Via Jill, this article about the TV-friendly euphemism “vajayjay” really drives home the point I was making earlier about how women’s body parts have this entire taboo around them that men’s parts just don’t. The word was used on “Grey’s Anatomy” and took off, because people are desperate for a new euphemism for the dreaded but important body part.
It began on Feb. 12, 2006, when viewers of the ABC series “Grey’s Anatomy” heard the character Miranda Bailey, a pregnant doctor who had gone into labor, admonish a male intern, “Stop looking at my vajayjay.”
Turns out the writers were poking a stick at the censors, who wouldn’t allow them to use the word they wanted to use.
Shonda Rhimes, the creator and executive producer of “Grey’s Anatomy,” who brought the word into full public view, never intended to promote a euphemism or slang term for the female anatomy. Rather, she fought to use vagina in the script.
“I had written an episode during the second season of ‘Grey’s’ in which we used the word vagina a great many times (perhaps 11),” Ms. Rhimes wrote in an e-mail message. “Now, we’d once used the word penis 17 times in a single episode and no one blinked. But with vagina, the good folks at broadcast standards and practices blinked over and over and over. I think no one is comfortable experiencing the female anatomy out loud — which is a shame considering our anatomy is half the population.”
Which is too bad, because the original line would have been 10 times funnier if they’d used the word “vagina” instead of this silly euphemism. And 100 times funnier if they’d been more accurate and said “vulva”.
The standards and practices thing really makes my point for me. It’s not just the word “penis” either. I’ve heard some ad over and over on TV for some new show that has a joke built around the word “cock” on it; that passes muster, but “vagina” doesn’t? There’s only one rational explanation, and that’s that people think women are dirty and men aren’t. The irony of this is that euphemisms don’t stay euphemisms for long; once the meaning catches on, they become the word for the thing itself and then a new euphemism is needed. So va-jay-jay might be cute now, but it will either pass out of usage or become something that sounds a tad too explicit to use after awhile.
The taboo against female bodies fascinates me, because a good percentage, probably half or more, of the people who have the taboo have female bodies themselves. I can only imagine the internal strife that causes. There’s been taboo studies that show that tampons are more taboo than toilet paper—read: menstrual blood bothers people more than shit. (Again, read The Female Thing by Laura Kipnis for more on this; it’s both convincing and fascinating.) The manifestations of the specifically female terror of the female body creep me out more than a bloody tampon ever could—think of Leslee Unruh of the Abstinence Clearinghouse with her bragging that her daughter remained so “pure” that she was unkissed on her wedding day, and her scary facelift that hints at other terrors of the body and its inevitable decay. It’s an odd world, where a quick and relatively simple outpatient abortion is considered some unholy intrusion into the body, but far more complex plastic surgeries are just fine, presumably because no one has to touch a nasty cunt while they do it.
Hell, think of the constant use of the word “purity” to refer to virginal women. That word choice speaks volumes.
Considering how strong the reaction is to the taboo against the female body in some segments of our society—the segments that make TV’s standards and practices departments so paranoid about violating their precious eardrums with non-euphemistic words for female anatomy—I’m honestly amazed sometimes how many of us mainly dodged the bullet. Even hardcore feminists would flinch to be called fish, but mostly the taboo has managed not to sink its teeth into a lot of people. In the post below, there are women trading stories of guys who wouldn’t go down, and I’ve encountered this particular breed of man, but he’s certainly in the minority. I can’t think of many men I know who’d balk at buying a box of tampons for their girlfriends or many women who would feel grossed out by a glimpse of a female friend’s vibrator. Embarrassed at witnessing something intimate, maybe, but not disgust.
But it’s clear that the disgust is out there, and it’s running rampant and it’s driving American politics to an alarming degree. You have people like Chris Matthews practically breaking into a sweat at the idea of a vulva-adorned tuckus sitting in the desk chair of the Oval Office. You have the Republican candidates making absolute asses out of themselves to the degree that you think they’re running for Least Likely To Be A Pussy instead of President. And they’re smart to do so, in that they’re vying for the votes of people like Ace of “Play-doh and Bacon” Spades. And Dr. “The Bitch Was Asking For It” Helen.
