What The "Don't Say Period" Bill Means In A Post-Roe World
For the first time on TV, the word “period” was said during a 1985 Tampax advertisement in reference to menstruation by a budding actress named Courtney Cox. At the time, it seemed as though she–and the brand–had made history. Women would no longer need to only refer to menstruation with euphemisms like “that time of the month,” “Aunt Flo,” “shark week,” “lady business,” or “on the rag.”
While today we might not give it a second thought, in 1985, it took a TV commercial for a woman to finally call her period exactly what it was–a period–both comfortably and publicly. Unfortunately, the current reality is beginning to look a little differently than what seemed like the promising future ahead of that 1985 commercial.
Even in 2023, the stigma surrounding periods doesn’t seem to be ending anytime soon. On the contrary, period stigma may be worsening (or regressing) due to blatant female health discrimination, thanks in part to newly introduced legislation. When Florida House Bill 1069 was first proposed, it made national headlines as the bill, if passed, would prohibit young girls before grade 6 from receiving formal education on their bodies.
The “Don’t Say Period” bill, a nickname given to Florida State Representative Stan McClain’s proposed legislation, is a nod to the controversial “Don’t Say Gay” bill recently signed into law by Florida Governor, Ron DeSantis. Most troubling, however, is that the “Don’t Say Period” bill is shining a spotlight on what life is becoming for girls of all ages in 2023’s post-Roe world.
What is the “Don’t Say Period” Bill?
Florida House Bill 1069 is a comprehensive guideline that dictates what schools within the state can–and cannot–teach in regards to human health and sexuality. It stems from Florida House Bill 1557, otherwise initially known as the “Parental Rights in Education” bill. This controversial piece of legislation, one strongly supported by conservatives, states: “Classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards."
The bill has received strong pushback from many who consider HB 1557 to be both homophobic and dangerous for queer youth. Opponents of the legislation quickly dubbed this the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, as it not only made classroom discussions about homosexuality illegal for this age group, but teachers were also now no longer legally allowed to ask students for their preferred pronouns. In addition, the bill provided additional guidelines, allowing parents the legal right to sue should schools or teachers not adhere to (or break) this law in any manner.
Despite protests and pleas for LGBTQIA+ equality and protection, HB 1557 was signed into effect in March 2022, with both Republican Gov. DeSantis and his supporters declaring that lessons on queer issues and lives were nothing more than “woke gender ideology.”
Exactly one year later, by March 2023, HB 1069 was read on the Florida House floor; by May, Gov. DeSantis had signed the controversial “Don’t Say Period” bill into effect. Highlights of this final draft include:
“It is false to ascribe a person a pronoun that does not correspond to such person’s sex.”
“‘Sex’ means…either male or female based on the organization of the body for a specific reproductive role.”
“a school shall…teach that biological males impregnate biological females by fertilizing the female egg with male sperm; that the female then gestates the offspring; and that these reproductive roles are binary, stable, and unchangeable.”
“Teach abstinence” and “benefits of monogamous heterosexual marriage.”
“Emphasize” abstinence to “avoid out-of-wedlock pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases, including acquired immune deficiency syndrome, and other health-related problems.”
Though the conservative intentions of this bill are clear given its repetitive insistence on abstinence, heterosexual marriage, and the prohibition of sex and gender identity conversations, many are additionally concerned with what’s not clearly defined in the bill.
While currently HB 1069 does not definitively state that young girls would be barred from learning about menstruation, the bill’s vague language leaves room for strong interpretation. In fact, when asked for clarification by Florida State Representative, Ashley Viola Gnatt, upon reading the initial draft of the bill, the bill’s proposer, Representative McClain, confirmed that girls under sixth grade would be prohibited from formally learning about menstruation. This resulted in a public outcry.
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— Florida Planned Parenthood Action (@PPactionFL) March 15, 2023
Watch Florida State Rep. @StanMcClain tell Rep. @Gantt4Florida that his bill prohibits young people from talking about their period….
