Recent data reveals an alarming education gap that continues to fuel period stigma and misinformation, as nearly one in 10 men (8%) believe menstruation attracts sharks in the sea. With half the population experiencing a period every month, it’s hard to wrap your head around what a lack of knowledge men have about women’s bodies.
And it doesn’t end with periods. The common image of women perpetuated by our society is that they are glitter-farting, strawberry-scented, soft and smooth creatures of hairless wonder. Just typing that feels disturbing, but sadly too many people hear that kind of nonsense told to them every single day.
“What's your ‘That's not how women work’ moment?” redditor u/Gamestar02 asked women on Ask Reddit, and the sigh-inducing responses started rolling in. And you wonder, how did we get to the point where this is acceptable?
#21
"You don't spontaneously generate a vaginal opening when your first period comes. You had your entire vagina at birth. No, I'm not pranking you."
"You don't insert tampons, of any size, into your pee hole.. No, that's NOT where the blood is coming from. Well actually.. Your urethra might be bleeding now if you've been trying to shove a tampon applicator up it.."
**Shortened versions of conversations with two of my female friends growing up**
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132points
#22
I’m a gay girl. A guy once warned me not to date women who had been married, because I’d never be able to satisfy them.
Still not quite sure what he meant. But anyway, he was so wrong.
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124points
#23
My (male) manager at a past job tried to tell me when I was pregnant that morning sickness shouldn't affect my work because it only happened in the morning.
120points
#24
An old boyfriend once explained that if I was having cramps, I just needed to do what his ex did: "there's this one yoga pose that will make that shift in the uterus that usually takes a few days happen in just a few minutes. It drops, and then your period is done in one day instead of four or five". He couldn't elaborate any further, (what "shifts"? What "drops"?) But he swore he was 100% right his ex cut her period down to one day with yoga.
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115points
#25
I heard this with my own two poor ears from my own mother: "When a woman shaves her leg, hair shouldn't start growing until the next 4 or 5 days. Only men grow hair every day." MOOOM
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109points
#26
The "men age like wine, women age like milk" phrase. Then you look at pics of women like Selma Hayek and Catherine Zeta-Jones and take a glance at most men around their age. Maybe, just maybe, some people are blessed with amazing genes while the rest of us look like dehydrated potatoes by the time we hit 40. Got nothing to do with genitals. I have only ever heard this phrase uttered by men who cannot seem to keep any woman around for more than a year at the time.
And in the spirit of equality I will say that there is definitely a female equivalent to this kind of attitude and they too cannot seem to keep a man.
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108points
#27
If more sex meant looser vaginas, having a kid would mean a catastrophe down there. Clearly women have multiple kids, you’d think the logic was simple that it doesn’t work that way.
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105points
#29
I was complaining about my period, and this awful guy goes "just p**s it out for f***s sake"
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101points
#30
Guy thought he needed to use a condom with his pregnant gf so she didn't get pregnant again. ....like she could have two babies of different ages in her.
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100points
#31
There was one guy online who tried responding to womens' complaints about expensive period products. He started by saying 'a tampon holds 4-12 mls of fluid... women lose about 40 mls per cycle ...
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90points
#32
My boyfriend told me to shower in cold water so my period would temporarily stop
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89points
#33
Basically anytime a teenage boy tries to describe anything in or about the female body or brain...
So confidently ignorant! So exquisitely condescending! Makes you want to pull your hair out some days...
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83points
#34
When a guy commented on a post asking what woman think and said women only care about looks. Like sure, some people of either gender are like that. But I surely don’t care if he’s a 10/10 if he can’t hold a conversation.
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79points
#35
On tv shows shows women go into labour and like 5 minutes later baby is out. They make it seems like baby shoots out of there like a rocket nope it takes like 6 hours of hard labour.
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78points