My question then is this: What is it that makes someone not fall prey to this irrational taboo of and hatred of women and femininity? Because whatever it is that spares some people from it needs to be replicated and promoted in society for the good of us all. If politicians couldn’t resort to this taboo to get people to put their rational minds on hold, we wouldn’t have nearly the problems that we have now. So what do you think is the difference between someone who buys into the taboo hardcore and someone who seems relatively untouched? What do you think goes into making someone a member of the latter group and how can we spread that quality around?
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The word was used on “Grey’s Anatomy” and took off, because people are desperate for a new euphemism for the dreaded but important body part.
Though I like the word “vajayjay” for casual use among friends, there’s a serious problem when a doctor in a medical situation is not allowed to say “vagina” on TV. It’s a goddamned medical term, people!
Seriously, ladies, if you see a doctor who insists on referring to your vagina as your “vajayjay” or any other non-medical term, get another doctor.
Excellent You Can’t Do That on Television reference.
It’s too late for a longer post, but anecdotally, I seem to be more into going down on a woman than my lesbian friends.
I have a bad feeling that vajayjay will take the same route that “cunt”, “slut” and “bitch” have taken in the past several years. I have a piece about that in my blog.
I can only speak for myself, but my lack of disgust towards women has a lot to do with the fact that I’m closely related to no less than two: My mom and my sister.
On a less snarky note, I think it has a lot to do with seeing women as equals and sex as just one among many ways people can interact with each other rather than as an act filled with shame.
Of course, it should be pointed out that part of the reason is no doubt that it’s a magical fairy land to me, while quite pedestrian to them. (also, insert data about men overly focusing on a few erogenous zones here)
Well, it’s kind of a gimme answer, but in my case my parents–the message was that bodies are good, healthy, frequently messy things. Similarly, you might be feminine/masculine, but best get over it and move on to the things that are actually important.
I wonder if there’s hope for people who are already so invested in traditional gender roles and see women and femininity as inherently weak? I’m not sure you could convince them otherwise.
Ha. When it was my brother’s turn to fold the laundry, he used to pick up my mother’s and my clean underwear with his thumb and forefinger and fling it across the room at us. Then, he’d carry on folding the socks.
For what it’s worth, the usage on “Grey’s Anatomy” was one of the funniest lines ever. I had never seen GA before, and after that, gave it a try for a few more episodes, and then gave up. But that line still makes me laugh.
And it was funny to me precisely because she used a euphemism - a character thing.
What do you think goes into making someone a member of the latter group and how can we spread that quality around?
It’s hard to think about anything else when you feel physically dirty. We see infants born in bloody filth and all we want to do is get someone to clean them up. It induces a state of mental panic, like having to urinate and not being able to. I don’t know if it reminds us of our mortality or what, but uncleanliness, or even the idea of uncleanliness, is uncomfortable for most people on a visceral level. As many things as Steven Pinker gets wrong, I think he’s right when he discusses the connection between cleanliness and morality (for example, the way homosexuality is considered immoral because it grosses some people out, and women are immoral because vaginas are slimy and cover newborn babies in goo.) I don’t think the solution is not falling prey to the dirtiness taboo as much as understanding where it comes from and getting over it.
I am suddenly having a flashback to my brother at age 8 (me, age 12): I called upstairs and asked him to please thrown down a damask napkin. A maxipad came flying down the stairs. He thought I had said “damsel napkin” and that he had directly complied with my request. We had to have a chat about what “damask” meant, but the whole thing was really cute.
(Point: lack of taboo starts early)
I agree with the opening of the Vagina Monologues, that the word vagina, no matter how many times you say it, never sounds like a word you want to say. I like the word pussy because it seems more onomatopoetic, in a soft, wet, warm kind of way.
I think there’s something even weirder going on, because while talking about cocks is just fine (and talking about vulvas and vaginas is right out), when it comes to showing the, er, offending organs a vulva will get you an R but a penis is much more likely to get you an NC-17 (or the television equivalents).
