Reproductive Writes: Love Your Vagina Dot Com

In my last post I discussed with Elizabeth Kissling the anti-advertising campaign produced by Kotex to promote their neon-bright range of tampons and pads. There has been a delay on these commercials airing due on the use of the word ‘vagina’ - with some networks asking that it be replaced with the term ‘down there.’

Meanwhile in the UK the makers of the Mooncup have sent out posters to be displayed on the London Underground proclaiming ‘Love Your Vagina’. The posters show euphemisms for vagina - such as Lady Garden and Coochie - with the letters arranged in bold flowers and the web address below directing readers to loveyourvagina.com for more information. The word ‘your’ is in bold type, I guess to make clear this isn’t about loving other people’s vaginas and the potential pornography connotations of that. Although I am sure many a man, and woman, is getting home from the commute and plugging that URL in not expecting to see a Mooncup.

U by Kotex - the range promoted by this anti-advertising - has been on sale in Australia for a long time. It was promoted there by a series of commercials which claimed their tampons and pads to be ‘the ultimate care’ for ‘down there’ - and featured a woman giving a gift of U by Kotex tampons to a beaver puppet. The campaign prompted much controversy, even without the word ‘vagina’ being involved. In response to the complaints a representative said, ‘People use euphemisms to make themselves feel more comfortable about talking about their own anatomy. Kotex research found people in the target age group had 181 alternative names for the vagina and 94 per cent said they used nicknames for their own genitals. The term ‘beaver’ was the 11th-most used by the people surveyed.’