Steminist blog
Menstrual Leave
Shreyasi Mukerji
The Australian government is starting to take the idea of mandating menstrual leave provisions by employers seriously. Many businesses in Australia and around the world already offer menstrual leave. Spain plans to be the first country to legally require companies to provide paid menstrual leave. While ideas such as these will obviously face opposition and eye rolling from people who do not see value in pushing for womens’ rights, it is interesting to note that consensus on legislating menstrual leave hasn’t been achieved even among feminists and champions of diversity.
To understand this debate amongst women better, I reached out to my female colleagues and asked them their opinions on the topic.
Opinion 1: “There will definitely be outcry. I'm all for it, I know many women who have terrible periods whether diagnosed with endometriosis or similar, or undiagnosed, and it's just their normal to be curled up in a ball with a heat pack every month. We get periods so that those who want to and are able can grow the babies and take time away from careers to raise them while the dads generally keep working with no interruption to their career (or super fund). Then the mothers go back to work and are more likely to be the parent staying home to look after sick children. Also, if more medical research went into issues that solely impact women so that they aren't waiting years for a diagnosis and having few (not fully effective) options for treatment then maybe not so many women would need to take menstrual days. (While this solution) might cause bias in choosing to hire a woman, the lack of understanding and empathy from a lot of men about endometriosis, PCOS etc is partly because women just suck it up and no one speaks about it.”
Opinion 2: “Personally, I think it’s quite private and I wouldn’t want guys knowing every month when I’m absent that I have my period. We are trying to close the gender gap and be more equal and this doesn’t seem like it would help that. I can already see the resentment and the eyes rolling. I would rather just get on with it and, if in pain, take a Panadol.”
Opinion 3: “I have a relative that has chronic issues every month. I’m all for it for people with serious medical problems to be looked after by an organization. This medical condition could be very controversial as such, due to private or personal preference. There are people who are very open about their issues; however, there are always some very reserved people. From a very personal view, it should be covered under sick leave. Personal health issues are an unfortunate part of life and are very different from maternity or paternity leave, which are not medical conditions. Empathy should apply to all people with any medical conditions and individual situations should be discussed with the manager or the organization to arrange some sort of flexibility or concession.”
As someone with PCOS, endometriosis and multiple failed pregnancies, I know I deserve menstrual leave, and do not believe hiding our pain is serving us in any way. However, I do see opportunities for an old bias against women’s abilities to resurface, at least in the beginning, and such biases affect the careers of everyone with a uterus. That said, the latter argument would have probably been raised, and overcome, at every step of the feminist fight for equality, from the introduction of maternity leave to making sanitary products tax-free or easily accessible. Perhaps we can power through this one as well. What do you think?
