BUZZ
Campus health office still calls women ‘menstruators’
Men won’t find free menstrual products in their bathrooms anymore at the University of Kansas, the student newspaper reported this week.
The change comes shortly after Kansas enacted a new law that, among other things, prohibits men from using women’s bathrooms in public buildings and vice versa.
The free feminine hygiene products, provided through the university’s PERIOD Project, disappeared from the men’s bathrooms sometime after Sept. 8, but campus officials are not saying why, according to The Daily Kansan.
Jenny McKee with the campus Health Education Resource Office confirmed the change in an email to the student newspaper. She said the products still will be available in the women’s bathrooms.
“This fall as the school year began, we evaluated the project — as is common with many campus programs — and made adjustments,” McKee said.
University spokesperson Erinn Barcomb-Peterson denied that the change is linked to the new law when contacted by the Kansan.
The student newspaper described the law as “restrict[ing] transgender people from using a gender-designated bathroom that conflicts with their assigned sex at birth”:
KU Law Lecturer Mark Johnson confirmed that placing period products in men’s restrooms is not prohibited under this law. Johnson believes the PERIOD Project’s initiatives were an “unintended consequence” of the bill.
“It’s certainly legal,” Johnson said. “It’s probably one of those things that they didn’t think about.”
Anti-SB 244 sentiments have manifested on campus since the bill passed. One example is flyers in Haworth Hall, attributed to TNET, Transgender/Nonbinary Education & Training.
The bathroom signs ask viewers to not question the identities of others and to allow bathrooms to be a safe space.
“Because people who menstruate also use the men’s restroom, they also need equitable access to those products,” said TNET co-owner, Daisy Fatemi.
Fatemi said having menstrual products in men’s restrooms is “a way of showing support that is very tangible and very helpful to trans folks, not just socially but also practically.”
The university’s Health Education Resource Office runs the free menstrual product program. The service began in 2019, but it is not clear when the university began putting feminine hygiene products in men’s bathrooms as well as women’s.
The program webpage uses the term “menstruators,” not women.
“A national survey commissioned by Free The Tampons in 2013 revealed that 86% of menstruators (ages 18-54) started their period unexpectedly in public without the supplies they need,” it states.
“In order to create a more equitable learning environment and negate the potential for menstruation to interrupt learning, working and living authentically, there are free menstrual supplies in the following buildings and restrooms across campus,” the webpage states, followed by a list of locations.
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