The internet is seriously upset about this man’s reaction to a tampon drawing
The ‘tampon guy’ has had his say, and no one’s happy about it
Great news – the tampon tax has been abolished! Bad news – there’s already been massive uproar on Twitter about one man’s response.
It was the first day of a brand new year (good riddance 2020), and the government announced that it would no longer be taxing tampons and other sanitary products. *Pause to appreciate this moment of pure joy for women and menstruating people everywhere.*
Previously, EU law required members to put a five per cent minimum VAT rate on these products, but now that the UK is no longer subject to EU rules on sanitary products, this “sexist tax” is being done away with for good.
Almost all Twitter users will have seen HM Treasury’s tweet announcing the end to the tax on the first day of the year, not because of the tweet itself, but because of this viral reply from radio host Adam Garrie, calling the illustration on the tweet “obscene”:
If you think that’s bizarre you’re not alone. Twitter users have not stopped rinsing this man on Twitter. Adam quickly defended his position with a series of Tweets explaining that he finds the “curvature” on the image somewhat too suggestive:
Sadly for Adam, this only intensified the backlash. People are coming up with new and exciting ways to let the man know that they’re angry, concerned, and honestly just confused. Here are some of the best clapbacks to queen of “obscene”, Mr. Adam Garrie:
1. Twitter has affectionately crowned him the ‘tampon guy’
Despite Adam’s resistance to the image of a tampon, he’ll likely be seeing the word everywhere he turns from now on. Twitter users are exclusively referring to Garrie as “tampon guy” or “tampon man”.
2. ‘I fixed it for you’
There has been no shortage of people jumping on the opportunity to help Adam out by editing to make the image look a bit easier on the eye. Hopefully he won’t think these are too “suggestive”:
3. Tampon pictures EVERYWHERE
Of course, a knee-jerk reaction has been to shower the man with tampons, tampons and more tampons:
4. It’s literally just a drawing…
What confused most people was the fact that the image in question wasn’t a bloody tampon or even a photo of a clean one. It was a pretty standard illustration. Many people took it upon themselves to make sure Adam realised this:
5. Yeah, what about toilet paper?!?
People have been quick to point out that if Adam is offended by the suggestion of “bodily fluids”, then there must be a range of other products he’s not okay with, toilet paper being one. Does loo roll upset Adam? The people are dying to know:
6. Some men are apologising on Adam’s behalf
You know it’s bad when you start seeing tweets “on behalf of men everywhere”:
7. Women have just had enough
On a serious note now, Adam’s tweets have meant a lot of women and menstruating people are sharing upsetting stories about their experience with periods, and how much they’ve been made to feel ashamed and uncomfortable with their own bodies, because of the way men react to menstrual products, period blood, or menstruation as a whole being brought into conversations.
These stories are all too relatable and show that society really needs to fix up and destigmatise the conversation about periods. Here are just a few stories that people shared:
Many are raising concerns and even joking about the fact men simply don’t understand as much about period products as they should:
This callback to a brilliant TikTok by @christaallen is a personal fave:
So while all these tweets have been funny, cheeky and unashamedly beefy, they’ve also got a lot to say about how much work needs to be done to reverse the stigma and eradicate taboos around periods. I’ll leave you with a tweet from BBC journalist Emma Barnett, who also said her piece when the whole internet drama kicked off:
As we’re not even a full week into 2021, let’s hope we’ll all have better things to be doing by the end of the year than getting wound up by the government’s tweets.
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