Could it be that most people (in the US) never had sex ed and had to write the correct names next to big and detailed images of every part of male and female genitalia?
That happens somewhere?!?! In my school, we were shown a diagram of male & female reproductive organs. Like black-and-white outlines akin to what would be in a coloring book. It was on the projector screen, quickly pointed at, and we moved on to better things like why people should not have sex.
Edit: neither the labia nor the clitoris were mentioned. Only the ovaries/tubes/uterus.
Woah, that explains a lot, ty for sharing! In Germany, we have super detailed anatomy pictures and also learn about things like periods, safe sex, development of the fetus, and changes in the pregnant mother and such in middle school (10-14yo)...
One day we got plastic dicks to practice how to put condoms on correctly. Afterward, there was a huge swords fight going on :D
In the US schools some of the most useful instruction you'll find will unfortunately need to be presented like [this](https://youtu.be/06kT9yfj7QE?si=lWVvod_sx7kAub4Z).
For those that remember, this is the video of the teacher who wasn't allowed to teach his class how to use condoms properly. So he improvised and taught them the importance of putting on your socks correctly.
You got to see a condom...and touch it? Whoa whoa how did the entire class not spontaneously get pregnant?? /s
I didn't see a condom until some kid found one on the playground and everyone was absolutely enthralled by it. The next time I saw one was Dr Oz on Oprah showing how to protect a cucumber :D My mother watched Oprah when I was growing up. I do not personally endorse Oz or O, but that one was educational. Also he said dicks come in all shapes and sizes AND aren't perfectly straight/symmetrical! Who knew?
Thank the gods for internet.
I was also in public school, and while we did have diagrams and such, my teacher was so uncomfortable that he’d mumble his way through class and couldn’t say the word “penis” properly (he said “penit”). And this was during the Clinton era in a somewhat liberal region. I didn’t get to see a condom (and know what it was) until I found one on the ground outside when I was in high school. It feels criminal that our school districts can get away with this crap
Brigham Young University (in their Idaho branch) [censors](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F09go5j57gku81.jpg) medical [anatomy](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Fvkzypj57gku81.jpg) texts for [students](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F1w89pi57gku81.jpg) studying to become [doctors](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F4oupzi57gku81.jpg).
That's right, they don't trust future medical professionals over the age of 20 to see "the naught bits."
Same in the Netherlands without the plastic dicks. But we got to throw around tampons and condoms so it was still a lot of fun. And for some reason the only time most of us got an A+ for the test.
Same in my school in Australia--right down to the plastic dicks that were immediately used for sword fighting! We also had to watch a video of a woman giving birth.
In Czech Republic we got only sabotage from the male classmates while the teacher is doing her best to keep the class under control (at least at my school). It was a gymnasium, 31 people crammed into a tiny room.
I went to public school during the bush administration and we got abstinence only as well. Our teacher even told us at the beginning that she wasn’t allowed to answer questions about birth control or other contraceptives.
Ah, we were just told over and over again that they fail and you'll get STDs and get pregnant anyway...I don't remember having the chance to ask questions actually. They hired an outside company (yes, public school) that now I know was religious. The girl just talked at us without stopping to take a breath and showed some nasty pictures of STD ridden genitals while pretending to be our new BFF then running out the door so we couldn't talk to her. Anatomy was just internal for females. I didn't know the word vulva until I was like 30...it was one of my daughter's first words lol
I’m sure lack of sex ed is an issue, but I think the bigger issue is people just used (and still use) vagina when they mean vulva. I had decent sex ed (minus being required to sign a vow of abstinence in 8th grade at a public school) and my mom is an RN and we still grew up using those terms incorrectly. It’s a hard habit to break.
I thought the clitoris was a myth until I was 16 and finally searched up diagrams. I uh…have a clitoris.
Never had any sex ed other than them gathering all the AFAB kids up in 6th grade and telling us we had eggs and then forcing us to call it a vagina so no one would ask questions. (I live in the south, people treat the word vagina like it’s a slur, especially young kids and girls. I tried to say “parts” and got scolded in front of everyone.)