I guess it’s the difference between the phallus and the penis or some such bleh.
wow, when I finally said ‘vajayjay’ outloud, I realized it reminds my of the kids show ‘Jay Jay the Jet Plane!’ Talk about some mixed metaphors there!
Some (Va) Jay Jay episodes:
Spending Time with Big Jake
Tracy’s Shooting Star
(Va) Jay Jay’s Butterfly’s Adventure
(Va) Jay Jay Meets Captain Hightower
Tuffy the Tiny Tow Truck
Tuffy’s Buried Treasure
I Love your Funny Face
The Buddy System
Are We There Yet
And the one that’ll ruin everything:
Switcharound Day!
(Va) Jat Jay the Jet Plane. *That’s Me!*
Vagina used to be a word I Never Said. Then one day I decided that was silly, and now I really rather like the word. Oddly, “vajayjay” sounds way dirtier to me, and I can’t really explain why.
Having three sisters (and a mother who was VERY VOCAL about her cycle for whatever reason) seems to have mostly dulled my brother to the “grossness” of the period, although I’ve noticed when he’s feeling he’s got to prove his manliness, suddenly it’s gross again.
One of the first times I realised my husband (then-boyfriend, obviously) was awesome was when I got my period while visiting him and didn’t have any tampons with me. He immediately offered to go buy me some without me even having to ask. All he wanted was me to write down the exact kind I wanted for him. Considering my boyfriend before that all but banished me to the menstrual hut during my periods, it was a really nice change of pace. I should ask him if he has any idea why he thinks of it as what it is: a natural thing that’s a little messy but not actually disgusting.
I thought I’d heard the word vagina used on an episode of Scrubs, by Carla, who was making fun of Eliot for her inability to use the proper terms for her own ladybits. Maybe it’s OK in a comedy or something, TV censors are weird.
And damn do I love me some Scrubs.
The ridiculous standards associated with female genitals and the other anatomical portions get weirder and weirder. And it’s not just discomfort with women’s parts. Try to find an erect penis in anything other than hardcore porn, and you will probably have to give up on humanity and go to the Discovery channel. Softcore nonsense on late night premium cable pretends men don’t have penises at all. Showtime’s Californication would be much better served by going balls–and labia–out. HBO series seem to love the penis (see: Rome, Oz, and the occasional Six Feet Under slabdweller,) but only in a flaccid state. You’d think with all these “E.D.” ads on television, there’d be some pent-up appreciation for a good hardon. But you’d be wrong. Or scaring the Heartland. Or something. And the closest you get to seeing female genitals on cable, even premium cable, is in Levitra ads. Which junior high bathroom stall sketch artist gets the royalties for that Georgia O’Keefe-inspired vulvosity of a logo?
As for mentioning the genitals, vajayjay is absurd. That someone would censor “vagina” is worse. But I’m a big fan of the Borat nomenclature and would prefer they call it a “vagheen”, which is a bizarre combination of repulsive and endearing. Though I just can’t see it catching on.
Any talk of looking at a woman’s vagina always brings to my mind the David Sedaris piece about him going to a nudist park, and how he was uncomfortable sitting across from a woman because he could see her “vagina”. I’m thinking, unless she was getting really creative with her lawn chair and a speculum, not as such. Vulva is not a hard word to say! It’s what I’ve taught my 4-year-old she has. Boys have a penis, girls have a vulva. I mean, sure, boys also have a vas deferens and a prostate and lots of other stuff, but we talk about what they can *see*, not what’s inside them, when discussing sexual characteristics.
That’s a really pedantic stance, though, and I know the vagina/vulva thing probably doesn’t bother many people as much as it irritates me.
Well then, bite my shiny epiglottis, you censorious mammary gland resemblers!
Although I have no doubt that women’s bodies are treated as “dirtier” than men’s, I also see many things that indicate to me that men’s bodies are also considered disgusting by other men. Perhaps I shouldn’t be misled by television, but I see countless jokes that turn on the idea that men don’t want to see other men’s genitals.
