Smear tests to subordinate women

[sakura]

I have been looking at the recent threads about compulsory smear tests in Poland, and I have to say, it doesn'T surprise me that they're compulsory in some countries. THis is a natural, inevitable, progression from the actual purpose of screening.

[Oh, did you think smear tests were about saving women's lives?!?!]

wildkittydear made an excellent point (I hope she doesn't mind me quoting her}
"It is shocking that Poland is thinking of making very personal medical examinations for women compulsory. I personally am very offended by the way only breast and cervical cancer are championed as the only killers of women and I know that is an exaggeration!! but do you get my drift? Some illnesses get priority in the media and I am not convinced there is always a benign reason for this."

Yes, Womanhood is the "problem" to be cured. Women's organs that are seen as faulty-- because men don't have them. Not male = pathology.

The truth is that women's bodies are much, much healthier than men's because we have two Xs in our chromozomal make up and each X contains lots of life-preserving genes, whereas the Y is slightly pitiful by comparison.
This is why women live longer and why boys are more like to be born with chromozomal abnormalities or die when they get sick. Girls tend to recover.
The extra X gives women the biological upper hand.

Men don't really know how to look after their bodies either, in a general sense (healthy diet etc)

Considering this, it's really important to question why the medical fraternity is obsessed with getting women to their tests and not men. Men are more likely to contract all sorts of diseases and cancers, and much earlier in their life than women too.

But men are trusted to look after their own bodies and decide for themselves whether they want to be screened or not. There is no goverment promoted mass-screening programme of testicular cancer, for example. BEcause testicles belong to men, and are therefore regarded as "healthy until proven otherwize"Men are not frightened, coerced or cajolled into being screened because there is no obsession with controlling them.

THe history of medicine teaches us that women, and by default their sex specific organs, are regarded as defective and pathalogical. (when if any sex is defective, it is the male sex due to the Y, which renders them biologicaly more vulnerable to disease in a number of ways)

Greer has covered this in detail in The Whole Woman. She has examined the evidence which shows that cervical screening has done nothing to save women's lives.
Women are still dying from cervical cancer. Although the rate of cervical cancer has been dropping , that is not because of screening, but because because it was actually dropping naturally before mass screening was invented, and continues to drop at the same rate.

Often mistakes are made in the laboratories, and there have been cases of women who actually had healthy cervixes being treated for cancer, and women who had cancer were missed, and ended up dying.

As I said, the point is not to actually save women's lives, but to get women to comply, to STFU and to be penetrated by gynelogical instruments.I don'T get screened, because I've looked at the statistics and found that, despite screening, women are still dying of cervical cancer so the margin for human error in the tests is too great.

Which brings me to another important question. WTF are men doing in gynecology anyway? I mean, WhyTF are they even there? In the room? Sticking bits of metal into women? Researching vaginas, when it's not their place to do so? THe funding should go to female scientists and doctors [but that's for another thread]

I haven't had a smear test for over ten years. WHen I had my first at 18 the results came back telling me I needed to go for a re-test for possible cancerous cells. I went back, had another check, the second time it came back clear (after me scaring myself to death). After doing research I learned that if you have had sperm or even your period (if you'd just finished it) can interfere with the findings, making it look as though there may be cancerous cells when there aren't.

WHat a joke. And the joke's on women. And I haven't been back since.

Thanks mamachocolate and slhillly for the informative posts.

I'm sure it is worked out along those lines, and it's good to understand them.

Sakura - Scientific proof please. Female separatist websites don't count. You get minus points if they're transphobic too. I'm not into pointless hatred.

When you talk about genetic superiority, you will sound like an eugenicist. Seriously, does anyone talk about genetic superiority for good reasons?

I also have a biracial child, do I get a cookie too?

Finally, I am a feminist so don't throw the anti-feminist card at me.

I am biracial, do I win?

Eldritch - Yes. All the cookies are yours

If you're not taking the pill (and plenty of evidence shows that non-barrier contraceptives are correlated with cervical cancer) then you are being nothing but paranoid if you go for smear tests
Unless you're a particular type of hypochondriac who gets all your organs tested for pre-cancerous cells every year.
In fact, that would be far more logical than zooming in on one random organ or body part. It's almost fetishistic, the way governments and doctors are obsessed with women's cervixes, when the risk of cancer is less than on other areas of the body.

However, if you are that paranoid about getting cancer in some random part of your body that you submit to tests, even when you present no symptoms, then wouldn't it be better to actually do something that could actually prevent the cancer in the part of your body you are so paranoid about.

Going for smear tests does not prevent cancer

Using barrier contraceptives such as condoms does

I've linked to plenty of evidence upthread proving the link between sperm and cervical cancer. THis is why women on the Pill are more likely to get cervical cancer than other women (even though the risk is still miniscule). The virus that causes cervical cancer is an STD, and so if you've never really had sex without a condom then you're highly unlikely to get cervical cancer at all.

These are the practical things a paranoid person can do to prevent cervical cancer/

A paranoid person prevents precisely nothing by going for smear tests.

The risk of cervical cancer is the same as the risk of mouth cancer.

ANd yet neither men or women (for men have mouths too) go for yearly mouth cancer check ups.

Why would that be?

THe women on this thread need to seriously think about why they don't go for check ups for the other cancers when they are just as likely to get them
As I mentioned upthread, in Wales the rate of bowel cancer is the highest in Europe. ANd yet nobody goes to regularly bowel screening. When statistically it would make more sense for both men and women to do that than for women to have cervical smears.

The risk of cervical cancer is overplayed. Statistically, the risk is very low.

