Bleeding heart business

Via Salon's Broadsheet, this good news story, and good on so many fronts.

Many girls and women here think they have it bad that time of the month when they're feeling boated, cranky, sleepless, crampy and find themselves checking the backs of their skirts every few minutes. (As for their partners who think they are suffering through this too, my heart bleeds.) 

But give me a break. Aside from the fact that the feds charge GST for tampons and other such products, menstruating is no great hardship. I mean, walk into any drugstore and you'll see entire aisles devoted to mini this and maxi that.

In my time I have even bought black pads made for thong panties.

Nowadays you can even skip the whole deal with certain pills.

What's more, period talk is common. Who hasn't heard a co-working kvetching about her PMS? There's no shame in it. And even commercials are pretty blatant nowadays, going way beyond animated cotton doves with wings floating around a girl's head.

Case in point:

So anyway, in some places, women don't have it so (relatively) easy.

Which is where the good news comes in:

Elizabeth Scharpf (MBA 2007) has been named the first Harvard Business School Social Entrepreneurship Fellow for her work in launching Sustainable Health Enterprises (SHE). SHE is a platform for starting businesses that use innovative, market-based approaches to tackle socio-economic and public health problems in developing countries. Scharpf started SHE in late 2007 based on the belief that charitable efforts alone are not enough to address the breadth and complexity of socio-economic and health problems that exist in developing countries.

The HBS Social Entrepreneurship Fellowship program is designed to support the efforts of recent HBS graduates who are launching social enterprises - nonprofit, for-profit, or hybrid organizations - with a central focus on the creation of social value. This pilot program provides seed funding support to one recent graduate each year through a $25,000 fellowship.

The first SHE venture addresses the widespread phenomenon of girls and women missing school or work when they are menstruating because they lack access to affordable sanitary pads. Currently working in Rwanda, SHE is developing a sanitary pad sourced from local materials to be sold for 30 percent less than currently available brands. Local Rwandan women will manufacture and market these pads and gradually become owners of the business through microfinance loans.

"In interviews with more than 500 women and girls in Rwanda, we found that half of the girls interviewed are missing school due to menstruation, primarily because sanitary pads are too expensive," said Scharpf. "Lack of access to pads affects not only the prospects of girls and women, it also has significant macro-economic consequences for countries - in fact, we estimate a $115 million loss in GDP per year in Rwanda alone.

"SHE expects that this rate is comparable in other resource-poor countries and we plan to undertake similar efforts in those countries," Scharpf continued. "It is an honor to be Harvard Business School's first Social Entrepreneurship Fellow. These resources will help SHE succeed during this critical phase of our pilot roll-out." 

So, not only do Rwandan women and girls get cheaper pads, they get jobs, businesses and educations. This means that they're less likely to start having children at young ages, which reduces the stress on the planet.

It's a win-win-win.

As for Scharpf, she makes money in an ethical way, giving back to where she takes from.

And Harvard? Well, as an MBA myself (Concordia 1985), I have to say that, if social entrepreneurship was on the curricula of B-schools long ago, we would not be in the economic and environmental mess we are now in.

Ontari-scary-o

Okay, here's the Brian Hughes graphic that was on the front page of The Star today, attached to this story by Robert Benzie. The boldface is mine.

Read it carefully because there's a trick question coming:

Premier Dalton McGuinty's move toward harmonizing the 8 per cent provincial sales tax with the 5 per cent GST is meeting with sharp resistance within his Liberal caucus, the Star has learned.

Behind closed doors in Tuesday's caucus meeting, skittish MPPs aired grievances over the scheme – which would raise consumption taxes on books, feminine hygiene products, heating fuel, children's clothing, diapers and fast-food value meals by 8 per cent while reducing the overall tax burden for business.

The premier has been receptive to arguments from business people who say they are at a disadvantage because they pay more in taxes to purchase equipment or machinery than competitors in Quebec or the Atlantic provinces, where the two taxes have already been harmonized.

But Ontario consumers would feel the impact immediately because many products that are now taxed federally but not provincially would be subject to the equivalent of both taxes under a harmonized system.

Do the Ontario Liberals hate women? Do they hate the working poor? Because what's up with making cheap shoes more expensive? What kids' clothes? Diapers?

And let's not get started on tampons which women, who make less than men, are already heavily taxed on. Some $60 million a year pads the federal coffers by women who are cursed with the GST every month on menstrual products.

And yeah, I know that was five questions.

And the trick is being played on us by these bozos.

Hey, didn't the NDP elect a woman as leader this past weekend?

Offside Offensive

Are you kidding me? This passes for sports ''comedy?'' Hey, I like a good joke -- and tell many a raunchy un-PC one -- but these videos go way beyond the sexist foul line.

What do you think? Is it just me getting cranky or do these videos deserve a pass?

Via Feministing.