In Weeds, when Andy asks his army buddy to take a picture of Andy lighting his farts (!), the buddy says, “Wait, wait, I don’t want to see your balls!” (Andy offers to “tuck.”) On Californication, when Hank’s best friend Charlie is negotiating a three-way with him (because the girl won’t go have sex with Charlie otherwise), Hank reluctantly agrees but insists “I don’t want your cock anywhere near me!” Entourage has jokes about the horror of “crossing swords.”
On the non-cable channels, where they are generally not that explicit, scenes in which men are disgusted to see their male friends’ genitals, or in which one man strips to show his “freedom” while the others look hopelessly embarrassed, are common.
In my generation (I’m in my 50’s), all the boys showered together in after high school gym. The ones who were reluctant to do so were called fags. Today, from what I’ve heard, boys avoid showering together (and therefore don’t shower at all - now that’s disgusting!), and the practice is called “so gay.” I’ve heard a young man in a public rest room tell a friend that he wasn’t going to use a urinal (while his friend stood at another one) because “I’m not going to let you see my chubby, you queer!” (The circumstances and tone gave me no impression that either kid was gay.)
Are straight men under 30 or so really like this? If they’re so disgusted by other men’s bodies, it’s hard to imagine that they don’t harbor some distaste for their own. Or, alternatively, that they act this way to cover up a perfectly average interest in what other people look like.
BTW, Jay Jay the Jet Plane’s Brenda Blue made the husband and I laugh because she seemed like such a … porn starlet! Doing kid TV! I dont know if it was her extra super slim body plus BOOOBBBBS! or her mannerisms or both.
So we did a little digging and … well, you prolly don’t wann know. Blue indeed.
My question then is this: What is it that makes someone not fall prey to this irrational taboo of and hatred of women and femininity?
I have some thoughts on why my boyfriend doesn’t fall prey to this, but I will ask him when he gets home, because I don’t know where it first started. (I know all of our circle of friends refuses these attitudes.)
I don’t fall prey to it anymore, though I used to. I know why, too — being diagnosed with PCOS in high school forced me to confront my body and learn to deal with it, and with talking about it. And yeah, I freaked out during the diagnosis process because of those female body taboos. It took a while.
Eventually it became something I just discussed matter-of-factly and expected everyone else to cope with matter-of-factly. (My high school boyfriend, who was a bad choice of boyfriend in so many ways, at least reinforced this lack of taboo — his parents were biologists and dealt with the human body as a medical fact, so he did too.) I got the reaction I expected most of the time. People usually responded well to my matter-of-fact tone.
That experience also made me want to learn as much about myself as possible, and to think it was kind of cool and interesting to find out why my body did what it did. I found information and a lot of like-minded people, which further reinforced the lack of taboo.
I guess what I’m saying is: it’s all about social climate, about what you see from the people whose respect you want, especially while you’re a teenager. If you’re surrounded by guys who feel the need to be macho and act like women = gross, then you’ll pick up on that. If you’re surrounded by people who think the women = gross attitude is juvenile and ignorant, you’ll pick up on that, too.
Oh, but what is this ad for JohnQ.com with the naked butt hanging out here? I won’t click through, so I really don’t understand but question the message…
What is it that makes someone not fall prey to this irrational taboo of and hatred of women and femininity?
I think a big part, if not the biggest part, is how one’s parental figures treat women/feminine things. Like FashionablyEvil said, it starts early. If you’re taught that “vagina” and “vulva” are Bad Words, and that menstruation is something that shouldn’t be spoken of, and so forth and so on, you will internalize that to at least some extent, and it takes work to root that out. On the flip side, having parents who call a vulva a vulva and who don’t shun talk of bodies and menstruation and such can go a long way towards mitigating the societal pressure towards that taboo.
What do you think goes into making someone a member of the latter group and how can we spread that quality around?
