Essay: In Appreciation of Vulvas and Vaginas

Vulva casts by artist Lydia Reeves via Instagram

The Arabic version of In Appreciation of Vulvas and Vaginas

In a world in which “vaginas,” “pussies,” and “cunts” are words that patriarchy deems to be inherently female and at the same time inherently profane, let us remember on World Vagina Appreciation Day that when we say “vagina” we often mean “vulva,” that not all women have vaginas (or vulvas) or pussies, that it’s not just cisgender women who have vaginas (or vulvas) or pussies, and that we can all be cunts. And let us today, and every day, tell cis-heteropatriarchy to fuck off.

The vulva is the external part of the genitals, and includes the labia, clitoris, the urethral opening (the hole out of which you pee,  just below the clitoris), the vaginal opening (the hole out of which menstrual blood comes out of your body, just below the opening to the urethra), and the perineum. The vagina is the tube that connects the vulva to the cervix.

The vagina, part of the internal genitals, is the canal that connects the vaginal opening to the cervix. It is where if you have penetrative sex, penises, fingers, and sex toys enter, and through which menstrual blood and babies exit.

My siblings and I grew up with medical terminology over breakfast, lunch, and dinner because our parents are doctors, so “vulva” was not a word I had to learn, but it is one that I have to remember to use because, like many, I have for years invariably used “vagina” to refer to everything to do with my genitals. Those of us who have vulvas and vaginas rarely know what those parts of our bodies look like let alone what they’re actually called or how they change as we age.

Not only does patriarchy use the words used to describe our genitals as curse words, it punishes if we then use those curse words (that describe our body parts, remember) but even if we just use those words as they were intended, as anatomical words. 

On World Vagina Appreciation Day, remember that 10 years go this June, Lisa Brown, a Democratic state representative in Michigan, was banned from addressing her colleagues after it was ruled she had “violated the decorum of the house” when she used the word “vagina” during a debate over a controversial anti-abortion bill. The bill was part of a package of proposed legislation pushed by Republicans always eager to limit or end a cis-woman’s ability to control her reproduction, and in this instance, even limit what a woman can say about a part of her body as her bodily integrity is put up for debate and a vote.

And exactly how did Lisa Brown “violate the decorum of the house”? “Mr. Speaker, I’m flattered that you’re all so interested in my vagina, but ‘no’ means ‘no,’” said Brown, a mother of three who opposed the bill because it ran contrary to her Jewish beliefs. For daring to use the word “vagina” during a discussion among lawmakers about a proposed law that would essentially control vaginas, a woman in possession of a vagina was found to be guilty of violating the “decorum” of the house. And that is exactly why I say fuck civility. Decorum rules, remember, were created by men and for men to control a place that they imagined would always be for and about men. And then the girls ruined it all.

That is why I say, “Fuck the patriarchy.”

A Republican state lawmaker who complained about Brown’s language wonderfully encapsulated the absurdity. 

“What she said was offensive,” complained state representative Mike Callton, a Republican. “It was so offensive I don’t even want to say it in front of women. I would not say that in mixed company.”

Not only does patriarchy use the words used to describe our genitals as curse words, it punishes if we then use those curse words (that describe our body parts, remember) but even if we just use those words as they were intended, as anatomical words. 

Patriarchy wants to control vaginas, but it also wants to control who has the right to even say the word “vagina.” Not only that, patriarchy screams “decorum” when we dare to fight back. And exactly what was “so offensive” that Callton could not repeat it in mixed company? The word “vagina”? Or that an owner of a vagina was telling men trying to establish control over vaginas that she was fighting back? Was it the “no” of autonomy and agency that so offended? How dare a woman declare autonomy! How dare a woman demand agency over her own body! Or was it the suggestion of sex implicit in Brown’s “Mr. Speaker, I’m flattered that you’re all so interested in my vagina, but ‘no’ means ‘no’”? Is sex profane? Why is it profane? Or was it that by her allusion to sex, Lisa Brown was reminding everyone that the conservative opposition to abortion has less to do with a professed concern over fetuses and more to do with controlling and punishing women’s desire and sexual agency?

It is all of the above. And that’s why I insist on saying, “Fuck the patriarchy.”

Also 10 years ago, the Russian feminist collective and rock group Pussy Riot collective performed a renegade “punk prayer” inside Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Saviour that eviscerated a host of patriarchs and their excesses, including but not limited to Patriarch Kirill I of the Orthodox Church and President Vladimir Putin and his authoritarian regime. Three of the performers were sentenced to two years in a penal colony as punishment. In a documentary made about Pussy Riot, several men interviewed made clear that the “offense” was not just profane lyrics that “insulted” Putin and the patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, but also the word “pussy” itself in the name of the collective. 