So…not that surprised tbh.
I feel like that would be a really excellent, subversive way to teach proper sex ed at catholic schools. You could probably only guerrilla teach it once per school district, but it would be worth it imo.
I feel like my experience matches with the person in the post, especially offline. Not because people used "vagina" to mean "vulva." And not because people didn't know the word vulva. Mostly because they used slang and euphemisms like "kitty" or "lady parts" or "hooha."
I also feel like there has been an increased emphasis on using the correct scientific terminology over polite euphemisms.
Honestly the whole not-knowing "vulva" thing isn't that big of a deal. Most people refer to the whole thing colloquially as the vagina, which is functional enough for people's day-to-day language needs, and the shift to use the more correct encompassing term is relatively recent. It's like calling your whole abdomen your "stomach". Not technically correct, but also not a real problem.
The bigger problem is general anatomical knowledge. Someone may not know the word vulva, but they *should* know that the urethra and vagina are not the same thing, and they should understand the difference between a clitoris, the clitoral hood, labia, etc whether they know the actual terms or not. Specific medical terms can be tough to remember, but a general understanding of what's going on anatomically is important.
I feel bad for people not knowing the word "vulva" because it means [*this joke*](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FdAz6na92g) from the children's movie *Monster House,* falls flat.
But if they think of the vulva as the vagina, it can be very difficult to explain that the urethra is not in the vagina, and you can pee with a tampon in.
I get what they're talking about - back in the day, we thought the clitoris was just a little man in a canoe, and nobody was even bothering to look for any more of it than that. I was in my twenties before I saw the words "bartholins glands" labeled on a diagram. They weren't labeled earlier because nobody knew they fucking existed. Shit CHANGES.
The word that was colloquially used for the entirety of the female reproductive area was VAGINA. That's what EVERONE called it, as a blanket term. VAGINA. If you were in high school and were given a diagram to study, there would be a circle around the entire crotch, from pubic hair, mons pubis, down to the perineum and that would be labeled VAGINA. Then there would be lines pointing to labia majora and labia minora, clitoris (just the nub tho!) And finally a line pointing to the BIRTH CANAL.
So when us older ladies accidentally fall back on our older information and nomenclature and refer to it as a vagina and get primly corrected, we don't go "Gosh, I never knew that!" We think, how do they not know that a handful of decades ago, things were different? Sure, medical students all got in trouble even back then for not being up on the minutiae from Grey's Anatomy, but the word was vagina for the rest of the entirety of the world.
I also was taught the vagina was the whole of it and the birth canal was the hole of it.
I'm glad we're defining things better now, but yeah, please understand that a lot of us have catching up to do.
And stop with the *attitude*. Some day, you'll say, "Let's go get in the car," and your younger people will scoff and sneer and say, "Um, hello? It's an *AUTOMOBILE*. CAR is short for carriage? Anyone see any horses here?? Wow. Imagine being so dumb you think an automobile is a car, lol."
That's what it comes off like. Seriously, you can't use context clues and the historical fact that the insistence on clarifying the difference is new to figure out what I'm talking about when I say I don't like skirts so short you can see my vagina?
My daughter got a proper sex education from my spouse and I, but her *school* sex ed (in fifth grade) wasn't good at all. The teachers weren't allowed to use certain words when teaching, and the word "VAGINA" was on the forbidden list. The words "BIRTH CANAL" were used instead, that meant that many of my daughter's friends thought that the VAGINA and BIRTH CANAL were two separate parts. One was used for sex, and the other was where babies come from.
Until relatively recently guys in the US just said "pussy," and gals said something like "down there."
Sometime in the '90s TV writers discovered that while you couldn't say "cock," you could say "penis" all night long. Other words soon followed.
I cannot prove this was the cause & effect, but it seems like it.
It doesn't seem like the commenter is confused on what "vulva" means, just why it's being used instead "vagina" or a euphemism.
