Do we remember this?
“Mujhe aapse kuch kehna hai, kaise kahun?” (I want to say something to you but how do I say?)
Well, I am sure that people born in the ’80s and ’90s surely do. This is the tagline of a TV advertisement for one of the most popular sanitary napkins. I vividly remember this ad and the awkwardness that used to come with it among its viewers. My entire family used to pretend to get busy with something or the other for as long as the ad was on TV – Papa trying to re-read the newspaper, Mommy going to the kitchen for some work, and Bhaiya getting out of the room pretending he has some work and little me sitting and wondering what is this ad all about.
However, the good news is that awkwardness is getting diluted as the media is moving from coyness to boldness.
The same brand which was hesitant to use the word ‘blood, menstruation, periods, sanitary napkin’ in their ad is now using the tagline ‘Have a happy period’.
We hear the words ‘during periods’ in place of ‘those days’ and also the colour of blood is moving from being ‘blue’ to ‘red’ (an ad of a popular brand featuring Radhika Apte). Not only the advertisements are getting bold but also in overall media, we are moving from indirect conversations to frank and open period conversations.
We always get influenced by the reel life which gets reflected in our real life. In world cinema, we have many TV shows and movies talking about periods either in the form of humor or in the form of a taboo-buster. Streaming platforms like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hotstar are playing a big role in this as they are not only making the world smaller but are also liberating the thought process by providing huge exposure to the overall world.
Periods have been mentioned in many dialogues in American shows like ‘Friends’, ‘Family Guy’ and ‘Orange Is The New Black’.
In the past few years, Indian TV media has also opened up towards talking about ‘periods’ in TV series as well as movies like:
- Padman (starring superstar Akshay Kumar) is one such revolutionary movie, which entirely revolves around ‘periods’ depicting the issues related to menstruation and fighting against the taboos to a huge extent.
- The Family man (starring Manoj Bajpayee) is a Netflix series in which there is a funny dialogue between father and son on sanitary napkins and another between father and daughter in which the daughter says to her father “It’s not a bomb, it’s a sanitary napkin”.
- Period. End of Sentence is an Oscar-winning documentary on Netflix that revolves around the stigma, shame, and lack of access to sanitary protection in India.
These movies and shows have had their own share of controversies and debates but at the least, they opened dialogues related to periods.
However, the mention or discussion of periods on TV might still be embarrassing for us and we might still feel uncomfortable watching that along with our parents or kids. The main reason for that is that until now, we have kept this topic out of our family discussions. Now is the time to embrace the change and not to shy away from discussing it in our family dinners. It is as natural as changing seasons and as biological as growing hair.
Media is playing a big role in bringing this positive change. However, this ‘period revolution’ is not only driven by TV. Today we have so many dedicated groups on various social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc. spreading awareness and working towards taboo-busting through articles, blogs, poetry, art, facts, and figures, etc.
Today’s youth is extremely well versed with these social media platforms and is actively indulging in social causes like menstruation to bring a wave of change in society. Positive change is bound to come with the combination and collaboration of charged youth, media platforms, and receptive society.