I have every test offered-I am not paranoid or a hypochondriac-it just makes sense. I recently did a bowel screening one through the post. My dentist regularly screens for mouth cancer. I have mammograms. Turning them down seems madness to me.

"If you go to your smear appointments you are being paranoid and/or a hypochondriac"

What nonsense, I just enjoy a jolly good poking with a cold speculum. I can tell the doctor gets off on it too. Phwoar!

"If you're not taking the pill (and plenty of evidence shows that non-barrier contraceptives are correlated with cervical cancer) then you are being nothing but paranoid if you go for smear tests"

You are talking rubbish, in a subject you clearly know very little about. I was not taking the pill and yet was diagnosed with CIN III - seriously advanced precancerous cells, which would turn to cancer-in-situ if left undiagnosed/untreated.

Being slightly unhinged and ranting on internet forums is all well and good, but it is the slight possibility that even one woman might believe you and stop going for smear tests that bothers me.

"The risk of cervical cancer is the same as the risk of mouth cancer. ANd yet neither men or women (for men have mouths too) go for yearly mouth cancer check ups."

You have been told quite a few times on this thread that dentists do check for mouth cancer, although they don't tell you this. Yet you don't get it. Why would that be?

I think it is highly irresponsible to tell people not to have tests because the risks are small-no consolation for the person who shouldn't get it, according to paper, but does.
My dentist tells me he is checking for mouth cancer-I don't say -mind your own business! I am pleased.
When the bowel test came through the post I thought 'what a good idea'-not 'how dare they be so presumptive and obtrusive'!

OP I think you are truly insane. It's frightening and yet oddly compelling.

Of course going for smear tests doesn't prevent cancer - it's a screening test just like going to the dentist doesn't PREVENT oral cancer, but it allows the possibility of pathological changes being detected. Just like a smear test.

Using condoms isn't a priority for many women - they may be in stable monogamous relationships and prefer to use other contraception. They may be trying to conceive.

I do worry about your agenda here on this thread - you don't seem to be here to discuss, debate or deliberate the cervical screening programme, or want to discuss your opening post regarding enforced smear tests in Poland (which was an interesting debate). You seem to have an agenda to actively denigrate cervical screening with spurious reasoning and a lack of definitive evidence and I find that worrying. If even one woman decides not to attend for her smear because of what you have posted on here then you should be ashamed of yourself.

Smear test are a screening tool employed to catch cancer before it takes hold.
The political views of the OP are harming women.
As the poster above mentioned, if ONE woman reads this as gospel and is affected by her views she's responsible.

OP, there is an interesting discussion to be had about the way that society views male and female bodies, and their different functions. There is another interesting debate as to why women in Poland are being forced to have an intrusive (but useful) medical test, which is horrific.

It's a HUGE leap to assume that the patriarchy wants us legs akimbo and full of speculums to break our spirits and keep us under control. About as factual as your assertion that two X chromosomes make women essentially fitter than men.

FWIW every smear I have had has been conducted by a female nurse or GP. Without exception.

I think the Polish Govt are proposing something that amounts to a major violation of womens' rights and bodies.
All cancer screening is elective, our informed consent is legally and ethically required...it does concern me that women rarely receive balanced information on the risks and actual benefits of cancer screening. We're entitled to the truth; we all have different risk profiles. So often screening is regarded as mandatory for women or we're foolish for declining it - not so!
As a low risk woman, it was an easy decision to decline pap testing - almost 30 years ago now. Lifetime risk of cc - 0.65% (near zero for a low risk woman) - lifetime risk of referral in Australia - a whopping 77% - almost all are false positives.
Few women know that testing women under 30 is of no benefit, but produces lots of false positives and can lead to harmful over-treatment. At least the UK doesn't test before 25, which spares these young women.
It is also clear that too many pap tests are being done and that risks our health. It seems a woman could simply have a HPV test at age 30 and if negative for high risk strains of HPV and monogamous or no longer sexually active, could forget testing. At the moment this option is not given to women - it's cheaper and easier to roll all women into the screening program.
They also "assume" a woman's risk profile might change - this is paternalistic - women who test negative to high risk HPV could be advised to revisit the subject if there risk profile changes or even have another HPV test in 5 years time. (a HPV blood test is available in Australia, but kept quiet)
Continuing to pap test low risk women just exposes them to risk.
Women who test positive could be offered 3 or 5 yearly testing (and self-test kits are available) and re-test for HPV after a few years - most women eventually clear the infection.
My reference: "Cervical cancer screening" in "Australian Doctor" July 2006 by Assoc Prof Margaret Davy and Dr Shorne. (produced for doctors, not women!)

I've also rejected mammograms also on the basis of information that is not released to women - the very real risk of over-diagnosis. The UK is lucky to have some amazing advocates for informed consent for women - Prof Michael Baum, Angela Raffle ("1000 women need regular smears for 35 years to save one woman from cc" BMJ 2004) Hazel Thornton & others. Sadly, Australia has no one protecting the rights and health of women - very few women here are giving informed consent for screening - the entire emphasis is on achieving govt-set targets and our doctors even receive undisclosed target payments for pap testing - unethical as this places them in a potential conflict of interest.
Men are treated respectfully in cancer screening and informed consent matters - they get the risks and benefits and are free to make up their own minds, while women are kept in the dark and counted like sheep. Not good enough....
A great reference is Dr Joel Sherman's medical privacy forum - in the side bar of "womens' privacy concerns" you'll find some great references.
Do your reading and make informed decisions about screening - do what's right for your body and level of risk.
patientprivacy.blogspot.com/2009/05/womens-privacy-modesty-concerns.html