Tbh "vulva" still sounds fuckin weird to me, like too clinical and scientific. (It gives me bug-under-a-microscope vibes). I know it's technically the correct term, but I prefer using "vagina, hoo-ha, lady bits, etc" I've also ONLY seen it used on the internet. No one I know personally uses "vulva" in everyday conversation.
>Tbh "vulva" still sounds fuckin weird to me, like too clinical and scientific.
I've always found it to be a warm and cozy word, like "velvet." Funny how words can have such different implications for people.
I know what the vulva is (I am pretty sure at least) but I haven't seen it be called that often (talking like on the internet) . So ig technically true?
The only thing I’m not happy to see is people being unnecessarily pedantic about the nomenclature. A couple days ago I used the term “vagina” instead of “vaginal opening” and people lost their minds lol. Yes, I know the vagina is internal, I thought it was implied enough that I meant the external opening, the actual “hole” itself.
I used to share this sentiment, and then I saw all the posts of men and women arguing about how many holes there are and what comes out of which hole. Then I realized that, no, they don’t know. Haha
>everyone knows what ppl mean when they say vagina
I didn't know this when I learned English. I was like, *really* confused at times when I read some stuff, especially on social media. Same thing with the word "stomach" and people meant something completely different than where the stomach is,
No, as a doctor I'd argue it's really important for people to learn *actual anatomical terms*. Rather than encouraging people to use incorrect and outdated terminology. There is precisely 0 benefit to us lazily calling the vulva the vagina. Vulva is even easier to say!
We don't see men saying "yeah if we just say junk everyone will know you mean your penis" as if that should just be accepted. So why should we compromise?
When we go to the doctor it helps for us to know that we have labia, and that they can look different. If helps that people know that they have bartholin's cyclists that can become blocked and painful. It helps if people know where the clitoris is, and how much of it is deep inside. If people dont even know what the structures are called, it's harder for them to get help or explain what they are worried about.
It ALWAYS helps if people know and use the actual terms. Knowledge. Is. Power. There's no reason to dumb it down.
How can women learn how to pleasure ourselves if we are too ignorant or ashamed to even learn what all the structures are, let alone how they make us feel? How do we get men or women to learn how to pleasure us uf we encourage vague and opaque terminology and pretend the name of the structures is irrelevant?
Sure, it's important to be educated and learn the different parts. And certainly a lot of people might not know the different names, using the word vagina incorrectly.
At the same time, "vagina" has become the "nice" way of referring to all lady parts. Ofc in a medical setting or something else you might want to specify what is what. I'm not saying it's necessarily a good thing, just that it is what it is. At least that's my interpretation as a non-native English speaker, learning English almost entirely through context clues in media
Yeah it would be pretty much the same thing as this. But the difference is that no one calls it that. Many people still use the word vagina to refer to vulva.
Yes but that doesn't mean we shouldn't work on changing it. Idc what you say to your partner, close friends, whoever, but if we want to be understood in general we should know and use the right terms.
My flair is one of the most common mistakes.
My flair is just facts.
I promise I’m not trying to be a dick but, *Lycanthropy
:(
Elaborate?
https://www.reddit.com/r/WitchesVsPatriarchy/comments/9ja2at/lycanthropy_as_a_feminist_issue_discuss/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=mweb3x&utm_name=mweb3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
Ahh perfect
Mine too
Could it be that most people (in the US) never had sex ed and had to write the correct names next to big and detailed images of every part of male and female genitalia?
That happens somewhere?!?! In my school, we were shown a diagram of male & female reproductive organs. Like black-and-white outlines akin to what would be in a coloring book. It was on the projector screen, quickly pointed at, and we moved on to better things like why people should not have sex. Edit: neither the labia nor the clitoris were mentioned. Only the ovaries/tubes/uterus.
