Sharing a rant.

[logansrogue]

I just ranted over at Shakesville about a book that some people were trying to get banned. A woman had the temerity to write a book, directed at children, that neatly and delicately explained the details of how women get pregnant, where the baby comes from, exactly *how* the sperm gets inside the woman, and how the babies develop. *GASP* GOOD GOD, WON'T SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN!?

My response:



What the ever-loving fuckaroonies? That book is so *sweet*! You know what I had around me as I was growing up and my Mum and my elder sister and cousins were having babies? Books with photos and diagrams and illustrations about this very thing. Detailed, heavy-duty books. There were books on sexual positions, there were books that detailed women's biology, there were books that detailed pregnancy, how it went right and how it could go wrong. When my Mum got pregnant, she took that shit seriously and had herself a library of information so she knew *just* what was going on. She also had a few Sheila Kitzinger videos, which we naughty children would take great delight in playing backwards, to watch the babies zip back inside the mother's stomachs.

Reproduction and sex weren't taboo for us, they were magical, wonderful things that made new friends for us to play with. Every time one of my older female relatives (or mother) got pregnant, I had new playpals! My little sister, Tina, would draw these beautiful drawings of women with great heavy breasts with big dark nipples, their legs open, a baby head crowning from great big vaginas. We were instilled with the appreciation of what a woman's body could do if she wanted to do that, and we were told what to do if we *didn't* want the baby thing to happen. We were never, ever ashamed of our bodies.

My Mum was known in the family as the Aunt with all the Pregnancy Books and Videos. They were routinely borrowed out. I would sit with my women relatives as they all spoke about their pregnancies and the difficulties and the joyous times in great detail. I knew about piles, about chafed nipples, about stretchmarks, about torn taints and the screaming pain, the drugs and the happy gas and the babies with collic and smelly poo and birth-pimples. I knew what it took to get pregnant, that it was almost a miracle, since so many things could go wrong, but that it was also very easy if one wasn't careful.

The result of this information-rich upbringing? I know all about what my body is capable of, I've always been careful to use contraception so I didn't have to go through the experience of pregnancy before I was ready, and the advantage of knowing my body well enough so when things went wrong (like with my endometriosis) I knew about it and could speak to my doctor, straight-faced, without fear or shame or bewilderment.

I refuse to treat my body like an obscene object and I'm so very glad that this library and the people that run it also refuse to treat very important information that way.

Whoops, I spooged. *cleans up after herself* This sort of thing gets me so pissy, I tells ya.

Comments

[hotclaws.livejournal.com]

I was never told anything but learned some rudimentaries from mating pet mice.

[shirasade]

Amen, sister! :)

I wasn't as surrounded by it, but my mom as a former nurse (and midwife, although she never worked as one) made sure we had the information. One of my favorite books as a kid was called something like 'Mommy, Daddy, Baby and I', which had cute pictures of the whole process, from intercourse to delivery. Also, a photo book of those revolutionary pictures taken inside the womb in the 70s, where you could see the actual fetus as well as photos of a birth. I loved that book!

[annlarimer.livejournal.com]

I didn't care at all. They showed us Disney's "The Story of Menstruation" in grade school, and my main thought was, "You have got to be kidding. I refuse."

Mom, concerned, finally made me read a set of Educational Comics in which, Seventies-style, they "rapped" with the "kids" about "sex." Interesting stuff, and entirely accurate and helpful, but the author was no Dodie Smith, lemme tell ya.

[logansrogue.livejournal.com]

Wait, you're saying you refused to have periods? LOL!

God damn it, I never got 70s style rappin' in my sex education. At school we had embarrassingly daggy government-funded videos full of bogans. There were mullets and stone-wash jeans and sleeveless t-shirts with splits down the sides. On the DUDES. It was like an episode of Home and Away, but with needless monologues discussing STDs and sexual matters in language a teenager would never, eve use, particularly at that time in the 80s.

[lauredhel.livejournal.com]

Oh my.

