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Original poster

Ridiculous BBC article claiming disposable nappies are a tool of female liberation?!

33 replies

mcmudda · 27/04/2006 20:27

\link{http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4946942.stm\BBC article}

What could have been an excellent opportunity to promote the use of real nappies (because they're cheaper and more reliable than disposables) has been turned into bizarre rant about how washable nappies disempower women? Huh??? Angry

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Waswondering · 27/04/2006 20:29

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Original poster
mcmudda · 27/04/2006 20:31

Dh sent a comment too, but his isn't published either. He said something along the lines of it being unfair of the feminist they quoted that disposables must be a good thing just because they were invented by a woman. Most washable nappies around today are also invented by women who wanted the best possible for their babies.

That's my hubby Grin

OP posts:
juuule · 27/04/2006 20:48

I sent a comment in support of cloth nappies, too.
Also not published.

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hoxtonchick · 27/04/2006 20:50

i saw that earlier & thought it was bollocks. and i'm a disposable user....

Nightynight · 27/04/2006 21:11

Oh, what a pile of crap.
It isnt one extreme or the other. I used washable nappies for ordinary wear, and - amazing! - took a disposable with me when we went out, thus liberating myself from the drudgery of washable nappies for the day!

How amazing that the writer of this article doesnt seem to have considered the common sense scenario.

Peachyclair · 27/04/2006 21:23

I love cloth nappies and used them even with DS1 before anyone else I know

But if your eared your child in 1950, with no washing machine and had to boil them and try to dry them on wet days, perhaps for three kids coz there was no pill.... maybe I get the point?

(didn't read article though, arse lazy tonight)

PinkTulips · 27/04/2006 21:30

eeeem, haven't read the article yet but mcmudda, weren't disposable invented by a man? i've heard the several places, he was the man who started pampers. was left alone with his kids on weekend in the 60's and couldn't handle washing the nappies so decided to invent a way he didn't have to, typical male i thought!

LeahE · 27/04/2006 21:30

I've just tried a comment. Might have been a bit long though.

thewomanwhothoughtshewasahat · 27/04/2006 21:31

I thought the history bit was interesting but this is ridiculous: "Yet many mums and dads resist pressure to go washable - not because they are indifferent to the environment, but because they see disposables as a valuable invention that has freed up women's time in particular." what a load of tosh and what a thinly veiled crap link from one bit of an article to the next.

ScummyMummy · 27/04/2006 21:32

I thought it had a good point, if a bit out of date. My mother-in-law had to boil nappies on the stove for my partner after soaking them in stinky buckets for days on end- no washing machine. Now that's rank, imo. You can bet your bottom dollar she felt empowered when disposables were around for her 2nd child.

PinkTulips · 27/04/2006 21:34

'less time cleaning solied children'? why is my dd dirtier because she's in washables? [confused emoticon]

LeahE · 27/04/2006 21:37

Have definitely heard an feature on Radio 4 last year that said a woman (even named her, had a whole biographical sketch and everything) had invented them. They interviewed her son who was supposedly the world's first disposable-nappies baby.

Bet it was men who made all the money out of them though [cynical emoticon]

PinkTulips · 27/04/2006 21:43

'The modern disposable diaper was invented twice, first by Victor Mills and then by Carlyle Harmon and Billy Gene Harper.'

taken from point 3 in this article: \link{http://www.gladwell.com/2001/2001_11_26_a_diaper.htm\link}

Original poster
mcmudda · 27/04/2006 21:47

This is from the article about the woman who "invented" disposables. Spot the deliberate mistake?

"In the 1950s the American inventor Marion Donovan developed a re-useable waterproof covering for cloth nappies. Later, adapting shower curtains using her sewing machine, she created something called "the Boater" - a re-useable nappy with plastic snaps instead of safety pins.

The disposable was born."

Um.. a re-useable cloth nappy with plastic snaps sounds an awful lot like a Motherease wrap to me - How is this disposable?

OP posts:
PinkTulips · 27/04/2006 21:50

lol, unless she was chucking them and sewing up a new one each time i don't think that classes as 'disposable', and if she was it certainly doesn't sound liberating!

Original poster
mcmudda · 27/04/2006 21:53

Liked your article PinkTulips - much better informed. Very quaint how the writer just couldn't bring him/herself to write "wee" and had to opt for "insult" instead. Or is that an Americanism?

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PinkTulips · 27/04/2006 22:02

no idea but it took me a minute to figure out what the hell he was on about as pregnancy brain can't quite cope with metaphors like that!

sparklemagic · 27/04/2006 22:04

my mum did nappies in the sixties with me and she has told me that disposables are a HUGE leap forward. she spent time soaking and washing nappies by hand - alot of time...how she would have loved to stick disposables on us and chuck 'em away when used!

Obviously had she had a modern washing machine things would not have been so bad, but alot of granny's can't believe people do washables because they are thinking back to the days of no washing machine and no tumble driers etc.

UniSarah · 27/04/2006 22:05

lol at " less time cleaning soiled children" I spend more time changeing DS clothes if hes in disys than when hes in cloth. Its the disys that leak wee and squirt pooh up his back, never had that prob with his real ( and regular) nappies.

sparklemagic · 27/04/2006 22:05

aaagh! been attacked by a floating apostrophe - I meant Grannys not Granny's...

Original poster
mcmudda · 27/04/2006 22:16

sorry sparklemagic - you mean "grannies"

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Original poster
mcmudda · 27/04/2006 22:16
Wink
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PinkTulips · 27/04/2006 22:18

ditto sparkemagic, when dd was born dps mother was gushing about how lucky we were to be able to use disposables, how she used to buy them as a 'treat' when her three were little, should have seen the look on her face when i told her, no, actually we were using washable!

washables and ways of washing them have come such a long way since our mothers had babies that although at the time they were first marketed disposables were quite liberating, they no longer are.

have to say personally i find washables easier, more comfortable for dd, less likely to leak and alot less smelly. and thats before taking into account the massive ecological and monetary benefits

Original poster
mcmudda · 27/04/2006 22:27

My mum used disposables on us in the 70s and has always said she hated them. She said they were really insubstantial and always leaking. They've definitely moved on from then, but still leak and with some very sinister ingredients and they smell weird too Grin

OP posts:
Bugsy2 · 27/04/2006 22:31

My mum also thinks that disposables are a gift from God! She had a horrible old twin-tub & remembers endlessly loading & unloading & even I remember pushing the nappies through the mangle in the back garden & I'm only 37!!!
I tried washables & found that without a tumble drier I just couldn't get my totbots to dry out quickly enough. They always smelt a musty from having taken so long to dry.
I used the nature boy nature girl disposables to assuage my guilt at the waste involved.

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