 

Being green, seeing red

Okay, I hardly eat any meat for environmental (and humanitarian) reasons. My water footprint is one-third that of the average Canadian. My fuel-efficient car, bought new in 2003, doesn't even have 35,000 klicks on it, most of them racked up driving to Montreal, not in town. I walk everywhere. I use biodegradable poop bags for the dog. I only run the dishwasher when full, use CFLs, unplug appliances and turn off computers when not in use. I repair, reduce, reuse, recycle and eject. So I'm green as one can be green in Toronto.

But I will never be this green.

There are 85 million women of menstruating age in North America. Conservative estimates are that the average woman disposes of between 10,000 and 15,000 tampons, pads and applicators in her lifetime1. That’s about 250 to 300 pounds of waste per woman.

In 1999, about 2.5 million tampons, 1.4 million pads, and 700,000 pantiliners were flushed away daily.

Waste consultant Franklin Associates reports that 13.5 billion pads and 6.5 billion tampons, plus their packaging, ended up in landfills or sewage systems in 19983. In the United States and Canada alone, more than 12 billion pads and tampons are tossed annually.

Disposable pads are made with polyethylene plastic. Producing polyethylene contributes to global warming and depletes the ozone, while emitting sulfur and nitrogen oxides, which add to acidification.

According to the Center for Marine Conservation, more than 170,000 tampon applicators were collected along U.S. coastal areas between 1998 and 19996. The Ocean Conservancy collected and cataloged debris along U.S. coastlines between 2001 and 2006, finding that tampon applicators made up 2.2 percent of the total debris field, more than syringes, condoms and plastic six-pack rings combined.

Most women are not aware that safe, ecologically sound, lower-priced alternatives exist. We have been conditioned since childhood by slick commercials for disposable products. The companies that make reusable products don’t have the revenue from massive repeat sales, like tampon and pad companies do, to advertise on television and in major print outlets. Word of mouth is vital.

Most obvious among “green” alternatives are washable cloth pads and pantiliners.

I don't think so.

Listen, women have enough to worry about without having to resort to this. We have enough to deal with in the office without schlepping around rags and emptying cups. I am still traumatized by leakage I experienced on a pleated white skirt back in Grade 6.

You want to get rid of something? How about pantyhose? That takes up a lot more landfill -- while being completely unnecessary -- than tampons.

And how about men doing their share? How many of those cars backed up at the Tim's drive-thrus are filled with guys? Most of them, I'll bet, because, from what I can see in my own travels, it's mostly women (and students)  taking the TTC.

So no. I'll stick with my super-absorbent with wings whatever and hope that the industry comes up with products that are disposable but not so toxic to the environment.

And by the way, why is there GST, still, on these products?

UPPITY DATE: I've been thinking. Maybe I'd consider a switch, if men stopped using disposable razors and aerosol shaving foam and went back to straight razors and shaving brushes. Why should women bear the burden of saving the environment?

THAT TIME OF THE MONTH DATE: Okay, okay. With so many readers telling me that they use and endorse these products, I'll check them out. But, if anything goes wrong, I have your email addresses and I am sending you the cleaning bills.

The Ick Files

Howard Stern is a pimp. Boosting your ratings on a woman's body is no different from living off the avails of prostitution. Read this:

Look for Howard Stern to shock again on Tuesday morning when he's due to kick off the auction of a 22-year-old beauty's virginity.

Expected to step on the block, so to speak, of Stern's Sirius radio studio is a San Diego woman who says she wants to sell her maidenhood to pay her college tuition.

"I don't have a moral dilemma with it," says the pretty brunette, who's using the pseudonym of Natalie Dylan "for safety reasons."

"We live in a capitalist society," she tells us. "Why shouldn't I be allowed to capitalize on my virginity?"

Dylan was introduced to Stern by Dennis Hof, proprietor of the Moonlite Bunny Ranch, Nevada's famed legal brothel (seen on HBO's hit series "Cathouse.")

Hof says the auction will be conducted online via bunnyranch.com, and that the deal will be consummated at the Bunny Ranch, where Dylan's sister already works. "I think it's a tremendous idea," he says. "Why lose it to some guy in the backseat of a Toyota when you can pay for your education?"

Apparently, ''Dylan'' has a degree in women's studies. I have a sneaking suspicion that what she's really studying is men's behaviour. Any guy who would bid for a virgin -- like he was attending a slave market in the ancient world -- is a sad sack of semen in my books.

As for Dylan, well, she's free to do what she wants with her body, although I am disgusted that she's going through Stern, who has always exploited women to get listeners. Couldn't she have just put up a YouTube video?

What do you think?

UPPITY DATE (12/9/08): Stern has said he had no plans to start the bidding on his program, and that the New York Daily News got it wrong.

Apparently, when Howard saw the piece, he was livid. “I have three daughters, a fiancé and a mother. This is not my thing. We don’t even know if it is true.

"I’m only interviewing the girl about WHY she is doing this, the same way ANY show – or ANY newspaper – interviews people about what they do.”

