who is able to name the male sexual organ that houses the urethra and a female w ho is not allowed to name her sexual organ—the vulva—that houses her urethra and instead must refer to it as “that.”
Until a woman can say the name vulva on TV, she is not on an equal footing with men. Only women can demand this change from the media and to begin, we must be using the word aloud with our friends.