Despite demonstrating defiance of some gender norms, both my mom and my step-dad instilled the Vaginas Are Gross! mentality in me. (It took me two years to tell my mom I’d started menstruating because I was so embarrassed.)
I got over it in college. BIG time. Not only did I get schooled in how amazing women are through observing them, I immersed myself in the academic trappings of feminist theory. Being able to articulate how and why patriarchy operates prevented me from accepting inequality, and gave me the verbal tools to enjoy female sexuality. Unfortunately, sending the whole country to a very progressive public university in California isn’t an option.
Ironically, I think patriarchy might have a lot to do with my embracing my own anatomy and bodily functions. Even liberal universities have male and female students who are shocked–shocked!–when a woman talks about titties and vulvas and tampons and dildos. So when I talked about those things with my friends or wrote about them in the campus newspaper, I got a big reaction. It was a positive reaction, but I wouldn’t have gotten it if it were commonplace to talk about period blood. In basking in the attention I was getting for being so naughty, I began to appreciate exactly how unfairly women’s bodies are treated. Reading some Luce Irigaray helped, too.
Um. Dirty, as in “sexual”, like “dirty magazines”? If so, I think you’re right. If you’re thinking more like “defiled” or “icky”, I don’t think so.
“There’s been taboo studies that show that tampons are more taboo than toilet paper—read: menstrual blood bothers people more than shit.”
My ex-boyfriend was very, very grossed out by periods, and told me point-blank, while we were dating, that he would think it was less gross if I shat the bed while we were having sex than if I had my period while we were having sex. He meant it, too, and did not see a problem with his view.
I can’t believe I didn’t end things then and there.
Well, see, you can fuck with a penis or pee with a penis.
You can only fuck with a vagina, ergo, pussy is dirrrrty.
There was a Boston Legal episode with something along these lines. Brad Chase, the conservative ex-Marine Captain America guy, started dating one of the new clerks in the firm and was thrown when, after he asked her out, she said “and maybe after dinner, you can come back and see my vagina.” Frankly, no matter how you slice it, it’s an awkward way to make a pass at someone, but it was obviously a tempting enough offer to overlook the syntax, because he slept with her, and they dated for the rest of the episode. They broke up the next episode, because he was uncomfortable with the frequency with which she used the word “vagina.” It… was a pretty high frequency, actually.
To be honest, I’m not a fan of the word, but none of the euphemisms I know really feel right, either. “Vagina” feels too clinical for casual use, “pussy” (perhaps because of its association with immasculinity in the vernacular) feels too insultingly vulgar, and none of the others seem anything but comical. I suppose I kind of like “Vagoo,” but that sounds more like a brand name.
I heard one woman say she liked the word “muff” because it was soft and furry and a place to put your fingers to keep them warm. (Presumably not a place to put them if already cold….)
I wanna know. C’mon, tell us, please. My youngest loves that show, but I’ve always thought similar things about Brenda, although I think I just associate the silly alliterative name with porn.
I really wish you couldn’t do that on television. That slime was barfalicious. Gross.
“Dirty, as in “sexual”, like “dirty magazines”? If so, I think you’re right. If you’re thinking more like “defiled” or “icky”, I don’t think so.”
So, “dirty” suddenly means something other than “dirty” when it’s used to refer to pictures of naked women? Seems to me that, just as Amanda points out that the fact that “pure” = “virginal” speaks volumes about society, so does the fact that “naked pictures of women” = “dirty” say a lot about society as well.
re: green slime
I couldn’t ever figure out why every kid who mistakenly said “I don’t know” didn’t follow that up with “water” on purpose. Yeah, that’s the kind of kid I was.
“What is it that makes someone not fall prey to this irrational taboo of and hatred of women and femininity?”
I think in my case my mother’s undisguised disgust toward men while treating things like periods as just something you dealt with and then got on with things really leveled the grossness playing field. It’s kind of hard to get too freaked out about your vagina doing anything short of robbing a bank when the other sex is supposedly composed of unwashed plague-sufferers. Not really a technique I’d recommend for widespread use, though.