I would hardly agree that ''any show -- or any newspaper'' would do it the same way, or do it at all. But then Stern didn't become the shock jock by hosting sobre political debates.

That said, he's still profiting off the avails ...

Mary's Boy Child Jesus Christ

"Christ in the House of Mary and Martha", c.1654-1655, by Jan Vermeer.

My doctor, a Canadian of Greek heritage like moi, has a lot of Greek-speaking patients. A couple of months ago, I was sitting in his waiting room, waiting, waiting, waiting, with my head buried in a magazine.

Also there were two men and two women jabbering away in Greek. I paid no attention until one of the men started railing against the Greek Orthodox Church and its regressive ways. The other man, backed by the Greek chorus of the two women, were not only defending the Church but also condemning the first man for having the audacity to attack it. Wasn't he ashamed?

Which is when I quietly spoke up, knocking them off their chairs because (1) I don't ''look Greek'' to most Greeks here who tend to be shorter in stature and darker of complexion, and (2) I backed the man attacking the Church, citing Biblical chapter and verse of what was wrong with it.

The second man called me a ''putana'' (whore) for my criticisms while the women became increasingly uncomfortable. I laughed at him and said his reaction was to be expected from a sexist Greek man who leans on the Church to oppress women.

After the men went in to see the doctor, I turned to the women -- who, incidentally, were not with the men -- and asked what had the Church done for them lately. Were they able to become priests? Were their daughters allowed to be altar girls? Were they allowed to take communion while menstruating? Weren't they at all concerned that, in the 21st century, the Church they so venerated was acting as it it were in the first?

And, last but not least, did they not believe that Jesus had more respect for women -- from his Mother Mary to Mary Magdalene and on -- than the priests do? After all, weren't the women his messengers when he was resurrected?

The women in the waiting room had no answers. They knew I was right.

So anyway, that's my introduction to today's treeware column -- triggered by last week's Vatican edict against women priests -- which has the mail, mostly positive, pouring in. This latest decree has it that not only would women priests be excommunicated, but also the bishops who ordain them. Here's an excerpt, with some links:

Monsignor Angelo Amato of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said the Vatican "does not feel authorized to change the will of its founder Jesus Christ."

This from a Church that does little more than pray for the pedophiles in its priesthood.

As for women, doesn't the Bible say: "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus?" (Galatians 3:28)

Clearly, some are more one-with-the-Lord than others.

And yet there is plenty of theological research arguing that Jesus included women among his disciples. Plus, according to the comprehensive WomenPriests.org, most Catholic scholars agree with the ordination of women on the grounds that's there's a historical foundation for it.

For example, the Last Supper, in fact a Passover Seder, would have, as a matter of course, included the women who prepared it. It was there that Jesus established the Apostles as priests, and there is nothing to indicate that he shut women out.

Another example: There's a documented trail of names of female deacons, dating back to the Church's beginnings and continuing through some 900 years.

Nay, verily I say unto you, there is no case at all to be made for Jesus Christ being as sexist as the Church would have us believe. All indications are the opposite: he was far more feminist than the society to which he preached.

But papal bull finds otherwise.

Here is a release by one pro-female priest organization:

The Women's Ordination Conference is outraged by yesterday’s Vatican decree, which reminds Catholic women once again of the animosity they face from the hierarchy, despite being the backbone of most Catholic parishes throughout the world.

Out of fear of the growing numbers of ordained women and the overwhelming support they are receiving, the Vatican is trying to preserve what little power they have left by attempting to extinguish the widespread call for women’s equality in the church. It will not work. In the face of one closed door after another, Catholic women will continue to make a way when there is none.

We reject the notion of excommunication. In our efforts to ordain women into an inclusive and accountable Roman Catholic Church, we see it as contrary to the gospel itself to excommunicate people who are doing good works and responding to injustice and the needs of their communities. While the hierarchy prattles on about excommunication, Catholic women are working for justice and making a positive difference in the world. 

Yeah Girls. They'll take your babymaking, your charitable work and your pie-baking but leave the peacemaking and preaching to the men.

Pull the plug on this already!

Comic Margaret Cho is shocked, appalled and sympathetic. This is her response to yesterday's paparazzi photos of Britney Spears' period stain.

Every month my body completely purges everything it has been holding onto. My periods are heavy, long, arduous - old furniture and books and records come out. Gold coins and anchors and treasures and lace and shoes. It's like a big clearance sale. Everything must go! That is just the way that I am built. I am just puzzled at the idea of a pantyliner or a regular tampon. I need to stuff half an emergency room in there every 28 days or I am looking at dying everything I own black. (Here's a hot tip - if you stain something with your own blood, spit on the stain - your saliva has enzymes that will break it down.unfortunately it has to be your blood and your saliva - you can't do it for anyone else). When my Aunt Flow comes to visit - the bitch brings presents. All the feminine products I use have "overnight" on the box.

The point here is let she who is without menstrual stains throw the first tampon.

If you want to see the photos, use Google. I am not linking to them.