A 1940s newspaper ad for Zonite, a cleaning company, opens with a photo of a young man and woman running away from a draped figure — this bed-sheet-ghost has the word “divorce” written across its front. The ad copy reads “Often a young wife is too timid or shy to learn these intimate facts. And because of this her husband may become sulky and resentful. She feels her marriage is breaking up—leading to divorce. Yet she finds herself helpless. It’s this pitiful young woman who definitely needs to be instructed on how important vaginal douching is to intimate feminine cleanliness, health, charm, and married happiness—to combat one of woman’s most offensive deodorant problems.”
To sum up: vaginas are gross, so sanitizing yourself is necessary for your health and your husband’s sexual satisfaction. It’s shocking to read in 2024, but what’s perhaps more surprising is how the underlying ideas persist.
Today, period products are a multi-billion dollar industry — walk through any drug store and you’ll find rows upon rows of brightly coloured boxes selling pads, liners, cups, and tampons. But this is a relatively recent phenomenon. For decades, periods were discussed in hushed tones, referenced through oblique metaphors, or alluded to disparagingly.
In fact, the word “period” was only first uttered as recently as 1985 on American television. In this Tampax commercial, Courtney Cox coily tells us “Tampax tampons protect differently than a pad, so you feel cleaner.” Though less explicitly condescending than the 1940s ad, the suggestion that menstrual blood is inherently dirty continues to be woven through popular (and medical) discourse.
Next time you’re in your local grocery store, consider this: that aisle with all the tampons and pads is probably labeled “menstrual-” or “feminine hygiene”. This term might seem neutral, but it actually implies that menstruation is somehow unhygienic. So where did this idea come from and how did this impact the evolution of period products?
The Origins of Feminine Hygiene
The term “feminine hygiene” is problematic for several reasons. First, it normalizes the gender binary and fails to acknowledge that many people who menstruate do not identify as a woman (or, for that matter, as “feminine” — whatever that even means). Second, it insinuates that periods are dirty, heightening the shame menstruators feel about their monthly bleed. To unpack why this is so harmful, let’s consider where the term came from.
In 1873, the US Congress passed “The Comstock Act'' into law, making it illegal to sell or advertise any “obscene” material, including contraceptives. At this time, birth control was still in its infancy — the pill had not been invented, so more rudimentary methods were often used, like lysol disinfectant wipes as vaginal douches.
But under Comstock, these products were considered illegal, so in the 1920s brands Lysol and Zonite repackaged and marketed existing douches as “feminine hygiene” products to creatively sidestep the legislation. As time passed, the term came to represent all menstruation related products, solidifying the connection between periods and cleanliness in the minds of consumers.
TL;DR: it was an advertising strategy companies used to continue profiting off of women’s shame. Of course this wasn’t the origin of period shame, but it did build on centuries of misogyny in Western culture.
Please Don’t Touch: The Evolution of Period Products
An interesting byproduct of the dated euphemism “feminine hygiene,” is that it stops us from ever actually having to mention the vagina or blood. It distances the speaker from the reality of a period. This is not surprising when we consider the prevailing attitudes of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. At the time, society at large and doctors in particular viewed menstruation as a “disease” — an illness that displayed women’s supposed weakness in comparison to men.
But veiled metaphors weren’t the only way that experts sought to distance periods from polite conversation, from mainstream society, and even, from our own bodies. In 1929, a man named Dr. Earle Haas invented the modern tampon — a densely bound strip of cotton attached to a string, fitted into a cardboard applicator. This was innovative in comparison to the sanitary belts of the late 1800s. Looking back, we might assume that the tampon was designed this way for added comfort or ease of use. Not quite.
Haas created the tampon and applicator so that women wouldn’t have to touch themselves directly, wouldn’t “dirty” their fingers, or risk breaking their hymens.
In depression-era America, women were largely valued for their purity, chastity, and docility. Sexuality was largely repressed and the public worried that women might feel pleasure if they touched themselves while inserting a tampon, that it might impact their virtue, or that they would spread germs after touching period blood. Clearly, more attention was paid to social and moral concerns than physical or health-related interests.
In fact, when asked if he measured any vaginas or cervixes while conducting research to create the tampon, Haas said “I have seen so damn many of them I had an idea. Some are short and some are longer, of course, but that didn’t make any difference.” This speaks to the prevailing attitude of the time: that vaginas and periods are indecent, shameful, and to be avoided at all costs.
Modern Tampons and The Weird Blue Liquid
Even as our vocabulary evolves, remnants of this dated relationship between menstruation and cleanliness persist and are subtly communicated through advertising. Until recent years, most tampon commercials used blue liquid to demonstrate the product’s absorbency. This looks like a cleaning product — it’s as if advertisers are trying to sanitize the viewer’s mental image of a period. We might not be using the offensive language of the 1940s, but the ideas remain the same.
Shockingly, the aversion to menstrual blood creeps into medicine as well. Until 2023, period products were tested using saline solution, not blood. This is a problem because menstrual fluid has a different viscosity and absorption rate than saline. It contains blood, cervical mucus, and endometrial tissue as opposed to the clear water-like consistency of saline. This means that the absorbency advertised on packaging is likely incorrect and doctors might be underdiagnosing heavy menstrual bleeding.
While using actual period blood for product testing can be impractical and problematic (due to inconsistencies in period blood from person to person and biohazard concerns), it calls attention to the need for greater development and use of synthetic solutions that are closer to replicating period blood versus saline.
How Do We Break the Stigma?
For decades, the narrative that periods are dirty and shameful has circulated, informing marketing campaigns, medical practice, and even, our understanding of ourselves. But learning about the origins of these terms and ideas can help us fight those negative attitudes, and consume products more mindfully. Words matter, and saying “period care” rather than “feminine hygiene” starts to chip away at some of those harmful prejudices that have been constructed over centuries.
Periods are natural, normal and vital. In fact, they’re amazing — we can learn so much about our health from menstrual blood, about our hormonal functioning, our moods and more.
Olivia Berkovits is a freelance copywriter specializing in period care, women's health, and wellness. Based in Toronto, Canada, she's also a PhD Candidate at the University of Toronto studying the legal and medical regulation of pregnancy and birth.
Sources:
https://www.vam.ac.uk/articles/a-brief-history-of-menstrual-products
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2015/06/history-of-the-tampon/394334/
https://sexualhealthalliance.com/nymphomedia-blog/a-brief-history-of-the-tampon
https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/23893044/period-tampon-menstrual-cycle-menstruation-cup-pad
https://helloclue.com/articles/culture/a-short-history-of-modern-menstrual-products