Kids usually get trained *out* of thinking slimy, gooey things are cool. Who didn’t like playing with different textures of mud puddle at one time? Or have a slight fascination with snails? Make booger jokes?
Then some adult sees them and freaks out over them touching disgusting things and getting dirty. It’s not really surprising some get conditioned to avoid messiness. Sensible people can shrug it off as an adult as they realize the only real reason they couldn’t play in the mud was because it created laundry. And that boogers are neither incredibly funny nor taboo, just mucus, like so many other things that line our body for practical reasons.
It’s more a question of why some don’t shrug off the distaste they were taught, conditioning, authoritarianism, or something else?
It always amused me that my younger brother, to this day, refuses to purchase feminine hygeine products (and isn’t that an odd phrase?) for his wife. I asked him about it once, pointing out that there can be no clearer sign of virility, in theory-the purchase is proof positive, more or less, that he lives with a fertile female. But no sale-he still maintains that it grosses him out, for some reason.
While my upbringing dictated that I believe vaginas and women’s bodies in general are disgusting and dirty, I was exposed to feminism in college and now I read blogs like this on a regular basis. I have to say that that has blown my mind on a number of different levels.
Lately I’ve been trying to use the more accurate term “vulva” when referring to external genitalia rather than “vagina.” Every time I do, I feel a little shocked. Like, whoa, I just said “vulva.” Even feminists aren’t immune from the poisonous message that women’s anatomy = unmentionable.
Slight nit-picking, or should I say, Yid(dish)-picking:
“tuckus” should be spelled “tuchus”, as the Hebrew “ch” sound is used.
In a way, that word and it’s more direct synonym disprove your theory that “dirty” words “either pass out of usage or become something that sounds a tad too explicit to use after awhile”. About 25 years ago, George Carlin (at Carnegie Hall) had a bit about how you could say on TV something like: “Well, you’ve certainly made an ass of yourself now!”, but couldn’t say: “Hey…let’s go get some ass!”
Somewhat. A large part of it is homophobia. The rest is peer pressure.
I’m 27 and I don’t ever remember anyone showering after gym class. It just wasn’t done, and I never really wanted to. It wasn’t until I was out of school and had a gym membership that I realized just how silly my aversion to the locker room shower was.
The urinal thing is a bit weird, though.
Um…I don’t know…
[SPLOOSH!]
Heh. Sorry, couldn’t resist.
Count me in the Anders camp. Why would I be grossed out by touching/licking something that gives a woman I’m with great pleasure?*
You might not want to hear this, but that rationale was formed thanks to porn, so it didn’t originate with the noblest of intentions (then again, “noble sex” doesn’t sound very appealing. When you get down to it, there’s a level of self-gratification involved in any good sex). It was something along the lines of giving a woman so much pleasure she’ll do anything for you, anywhere, anytime.
Free porn for everyone! Yay!
*On the other hand, my wife asked me the other day why I didn’t worry about fecal particulates in that area (she wipes sitting down. I pointed out that, if that were to happen, she’d be at a far greater risk of infection than I would be). It’s true that that’s a possibility, but any concern is overridden by the thought of sex.
“complex plastic surgeries are just fine, presumably because no one has to touch a nasty cunt while they do it.”
Well, unless the plastic surgeries are restructuring an ugly, big-labiaed vagina into a prepubescent-looking small-labiaed vagina. I wonder if there’s such a thing as vulva electrolysis? You know, electrically zapping the ugly pussy hairs out of your crotch? I’ve never heard of the procedure, but I’m willing to bet it’s out there.
Quite a while ago, I remember hearing someone talking about writing a tv episode in which they tried to get a character to say the word “vagina.” The censors wouldn’t allow it. The word “labia,” however, they would allow. Which is completely insane.
I have no idea how I ended up without the ‘girls–ew gross!’ thing, or why so many other men (and women!) freak out even at the mention of menstrual blood. While I would like to say it has something to do with living in close proximity to women–2 sisters and a mother, then attending a majority-women’s college–I know damn well that has nothing to do with it. Everyone out there who gets grossed out by The Vagina has a mom. Hell, some even have their own vaginas.