How dare women connect the patriarchy of their country’s authoritarian president to the authoritarianism of the patriarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church who support him; how dare they use a word that calls to mind vaginas and chaos? How dare they use a word that forces men to imagine not only a vagina but a vagina that rises up against patriarchy?! How dare women use a word that belongs to patriarchy—because, of course, pussies belong to patriarchy—as part of the name of their punk feminist collective that demands freedom for the pussy from patriarchy?!

Remember that when the patriarchy of the Russian Orthodox Church unites with the patriarchy of Putin, women, children, and LGBTQ people are hurt.

How dare women use a word that belongs to patriarchy—because, of course, pussies belong to patriarchy—as part of the name of their punk feminist collective that demands freedom for the pussy from patriarchy?!

And just last year, let us remember on this World Vagina Appreciation Day, that as FEMINIST GIANT contributor Samiha Hossain pointed out in her Global Roundups, in at least two different countries, vulvas and vaginas were considered obscene and reasons for punishment. In Malaysia, the menstrual hygiene brand Libresse had to withdraw an ad featuring a vulva flower design after it was deemed a “dishonour to women” by religious conservatives. And in Russia, LGBTQ artist and activist Yulia Tsvetkova’s vagina-themed art online landed her in court on charges of “pornography.” 

And it is not just cis-heternormative patriarchy that robs us of words for our gentials, uses those words as profanities against us, and punishes us simply for using the actual noun given to part of our genitals. As Myriam Gurba incisevely writes, white supremacy too lays claim to our pussies: from the “vanilla cream inner thighs (that) always led to bubblegum pink labia,” in the pornography she first encountered at an elementary school friend’s house, to the pink pussy hats of the Women’s March.

Remember that not all pussies are pink.

And if you think the older we get the more comfortable we are with talking about our vulvas, vaginas, pussies and cunts, you have not heard the silence about what happens to our genitals as we age, and specifically as we go through the menopausal transition. It is a silence that is compounded by ageism, and the shame and stigma that still surrounds talking about menopause and the ways it affects our bodies, especially our vulvas and vaginas.

It is why I wrote Moisturize Your Vagina, and why I opened and closed my essay with the reminder: When you are shameless, you cannot be shamed.

“It’s 2022, there are billionaires in space, yet 73% of women still don’t know the difference between the vagina and the vulva.”

What, if not shame and ignorance of our genitals compounded by ageism, are the reasons that 68 percent of menopausal women surveyed by Bonafide have never used over-the-counter vaginal treatments, even though vaginal moisturizer can treat vaginal dryness and painful sex? Of the 58,703 people who have taken Kindra’s assessment quiz, 70 percent reported vaginal dryness as their top menopause concern, while 49 percent said painful sex was their top menopause concern. 

“It’s 2022, there are billionaires in space, yet 73% of women still don’t know the difference between the vagina and the vulva,” Kindra said in a statement launching its Know Yourself, #VYourself campaign to destigmatize the use of the proper words that refer to our genitals. It said it was using the letter “V” in the name of a new product for sensitive vulvar and vaginal tissue in older bodies instead of “Vagina” or “Vulva” because “we face rejection and censorship when we use those anatomical words, even in a caption” on social media.

The vaginal moisturizers I use. RepaGyn is available in Canada and Revaree via Bonafide in the US.

I am a big fan of products from both Bonafide and Kindra, including vaginal moisturizing suppositories by the former and a moisturizing lotion for my vulva by the latter. I have not accepted payment, free products, or reductions for mentioning any of the supplements I use. I mention them because they work for me and they do not contain hormones.

A cheaper alternative to these products is Kooch Quench by Fat and the Moon, which was recommended by a kind person on Twitter whose handle I can’t find. 

The vulvar moisturizers I use by Kindra (L) and Fat and the Moon (R)

On this World Vagina Appreciation Day, insist on using the proper words for your genitals. Claim the words and use them without shame. Do so with the understanding that it is revolutionary to insist on ownership of your body, it is revolutionary to refuse stigma and shame and to demand instead that the proper words are used to refer to your genitals. 

Patriarchy insists on controlling our mouths and vaginas and, by extension, everything that enters and exits those orifices. Patriarchy insists that it and it alone can police those orifices. Patriarchy reserves for itself the power to offend, the power to be obscene, the power to name bits of our bodies when it wants and to determine their gender, to use them against us, and to punish us for daring to think that those parts of our bodies are ours, whether by name or in fact.

On this World Vagina Appreciation Day, my message to patriarchy is clear: stay out of my vagina, unless I want you in there.

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Mona Eltahawy is a feminist author, commentator and disruptor of patriarchy. She is editing an anthology on menopause called Bloody Hell! And Other Stories: Adventures in Menopause from Across the Personal and Political Spectrum. Her first book Headscarves and Hymens: Why the Middle East Needs a Sexual Revolution (2015) targeted patriarchy in the Middle East and North Africa and her second The Seven Necessary Sins For Women and Girls (2019) took her disruption worldwide. It is now available in Ireland and the UK. Her commentary has appeared in media around the world and she makes video essays and writes a newsletter as FEMINIST GIANT.  

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