Blood Quotes

“They are not “feminine hygiene” products because: • Needing them is not a sign of being feminine; it’s a sign that you need something to catch blood. • They’re not hygiene products because menstruating is not unhygienic”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“But this is the patriarchy: facts are irrelevant; it's the world order that matters.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“When it comes to painful periods, there is an epidemic of undertreatment. Women's pain is undertreated in general, as compared to men's, but painful periods have historically been seen as a "woman thing" and hence unimportant. Our patriarchal system has dismissed menstrual pain as both exaggerated and a sign of weakness, and at times, perversely, as something women deserve (punishment for "original sin," I suppose).”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“Providing disinformation about contraception is not feminism; it is misogyny.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“People who seek to deny access to abortion are not pro-life, they are forced-birthers.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“Experts estimate that, each year, about 1,500 people who live in a state that restricts access to abortion will develop cancer during their pregnancy, and 135 to 420 of them will get subpar therapy because they can’t get the abortion they need to start treatment. Some of them will die as a result.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“First, changing laws can affect you even if you have no desire to have an abortion. For example, medications to help manage miscarriage are the same as those for medication abortion, and there are stories of pharmacists refusing to dispense these medications for fear they’re for abortion and not miscarriage.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“In the United States especially, a woman is far safer being on the pill than being pregnant. The risk of death and serious complications, such as blood clots, stroke, needing a blood transfusion, incontinence, and postpartum depression, JUST TO NAME A FEW (yes, I’m yelling), is significant.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“They are not “feminine hygiene” products because: • Needing them is not a sign of being feminine; it’s a sign that you need something to catch blood. • They’re not hygiene products because menstruating is not unhygienic. They are menstrual products. And they’re essential.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“The desire to control your bleeding, either how often or how much, to improve your quality of life isn’t a frivolous pursuit or an abomination. And you get to decide what “quality of life” means, because it is, after all, your life. Wanting to feel better just makes you human and that, my friend, is reason enough.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“On average, the risk of death during pregnancy is 58 times greater than the risk of dying from a legal abortion. Given these statistics, there can be no "pro-life" stance about abortion that is not hypocritical unless the life of the pregnant person is inconsequential. It is always safer to have an abortion than to be pregnant even in countries with lower maternal mortality.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“When you see people promoting a product because it’s “natural” or denigrating one because it’s “synthetic,” you are seeing marketing, not medicine.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“Evolution demands that all species solve the equation of converting energy from the world around them into the next generation. Living things, from bacteria to blue whales, solve this equation in different and often ingenious ways based on their biology, environmental pressures, the care required for offspring to reach maturity, and even social structure. For example, some organisms reproduce asexually, some deposit unfertilized eggs that will hopefully get fertilized, and some have very long gestations, like an elephant, which carries its calf -- which will ultimately weigh approximately 110kg (243kg) at birth -- for twenty two months.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“I just can’t get my head around the concept of believing that menstruating women could wilt plants. If this were true, it wouldn’t be a curse; it would be a weapon. After all, if they could, wouldn’t they have used that power to lay waste to entire crops, bringing kings, emperors, and governments to their knees?”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine and Mythology of Menstruation

“It's always amazing to me how the people who fearmonger about modern medicine negatively affecting the menstrual cycle are usually promoting some type of unstudied supplement or botanical. Then again, fears about fertility are a big business. Also, these people seem to believe suffering is acceptable, and maybe even necessary, in the quest for mythical menstrual purity.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“Reproducing a human is a massive biological effort. Energy-wise, it's on par with the limits of the most extreme sports, for example, running 5,000 km (3,000 miles) over 120 days or cycling the Tour de France.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation

“Unfortunately, instead of a world where those who bear the physical burdens of reproduction—whether they reproduce or not—have equal footing, we have the opposite. The Ancient Greeks, the originators of Western medicine, labeled the female body as inferior, and the act of menstruation has been viewed as proof that women have troublesome physiology and are by nature dirty and toxic. Many religions and cultures have long carried that same torch based on the erroneous belief of impurity and the idea that menstrual blood is filthy and contains actual toxins that poison the body (and especially men, if they were to touch it). Women have been banned from places of worship, from preparing food, from having sex, and even from their own homes based on the supposed polluting powers of menstrual blood.”
― Jen Gunter, Blood: The Science, Medicine, and Mythology of Menstruation