Our pilot education workshop: surprises and success!
- By Chloe Tingle
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- 03 Apr, 2017
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The No More Taboo team had an unexpected turnout for our pilot education workshop in Lockleaze this Monday: consisting solely of young men aged between 14 and 20. What was more unexpected is what we found... Ellie Taylor blogs about our experience!
With an entire adventure playground, a ping pong table and a pool table all ready to be enjoyed waiting outside our room, our hopes were not initially high that we would attract a group of teenage boys into our workshop about periods. However, soon enough, some of the young men wandered in to see what we were doing. Most of them ended up talking to us and participating enthusiastically in the workshop for the next hour and a half!
The attitudes these young men held towards menstruation were extremely encouraging:
- All of the participants scored themselves 8/10
or higher when asked how comfortable they were discussing menstruation (with 10
being most comfortable). Considering that when I was at school, the rare
mention of periods would have sent your average boy into a frenzy of ‘yuck’ and
‘eww’. This was a refreshing statistic.
Instead, the general sentiment was not one of disgust but of maturity:
‘girls have periods, get over it’.
- During our discussion of the more
practical side of menstruation, the young men were shocked to find out that a
woman uses on average 11,000 disposable
sanitary products across their lifetime. We discussed the cost of this, and
they collectively disapproved of the tampon tax, calling it unnecessary and
unfair! At this point, I was sincerely hoping that this group represents the
attitude of teenage boys and men as whole.
- Although most of them found the idea of reusable sanitary products distasteful when we first introduced the products to the group, they came around when we told them that some menstrual cups could be used for years. They considered the positive financial and environmental impact of using these products.
They also surprised me by offering up an alternative name for period - ‘reds’. I am definitely going to look out for that one!
Overall, it was extremely promising to see a group of teenage boys voluntarily give us their time to participate in the workshop. As pilot projects go, it was a success: they learnt more about menstruation, and we learned more about how to discuss menstruation with teenage boys and young men. Thank you very much for an educational and heartening experience, boys!
WOW Women of the World festivals have been popping up across the world, if you get the chance to go along to one we would strongly recommend it.
WOW – Women of the World festival celebrates women and girls, and looks at the obstacles that stop them from achieving their potential.
Around the world, individuals and communities are insisting on the simple proposition that women and girls must have equal rights and asking the question: why is gender equality taking so long?
Southbank Centre's WOW – Women of the World festival is a global network of festivals which provides a platform for celebrating what has been achieved, and exploring all the ways we can change the world for the better.
What’s not to love?
Our Founder, Chloe, and her Mum Angela went along to represent No More Taboo with a stall across the two days. Here’s her highlights:
“Although we didn’t get much time to take in all the discussions as we were kept busy wo-manning the stall (thanks Mum for helping out)! We had some great discussions around gender, equality, inclusivity and of course periods with new customers, supporters, other panellists and some old friends who came to see us.
In fact, we were really pleased to catch up with Plan International UK who were opening the festival with a discussion about Period Activism exactly one year on since the launch of our #BreaktheBarriers research and Period Poverty Conference that we ran in collaboration with Plan.
On the first weekend of September, No More Taboo set up shop at Lush Cribbs Causeway for their Charity Pot weekend.
The Lush Charity Pot is a wonderfully creamy shea-butter hand lotion where all the sales money (excluding VAT) goes towards a chosen charity or non-for-profit. This scheme is designed to help boost grass-roots, small and local organisations, like ourselves, financially so that we can continue to do the work we do such as our Tackling Period Poverty programme.
As we were Lush’s chosen organisation for the weekend of the 1-2 September, one of our volunteers, Iloni, and one of our advisors, Carolyn, went along to wo-man the (suitably Lush-styled aesthetic) stall that Lush had kindly provided for us. We took along a range of our products, stacks of leaflets and information as well as our enthusiasm for talking about all things to do with periods.
Over the weekend, we sold over £200’s worth of stock with Ruby Cups and Honour Your Flow re-usable pads proving most popular with Lush customers. On top of this, Lush sold so many of their Charity Pots that £340.60 was raised for No More Taboo – which was amazing!
However exciting the money side of things were with this event, what I personally took away as being the real highlight of the weekend was the number and nature of conversations we shared with customers.
Mothers and daughters came and chatted to us about how they agreed it was so important to use re-usable products for personal and financial reasons as well as for the planet’s sake. Boyfriends accompanied their other halves as they prodded and probed the range of menstrual cups on display. Older women commented on how it’s such a relief to be able to talk about menstruation in public and with people you’ve only just met. They regaled of a time when periods were even more hush-hush and celebrated with us out mission of there being No More Taboo.
We would like to thank Lush Cribbs Causeway for being such wonderful hosts, encouraging every customer that came through their doors to consider buying the Charity Pot or simply to chat with us. Each member of their staff team was incredibly warm and so keen to find out more about what we do. On behalf of all of us at No More Taboo, thank you.
For more information, take a look at their website: https://www1.uwe.ac.uk/whatson/biggreenweek.aspx
Read more here: https://www.wen.org.uk/environmenstrual-week-of-action/