I grew up in a very patriarchal, sexually oppressive household where upon my puberty, my father repeatedly teased me for having hips and not quite measuring up to some unknown beauty standard.
My exposure to sex was mostly through porn mags I found discarded repeatedly outside a certain on my walks home from junior high school. I started having sex early as well as a cry for attention.
Thus, by the time I was about sixteen, I decided I was done with sexual activity for awhile and at seventeen ran off with a man twice my age. (early ’80’s) Soon after I was pregnant and the resulting feelings of entrapment and shame caused me to search out alternative information about women and their bodies and the birthing process.
I picked up a lot of feminist writing from the seventies in used book shops and flea markets and the like. That is when I began to understand that the shame I felt about my body and my inability to express my own needs and desires were inculcated in me by a system of oppression.
Also, my ex had a very childish notion of sexuality (any wonder he hooked up with a girl-woman?) which as I quickly matured, grew old and very soon highly annoying.
I made a point to bring up my children (two girls and a boy) to not have shame about their bodies.
The “Out Bodies, Ourselves” books, of which I had two different volumes were great in dispelling a lot of mythology I had absorbed about my body.
Hurray for seventies feminists writers!
I remember attending a womans circle back in the 80’s, a baby girl tucked in her crib interrupted our meeting every few minutes giggling and hollering out “vagina!” Her mother made a point that vagina would be one of her first words, and thanks to her it would engender joy and pride and parental approval. Those were the days.
I’m reminded of the Rik Mayall and Ade Edmonson stage show of Bottom. In one such show they start fantasizing about the Queen of England’s vagina and begin pantomiming a scenario about climbing in and out of ‘Her Maj’s Vag’.
Such naughty boys!
Nekouken, you beat me to it with the reference to Brad Chase and BL. It made so much sense that this extremely uptight character would have a HUGE problem with saying “vagina”, versus Alan Shore who happily rolls “lesbian, lesbian, lesbian” off his tongue during office meetings and gets everyone else to chime in.
I’ve heard vajayjay all way too often in the media, and seen it in print, as of late. Which is making me wonder (as I cannot recall) what the hell I’m reading and watching”
Anyway, if a friend ever said that… it would have to be in the most knowing way. Of course, the thing that really bothers this neurotic about words girl? “Vajayjay” is supposed to refer to the entire vulva. Which just makes want to rip out a poster and instruct people as to where the vagina is actually located.
Oh, and surprise, I don’t want to hear that word. Nope. Not. At. All.
“Vajayjay… not as gross as “juicy”, but just plain stupid”.
Well, since the character was in labor on Grey’s, a proper angle could result in looking at the vagina
It’s definitely upbringing. My husband was raised in a conservative Catholic home and has no sisters. Went to an all boys school.
Still fusses about having to buy pads, though now it’s more of a “tell me exactly what kind I have to buy or give me the old box” sort of thing.
He does it b/c I won’t baby him like his mom does. Grow up! It’s just a period! You’re the one going to the store, I need them, GO BUY THEM.
Of course, I did kind of traumatize him with a panty liner once…I forgot to take it out of my panties, and he did laundry. It burned a hole in one of his t-shirts. That has never happened to me, ever.
I still crack up b/c he sleeps in that old shirt sometimes. He was really ticked at the time, but I think it was good for him.
And way up there, my babies were NOT born in filth. Yes, they were cheesy and had amniotic fluid and some blood on them, but that didn’t stop me from wanting to hold them or putting them to my breast. They can get cleaned off later.
Entourage has jokes about the horror of “crossing swords.”
God, that would be so much funnier if they joked about not crossing the streams.
