Morning After Pill Availability

http://www.cbc.ca/health/story/2008/05/16/morning-afterpill.html

Pharmacists unhappy about new morning-after-pill availability
Last Updated: Friday, May 16, 2008 | 12:20 PM ET
CBC News

The emergency contraceptive drug known as Plan B will likely be coming out from behind the pharmacy counter, a move the Canadian Association of Pharmacists is not happy about.

The National Association of Pharmacy Regulatory Authorities accepted a recommendation this week to change the way the drug is sold, allowing it to be freely available on drugstore shelves instead of behind the pharmacy counter.

Currently, women who want to buy the drug have to ask pharmacy staff, a condition critics have contended may discourage some women from using it to prevent unwanted pregnancies.

The proposed change would see Plan B stocked on shelves near the dispensary, so purchasers could easily ask for advice on its use if they need it.

The national body advises provincial and territorial pharmacy regulatory authorities, each of which will have final say over the matter in their own jurisdiction.

The Canadian Association of Pharmacists (CPhA) does not support the proposed changes.

“Health Canada’s decision in 2005 to take emergency contraception off prescription status [but keep it behind the counter] was based on the need to have a trained health professional provide advice on the appropriate use of ECP,” said Janet Cooper, CPhA’s Senior Director of Professional Affairs, in a news release Friday.

"What will be lost is the opportunity for a pharmacist to use consultation on emergency contraception as a bridge to a referral to other health care providers, when needed, as well as providing important education regarding contraception and reproductive health.”

She says many women don't actually need to take the pill, which can be used within three days of unprotected sex to prevent pregnancy. And once the pill is easily accessible on pharmacy shelves, they'll be losing out on key information about the product, its correct usage and contraception information that pharmacists currently provide.

She says previous studies have shown that many women have misconceptions about Plan B, also known as levonorgestrel, and are confused about birth control generally.

In taking the decision, Canada, where the drug is sold by Montreal-based Paladin Labs Inc. Research, becomes the fifth country to agree to allow Plan B to be sold as an over-the-counter product. Other countries where the drug is sold this way are Norway, the Netherlands, Sweden and India.

"CPhA is also disappointed by the lack of an open and transparent consultation with health professionals on this issue," said Cooper. "We believe that such decisions should be both evidence-based and socially responsible."

It could be some time before the result of the decision is seen on drugstore shelves, even if provinces and territories accept the recommended change. Where some can almost automatically accept a decision of the national body and incorporate it into their own provincial drug schedules, others may have to go through more regulatory steps to make the change.

If you have ever tried to obtain Plan B, an over-the-counter emergency contraceptive, from a pharmacist in Quebec, you can (or maybe are, but I've not been to every pharmacy in the province) be required to have a consultation with the pharmacist. It's a hassle, it's a long wait to listen to things you probably already know, but it's a small price to pay for being able to control your own reproductive system, even after you've had an "oops." What you may not know about this consultation is that it actually does have a high price to be paid, and it's paid by the medicare system to the pharmacist. Its sale can be also recorded in order to catch those who are supposedly abusing or unnecessarily taking the medication.

This system disengages women in vulnerable situations from access to reproductive power: if they are for any number of reasons not covered by medicare (e.g. if they are newly arrived in the country, if they have no fixed address) they will have to pay for the medication, and will also have to pay out of pocket for the consultation to receive the medication.

It is essential that women have as much access to as many options for their reproductive health as society can legitimately provide. Who should we lobby?

This Is Not Marilyn

A few weeks ago, this image replaced images of women in black and red PVC bodysuits as advertisements for Montreal's sex boutique Sexe Cité. I love the fact that sex stores in Montreal advertise in the metro, and that no one here gets offended that the kiddies might see something they're not supposed to.

The image itself, however, makes me want to claw my eyes out.

I'm not going to get into the issue of whether or not North America's most recognisable sex symbol would or would not have worn plus-sized clothes today. Completely unconfirmed internet research puts her measurements somewhere in the vicinity of 37"-23"-36" Any woman who's shopped for clothes in a mall knows that that's definitely in the large/extra-large range. I don't really care if she would have been a size 16, or a size 12, or even a size 10, but I think any less than that is stretching the point.

It offends me the way that this image of a lush, curved, sexy woman has been co-opted into a stick figure. It offends me most that this emaciated model is considered more sexy than her iconic progenitor.

This is not to say that thin women cannot be attractive. Some are, certainly. Though it's not as if that's something you hear every day. Every media image out there of what a woman "should" look like reinforces society's views, and not mine. We can all quote facts and statistics - about Barbie, about supermodels, about the smooth, thin legs of pre-pubescent girls passed off as those of adults - they're not important. We know that society's idea of beauty is impossibly skewed. There's only so much reminding that we can do.