WHAT?!?! pic.twitter.com/PoEgRm4sK0
Yet, in comparison to the final bill that took effect on July 1, 2023, it doesn’t seem as though Florida legislators were overly concerned with the national controversy that this bill sparked. Instead, the “Don’t Say Period” bill also included an expansion on the prohibition of sexual orientation and gender identity instruction. Students in prekindergarten through grade 8—instead of kindergarten through grade 3—would only be taught according to the guidelines above, thus virtually disallowing LGBTQIA+ youth in Florida schools.
The prohibitive bill continues, stating that all materials used for instruction in grades 9 through 12 must be approved by both the Department of Education and parents. According to the newly-enacted law, school districts must make all instructional materials available to parents, as well as provide an objection form that “must be easy to read and understand and be easily accessible on the homepage of the school district’s website.” Should a parent object to any instructional material used, this resource “must be removed within 5 school days of receipt of the objection and remain unavailable to students of that school until the objection is resolved.”
““Simply put, this language indicates that should a parent find that even just one paragraph of a 200-page health book is not suitable for their child, the entire book could be banned permanently or, at the very least, removed ‘until the objection is resolved’ for all students.””
Simply put, this language indicates that should a parent find that even just one paragraph of a 200-page health book is not suitable for their child, the entire book could be banned permanently or, at the very least, removed “until the objection is resolved” for all students.
What Sexual Education Looks Like In America’s Schools Today
The “Don’t Say Period” bill is the latest attack on America’s already ill-equipped sex and health education system, two programs that are often closely linked. Only 25 states and the District of Columbia mandate both sex and HIV education, while only 17 states require that the program content be medically accurate. Of the states and DC that mandate HIV education, only a staggering 19 of them require teaching about condoms, yet each requires abstinence education.
Florida is just one of the many states that emphasizes abstinence and the importance of sex solely within the union of marriage, requiring only that lessons on “the consequences of teenage pregnancy” be taught. However, lessons regarding periods and menstruation, important information indispensably associated with ovulation, birth control, and pregnancy prevention, are not permitted.
Regardless of state political affiliation, there seems to be a rise in the national interest to persuade teenagers to refrain from sex before marriage. While numerous studies have consistently found that abstinence-only education is ineffective, what is additionally troublesome to note is that many of the same states that mandate abstinence education also have abortion bans in place. This lack of sexual education is irresponsible–not only are these states’ youths not learning about the importance of safe sex and contraceptives, but those that do have uneducated and unprotected premarital sex do so at the increased likelihood of getting pregnant, with few resources available for termination.
Will “Don’t Say Period” Benefit Girls?
Any bill prohibiting young girls from learning basic sex or health education, including about their own menstruation cycle, can be both dangerous and cause irreparable harm. Supporters of such legislation argue that parents should decide how and when they want their children to learn about human health and sexuality. (Currently across the United States, however, 40 states and the District of Columbia require parents to be involved in sex education, HIV education, or both. Of those, 35 states and DC allow parents the option to remove their child from instruction.)
Yet in practice, what a bill such as HB 1069 may implement is a limit on just how much a child can learn about these topics in a formal setting. In a 2022 article published by the United Nations, UNFPA Executive Director, Dr. Natalia Kanem, was quoted as saying, “Because of social taboo and gender stereotypes that stigmatize menstruation as dirty, many people experience menstruation with shame and without access to the resources needed to manage their menstrual health safely.” Today’s prevalent period stigma, an issue such legislation inevitably further promotes, increases the chances that parents of menstruating girls may be uncomfortable and/or unknowledgeable when discussing menstruation with them at home.
““What happens if there is no trusted and period-educated adult in the home? A lack of such an adult can be present in any type of home; however, there is a growing concern that a trusted and period-educated presence is even less likely to be found in nontraditional homes.””