Mnemosyne nailed it:
there’s a serious problem when a doctor in a medical situation is not allowed to say “vagina” on TV. It’s a goddamned medical term, people!
besides that, it’s funny! it’s funny because it’s true! women in a guys’ workplace are going to set off the “oh-no-vagina!” alarm, if said guys that as ignorant and childish. the fact that it’s patently absurd to maintain that ignorance and childishness when it’s your *job you get paid for* to deal with women’s anatomy in real life really casts into relief the fact that we have a problem with the way we talk about our bodies, and it’s an imbalanced kind of problem.
in short, the vulva signs your checks. get over it. i think it’s actually most people’s default state to just use the right words– it takes years of conditioning and punishment to euphemize and learn to get rewarded for it.
“Women are dirty and their vaginas are dirty”
Andrea Dworkin has said it a thousand times. And even feminists today still don’t take the hint.
Jon, thank you for bringing up that Levitra ad. I have been waiting for someone to talk about its utter lack of subtly.
I saw a gynecologist once who referred to my vagina as my “hoo hoo” and then asked me to go “pee pee” in a cup. On my way to go pee pee, I walked out the front door and straight to my car.
First time I heard the word vajayjay was during a clip of Oprah shown on Talk Soup, last year sometime. I thought it was pretty stupid and annoying as hell. My ex-wife’s mom and aunts used to refer to the vagina as their “deal” and penises as “things”. Weird.
The lead singer from Tool has a side-project whose new album is apparently called “V is for Vagina”. The DJ at the radio station I listen to on the drive home makes a big deal about how he’s afraid he’d get in trouble if he said the name on-air.
What’s really a shame is that I’m not sure he’s wrong.
Spectrum Rider
That is not disgust, that is homophobia. If you look at another man’s genitals, you will either become gay, or your balls will ascend the inguinal canal and disappear, your penis will shrivel into a clitoris, and your scrotum will part like the Red Sea revealing a moist vagina.
That’s fear, not loathing. And further proof of the power of the penis.
Human:
Well, I do most of the laundry around here. I might fondle Val’s panties… OK, I sniffed them once just to see if they were clean. Honest. But now with Alison’s underwear there, it has thrown water on the whole erotic laundry experience. Now I wait for Val to wear them.
Ha. When it was my brother’s turn to fold the laundry, he used to pick up my mother’s and my clean underwear with his thumb and forefinger and fling it across the room at us. Then, he’d carry on folding the socks.
In your brother’s defense, I still do that with my brothers clean underwear. It’s UNDERWEAR belonging to my BROTHER!
And damn do I love me some Scrubs.
Word. Scrubs did definitely use the word vagina because Carla told Elliot that if she was going to be a doctor she couldn’t keep referring to it as a bajingo. The best part was at the end:
Elliott, struggling: You have a, a, p-penis. And… and I h-have a…… vagina.
Elliott’s matchingly-awkward boyfriend: That is SO hot. *commences making out*
There was a comedienne a few years back(can’t remember her name), who had a bit about being invited to appear on Oprah, and the morning of the show, she used the complimentary hand lotion in her hotel room’s bathroom, and then couldn’t open the door. So she worked it into this funny routine, where she wished she could be MacGuyver: “He could probably make a bomb out of the hand lotion and a tampon, and blow his way out.” When she ran the script by the show’s producers, she was told she couldn’t use the word “tampon” on the air. She pointed out that people constantly used the word “penis” on the show; “That’s a medical term,” was their answer. So she re-wrote the joke: “He could probably make a bomb out of the hand lotion and a penis.”–and they let her use it.
it’s been said before but i’ll say it again … My mom and dad are the reason that I can use the word vagina and not freak out … just as a religious nut can teach their kids to hate teh horrible horrible gay a DECENT parent can teach their kids to be open minded and have respect for women in general. … … oh and having a feminist friend you’re deathly afraid of helps too
DeadMan
Kids usually get trained *out* of thinking slimy, gooey things are cool. Who didn’t like playing with different textures of mud puddle at one time? Or have a slight fascination with snails? Make booger jokes?
OK, so people might be grossed out by vaginas because of the fluid they produce. But penises produce fluid too, so why the disgust with vaginas but not penises? It seems like any explanation people can come up with for vag-hating that doesn’t involve misogyny involves something that also applies to penises, and doesn’t account for why the same traits are yucky in one but not in the other.