OU organizations are working to provide menstruation products so that low-income women in the Norman community can have the resource available to them for free and easy access to feminine hygiene products.
“It starts as young as elementary school, when they teach you you’re going to have a period you’re separated from the boys so it starts really young and it means that there’s a lack of education in the law makers,” Women and Gender Studies Center for Social Justice Program Coordinator Megan Smith said.
On the first floor of Robertson hall, the Center for Social Justice not only has free pads and tampons available, but also has food, condoms and all kinds of different hygiene products.
“We have people from all different walks of life, we have a food pantry and we like to feed people,” Smith said. “You’re stressed out with all of these things every single day you shouldn’t also have to worry about where your next meal is gonna come from or how you’re gonna stop from bleeding through your pants during a presentation.”
An OU organization started by women of color called the Revolutionary Baddies is rumored to be hosting a fundraiser that will provide a local Norman women’s shelter with menstruation products.
“Menstruation is a completely natural and normal thing that happens to women but is treated as if it isn’t and is taxed as such and is taxed as something that isn’t essential for women,” OU Women and Gender Studies graduate Latrecia Breath said.
The tax on women’s menstrual products is considered a luxury tax rather than a necessity, which has left many low-income women searching for affordable resources.
“Revolutionary Baddies is gonna put together a fundraiser to get a bunch of menstruation products or feminine hygiene products for people who may not be able to access any feminine hygiene products because of how expensive and inaccessible that they are,” Breath said. “This fundraiser is gonna be an art show that highlights menstruation and womanhood through art and probably poetry and other mediums as well.”
The Revolutionary Baddies fundraiser is rumored to happen this spring.