That further begs the question: What happens if there is no trusted and period-educated adult in the home? A lack of such an adult can be present in any type of home; however, there is a growing concern that a trusted and period-educated presence is even less likely to be found in nontraditional homes. Recent data collection showed that approximately 24% of all foster children in Florida were between the ages of 8 and 13 years old, while single-father families make up roughly 2.1% of all Florida households. Without the availability of education in schools, will this large group of children be as able to learn about periods as those in a traditional home?
Given the unsure nature of household health education, many now worry that this will lead to young girls seeking out information from peers, in turn putting them at risk for incorrect information, dangerous or harmful “tips,” and/or being socially shamed.
What Led to the “Don’t Say Period” bill?
It is not coincidental that such a strict bill like HB 1069 was able to be established today. This recent law was signed into effect just less than one year after the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization to overturn the precedent set in Roe v Wade, a ruling that no longer federally protected abortion access and ended almost 50 years of abortion rights. There seems to be a troubling, ongoing trend of restricting–or outright removing–the bodily autonomy of all persons, especially women, despite research and evidence coming to a very different conclusion.
The federally run Office on Women’s Health states that the average age for first menstruation is approximately 12 years old–when most students are in grade 6 or 7–but girls as young as 8 may begin menstruating. Why then would Florida officials seek to ban period education for girls prior to grade 6?
Extensive research has warned of the dangerous consequences of abortion bans, many of which have come to fruition. Within 100 days of the SCOTUS decision, 66 clinics across 15 states stopped offering abortions; 26 closed their doors permanently. A 10-year-old child sex abuse survivor was denied an abortion in Ohio just three days after the SCOTUS ruling. Why? She was just six weeks and three days pregnant, yet Ohio’s strict six-week abortion ban had taken effect almost immediately. She then traveled to Indiana–where a ban was still pending–to receive the procedure. The surgeon who performed the surgery has faced intense scrutiny since, with many Republicans pressing for prosecution.
Violence against clinics that provide abortions–as well as the women who receive them–has increased and become more blatant. A Planned Parenthood Clinic in Illinois was bombed by a man whose ex-girlfriend received an abortion that he did not support, while a Texas woman was murdered by her boyfriend immediately upon returning from Colorado after receiving an abortion. While these two crimes are being criminally prosecuted, it has become clear that many think that women who receive abortion care–and the clinics and clinicians that provide it–are deserving of fatal repercussions. So then, why would the Supreme Court vote to remove federal protection of abortion care?
Politics.
And politics correlates with American values, ideologies, and behavior. Arguably, for much of the early 2000s, politicians tended to be mindful of their rhetoric by choosing carefully selected words during their campaigns so as not to completely alienate any one specific group. However, with the start of Donald Trump’s presidency in 2016, the tides began to shift and extreme rhetoric became marketable. Radical beliefs garnered widespread public support in a way that hadn’t been seen in decades, including notions that the progression of women’s rights has–and increasingly does–lead to men’s oppression. If true, politicians, like DeSantis, thus aim to serve “insecure men,” and they do so with success.
Each state that has banned abortion at all stages of pregnancy voted for Donald Trump in both the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections, with the exception of the swing state Wisconsin, where Joe Biden narrowly won by a margin of less than 1% in 2020. These conservative states collectively voted in favor of radical anti-women beliefs in both recent elections, while the six states with the most protective pro-choice, pro-women laws voted for Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, respectively. It is clear that the decisions made on the national stage are aligning more and more with the anti-women politics seen across many states.
““In the end, it is the re-normalization of extreme conservative values–from the President to the everyday man–that is molding our reality into a modern-day Gilead.””
In the end, it is the re-normalization of extreme conservative values–from the President to the everyday man–that is molding our reality into a modern-day Gilead. With widespread abortion bans being implemented in many states and now a state period-education ban in Florida, will the trend of restrictive laws continue? Just how much longer will women and girls be allowed to be in charge of their own bodies?
