Cartoon created by Lisa Leger, with photo by Λ |_ ν- Γ Ø // CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
At the 2007 conference of the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research, a presenter cited the famous satirical essay by Gloria Steinem, If Men Could Menstruate, as inspiration for ”flipping the image” to raise awareness about an issue.
Remembering this and frustrated by the marketing of cycle-stopping contraception, Lisa Leger created this spoof ad for a drug that suppresses an integral part of the male reproductive cycle.
She says,
I work in a pharmacy setting and monitor the medical journals to observe how the pharmaceutical industry markets drugs to both doctors and patients. An ad framing male ejaculation as a bothersome and icky inconvenience mirrors the way cycle-stopping contraceptives are marketed to women as a modern way to escape the hassles and mess of menstruation. By flipping the image and taking the same marketing tactics that are used toward women and using them toward men, the absurdity of suppressing a vital body function for the sake of convenience is revealed.