If you see this ad, please be disgusted. Even if you do nothing about it, if you don't even mention it, blog about it, or write an angry letter to the company about it, please be disgusted. Hold a company morally responsible in your own heart for its part in arbitrarily setting beauty standards and dividing women from each other.

Why I Love Canada

Some number in a series.

http://www.thesexparty.ca/Platform.html

But this is hands down my favourite part:

Sex-Positive Holidays
The provincial Victoria Day holiday in May commemorates a monarch legendary for her negative attitudes towards female sexuality. The Sex Party would change Victoria Day to Eros Day to celebrate and encourage sex-positive expression.
There is no provincial holiday in February. The Sex Party would proclaim Valentines Day as an official holiday

Well, that and that their webpage looks like a porn site, I mean, really.

And yes, they're based in BC.

Smile And Act Nice, and things I hate.

In a famous "Googleit!" attempt to discover how to become a dominatrix (I had a day off, what'd you expect me to do, stay at home and have sex with boys on the internet? wait a second...) I ran across a very cool website, the kind with a title that makes you think that these gals know exactly where you're coming from: http://www.smileandactnice.com

I read through the article (an interview with a professional dominatrix by the name of Mistress Elle), and, impressed, head to the site's main page. Given the section heading choices of Sex, Food, News, Home, and Life, I obviously choose Sex, and find myself reading hands down the best on-line sex advice column I have ever read. Lynne, their resident Ho In The Know has five "Ask-A-Ho" question & answer columns covering topics from how to have better orgasms to whether one should spit or swallow. Her advice is non-nonsense (learn to give yourself a pleasurable orgasm, then teach your partner), and honest ("swallow... or at least try"). Please. Read every single one.

Her best advice, however, comes to this guy:

I recently caught my wife kissing her best girlfriend. She told me that she had done this about 3 other times before. Being that her girlfriend is one of her best friends, she occasionally spends the night at her house. I am fairly certain that they sleep in the same bed. My wife has told me that she is not gay or bi. I mostly believe her, but because we are having some problems lately, I am beginning to question it. In general, do girls do this without being bi or lesbian? Any advice?

To which our dear columnist replies:

Hmmmm... sounds a little fishy to me. If your wife feels comfortable enough to make-out with her friend while you're in the vicinity, chances are they've been practicing. But it doesn't matter what the gender of the object of your wife's affections, unless you haven an"open" marriage arrangement in place, it's still cheating, isn't it? Mind you, this little foray doesn't necessarily mean your wife is gay, or even bisexual--but that's not the issue here. You two need to identify your problems and redefine what you each want out of your lives together, both sexually and emotionally. Good luck.

Which brings me to the two things I want to point out that I hate:

1. Awesome websites that haven't been updated since 2003.
2. When men think, for some warped reason that if their female significant other does something sexual with another woman it's not cheating.

Number one speaks for itself. If you are a progenitor of Smile & Ask Nicely and trip across this blog, please be encouraged to pick it up again, and if you can't be convinced, then please accept my thanks.

Number two is my ranting and raving at the universe for sexist double standards. And to take this opportunity, underneath a little line, and in a smaller font, to tell a Q-list celebrity sighting story.

*Note* If you are a man with a reasonable explanation of this, please tell me. If you are a woman who has tips for not worrying about this sort of thing all the time, please drop me a line.

---

There was a sub-plot on the Showcase TV show "Naked Josh" where main-character Josh's best friend's girlfriend cheats on him with another woman. Because "it's not *really* cheating," girlfriend doesn't get dumped, best friend just gets a single get-out-of-jail-free card to sleep with another woman. *Fume*

At my sister's birthday this year, the actor who plays Josh was sitting a table away from us, with two stick-thin girls in little black dresses, and a second guy who actually seemed to be enjoying himself.

Five Things Feminism Has Done For Me

As a collective web-response to the attacks being levied at Status of Women Canada/Condition Feminine Canada, over at ProgressiveBloggers.ca, they've asked us bloggish types to post five things that feminism has done for us. All over the Canadian internet people have posted well-thought-out, reasoned, touching, empowering lists. The following may or may not be one of them. But that's because feminism has as much impact on the quotidien as it does on the global.

Because of feminism...

1 - I wasn't shunned for not bringing a date to my high school prom
2 - I can build a career as a sex writer, and as a stage manager
3 - I don't feel obliged to shave my legs (or anything else for that matter)
4 - I can choose whether or not I want to have kids
5 - I'm taken seriously when I open my mouth to speak. Or if I'm not, it's because I'm an annoying, mouthy person, not because I'm a woman.