You should have seen The Sex Video we were shown at the beginning of The Sex Unit in second or third year med. Which was considered necessary because, you know, a few med students managed to somehow make it that far, right through O Camp and post-Prosh parties and everything, and not actually know ... what sex was and what went where.

The video involved rather hairy seventies hippies types bonking and wanking dispassionately on a white mattress placed on a bare floor in an empty room.

Rumour has it the video was originally made for couples in infertility clinics who perhaps didn't actually need to be there.

[transcendancing.livejournal.com]

Beautifully said :)

[logansrogue.livejournal.com]

Dude, can you imagine our sweet Tina drawing picture upon picture of crowning baby head and big pregnant titties at the sweet, tender age of 5 or below? It was awesome, I loved those drawings. I don't think we still have any, which was a shame cause they were like cave paintings or some shit, they were brilliant.

[girlguitarist.livejournal.com]

There was a great book when I was young called "Where Do I Come From?" that was a very cartoon-ized version of this. I loved it! My mom had to keep checking it out of the library for me.

I don't remember much of it, but I do remember one set of pages that said, "If you put your mom and dad naked in the bath tub together, you would notice some differences" with an illustrated drawing :)

I hate when people make a big deal about it. I was a total prude despite being exposed to that information! ha ha

[transcendancing.livejournal.com]

I hear you - I can so imagine :) How fucking awesome is all I can say :)

[purrdence.livejournal.com]

I freaked out my year 7 Health teacher by knowing all the proper names for the male and female repoductive systems. I think I read every book on puberty and reproduction I could get my hands on from 3 different libraries. (While my parents didn't refuse to talk about sex per se, they much preferred me to learn from books then them having to explain it.)

I remember one book that showed multiple photos of penises and women's breasts to show how much variety there is and that there wasn't just one 'normal'.

Also, 'birth-pimples'?

[shiyiya.livejournal.com]

I had a fluffy little cartoon book about the birds and the bees (it actually had birds and bees randomly around the illustrations), but the main book was called Mommy, Did I Grow In Your Tummy? and it talked about the different ways people get kids, from adoption to surrogacy, and how mommies and daddies love their babies anyway and it doesn't really matter if they get them differently. (My parents had trouble getting pregnant, and a lot of the kids I played with when I was little were products of the other adults in their infertility support group.)

[nephron.livejournal.com]

I learnt a huge amount from highly informative books when I was a kid, which helped me greatly in later life.

You know what, though? If you really don't want your kid reading your books you don't like for whatever reason, don't let them. It isn't other people's responsibility to parent your children.

Completely OT (sorry!)

[zzzzsleep.livejournal.com]

Not sure if this is something that you're interested in, but I'm passing it on anyways.

http://flyingblogspot.livejournal.com/358024.html

[logansrogue.livejournal.com]

In the fist months of a baby's life, they sometimes get little pimples on their faces. I forget why, now, but they go away again.

Re: Completely OT (sorry!)

[logansrogue.livejournal.com]

Thanks, but can you warn me if a link is going to talk about rape culture and stuff? It's just that sometimes I don't have the emotional strength to deal with that stuff, and I like to be able to choose whether I can take on that load or not.

Re: Completely OT (sorry!)

[zzzzsleep.livejournal.com]

Oh shit! Sorry! Complete think-o on my behalf.

Re: Completely OT (sorry!)

[logansrogue.livejournal.com]

Now that I'm reading it, it goes double for talking about the geek Perth scene, cause that's a subject that always gets me freaking out. BUT, but, it's good that you sent this because I realise it's something I need to prep my niece for, because she wants to go to Swancon.

[mysanal.livejournal.com]

You so rock. ;-)

Alas, some of us had NO sex ed of any kind - I went to Catholic school. We didn't even have the human reproductive system in our biology books. Eventually, mom tried to explain but her lack of knowledge led to her opening the encyclopedia, which confused both of us.

I really don't recommend ignorance.