Status Report - Status of Women Canada/Condition Feminine Canada

Status of Women Canada/Condition Feminine Canada, the federal agency responsible for funding women's groups in Canada, as well as conducting gender-based policy research, has just had its budget radically sliced up by the Conservative government. Its mandate has been altered so that it no longer includes the word "equality," and as recently as this week, groups who receive funding through Status of Women Canada/Condition Feminine Canada are now no longer able to use those funds to do government lobbying.

But guess what Stephen Harper, the feminists are coming, and they're pissed off.

If you'd like to learn more, or to get involved, please leave me a comment with an email address, or you can check out the fledgeling site: http://www.statusreport.ca

This is about porn.

I've been thinking recently about what it is that allows me to call myself a "sex positive feminist." Sure, I like sex. I think people should have sex. I don't think that all sex is rape, nor do I think that there is anything fundamentally unfeminist about sex.

I've been thinking about the impact of the label "sex positive" has on my idea of specific "feminist issues" (an idea I have trouble with as it is, mind you.) Does an identity as a sex positive feminist change my view on abortion? Does it suggest that I ought to be more in favour of abortion as unwanted children are a basic consequence of unprotected sex? No, because being in favour of sex doesn't make me in favour of unprotected sex. Unprotected sex is dumb. Period. That's not to say that I don't understand why people have unprotected sex, nor is it to say that I haven't had instances where I've thought about skipping out on a condom.

However, the question of pornography is the one that's given me the greatest pause recently. To one extent, I've made peace with my personal ethics by only looking at porn of the drawn/animated/written varieties, even though I'm assured (by men, might I add) that women in the business are a) "in control" (whatever that means), and b) better paid (than men, I assume.) Let's be clear, though. Better paid does not mean not exploited. "In control" (of which we'll take the narrowest of definitions, and say that they have a veto over what might happen on set - though who would, lest she not be paid that "better pay") may mean that no one's holding a gun to her head, but doesn't mean that she's in the business for the fun and the glamour. Paris Hilton being a porn star is not the same Sally Wilson of Terre Haute, Indiana moving to New York to be a Broadway dancer and ending up making skin flicks to pay the rent.

This is not to pay any disrespect to any woman who enjoys what she does in the porn business. With them, I have no quarrel. It'd just be nice if for-women-by-women were splashed across more porn, and if I could believe the words that allude to that, but don't say it.

The theoretical, ethical issues that I have with porn, however, remain. Let this not be construed as my being against porn on principle, or being against the sex trade, this is more a litany of reservations.

First, the overwhelming majority of porn is created for a male audience. The resulting product caters to male tastes, the actions portrayed pander to male enjoyment and arousal, which leads men who consume a lot of pornographic material to believe that that's the way that sex ought to occur, and further more, that women are as easily aroused as porn stars pretend to be. To extrapolate an example, most influenced by this of course are men/boys with little sexual experience, who most often have sex with women/girls with little sexual experience, leading more women to enjoy sex less.

Women, I believe, have the right to enjoy sex.

Secondly, the portrayal of women in porn, even that that is drawn/animated/written, is so ridiculously antiquated that it scares me. Women solely as the object of desire. Women solely as the providers of pleasure. Women solely as subject to the whims of men. Porn perpetuates those stereotypes. Women have a right to be seen, in porn and in life, as better than that.

This is about dating sites and abortion.

The dating site OkCupid improves the degree to which two people will "match" based on answering multiple choice questions that both the site maintainers create, and the site users submit. It's a cool site, lots of interesting people, and as a bonus, it's 100% free.

Here's one of the questions asked by the site. It is, as I recall, a user-written question:

Hypothetically, if you had an unwanted child on the way, what would you do?
1 - Abort it
2 - Give it up for Adoption
3 - Keep it regardless

This question seems odd to me. Mostly because as written it implies that a man answering the question could legitimately made a decision about a woman's right to choose.

If the question is intended to ascertain a view on abortion, might I suggest the following as a better question:
How do you feel about abortion?
a) I am pro-choice
b) I am pro-life
c) I respect the right to have an abortion, but I would not want to have one/want my partner to have one

I know this may make me come off as man hating feminist. I don't really care. This is one of the things on which I am very firm: a woman's right to choose is a woman's right to choose. She should have access to a safe, medically supported, and medicare-covered abortion. It should be her decision to have one, or not have one. Not her partner's, not her doctor's, not her government's.

That isn't to say that women shouldn't have the good sense to make the decision with their partners (should such a person be a positive part of her life), and/or to tell the father if she decides to keep it, because that's just basic human niceness.

As an addendum, an online acquaintance once explained to me her view on abortion: she said "I would like there not to have to be abortion. I would like every child to come into the world as a loved, cherished, and nurtured individual. In the meantime, there is abortion, and it should be legal, safe, and affordable." I thought this was very sensible.