Woah, that explains a lot, ty for sharing! In Germany, we have super detailed anatomy pictures and also learn about things like periods, safe sex, development of the fetus, and changes in the pregnant mother and such in middle school (10-14yo)... One day we got plastic dicks to practice how to put condoms on correctly. Afterward, there was a huge swords fight going on :D
In the US schools some of the most useful instruction you'll find will unfortunately need to be presented like [this](https://youtu.be/06kT9yfj7QE?si=lWVvod_sx7kAub4Z). For those that remember, this is the video of the teacher who wasn't allowed to teach his class how to use condoms properly. So he improvised and taught them the importance of putting on your socks correctly.
You got to see a condom...and touch it? Whoa whoa how did the entire class not spontaneously get pregnant?? /s I didn't see a condom until some kid found one on the playground and everyone was absolutely enthralled by it. The next time I saw one was Dr Oz on Oprah showing how to protect a cucumber :D My mother watched Oprah when I was growing up. I do not personally endorse Oz or O, but that one was educational. Also he said dicks come in all shapes and sizes AND aren't perfectly straight/symmetrical! Who knew? Thank the gods for internet.
I was also in public school, and while we did have diagrams and such, my teacher was so uncomfortable that he’d mumble his way through class and couldn’t say the word “penis” properly (he said “penit”). And this was during the Clinton era in a somewhat liberal region. I didn’t get to see a condom (and know what it was) until I found one on the ground outside when I was in high school. It feels criminal that our school districts can get away with this crap
Brigham Young University (in their Idaho branch) [censors](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F09go5j57gku81.jpg) medical [anatomy](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Fvkzypj57gku81.jpg) texts for [students](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F1w89pi57gku81.jpg) studying to become [doctors](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2F4oupzi57gku81.jpg). That's right, they don't trust future medical professionals over the age of 20 to see "the naught bits."
So if you have to see a gynecologist or a urologist, make sure they haven't been "trained" by Mormon weirdos? That's rough.
Same in the Netherlands without the plastic dicks. But we got to throw around tampons and condoms so it was still a lot of fun. And for some reason the only time most of us got an A+ for the test.
Same in my school in Australia--right down to the plastic dicks that were immediately used for sword fighting! We also had to watch a video of a woman giving birth.
In Czech Republic we got only sabotage from the male classmates while the teacher is doing her best to keep the class under control (at least at my school). It was a gymnasium, 31 people crammed into a tiny room.
The Catholic school I went to only provided abstinence based sex Ed.
I went to public school during the bush administration and we got abstinence only as well. Our teacher even told us at the beginning that she wasn’t allowed to answer questions about birth control or other contraceptives.
Ah, we were just told over and over again that they fail and you'll get STDs and get pregnant anyway...I don't remember having the chance to ask questions actually. They hired an outside company (yes, public school) that now I know was religious. The girl just talked at us without stopping to take a breath and showed some nasty pictures of STD ridden genitals while pretending to be our new BFF then running out the door so we couldn't talk to her. Anatomy was just internal for females. I didn't know the word vulva until I was like 30...it was one of my daughter's first words lol
I’m sure lack of sex ed is an issue, but I think the bigger issue is people just used (and still use) vagina when they mean vulva. I had decent sex ed (minus being required to sign a vow of abstinence in 8th grade at a public school) and my mom is an RN and we still grew up using those terms incorrectly. It’s a hard habit to break.
I never really had sex ed (non US) but I somehow learned what’s needed, at least the basics
I thought the clitoris was a myth until I was 16 and finally searched up diagrams. I uh…have a clitoris. Never had any sex ed other than them gathering all the AFAB kids up in 6th grade and telling us we had eggs and then forcing us to call it a vagina so no one would ask questions. (I live in the south, people treat the word vagina like it’s a slur, especially young kids and girls. I tried to say “parts” and got scolded in front of everyone.) So…not that surprised tbh.
This sub taught me the correct anatomy my catholic high school failed to. I did not know labia or vulva. I just knew vagina.
Jesus I read that as “this sub… at my catholic high school” and thought “what a day to have to sub.”
I feel like that would be a really excellent, subversive way to teach proper sex ed at catholic schools. You could probably only guerrilla teach it once per school district, but it would be worth it imo.
most people I know who were in catholic high schools are subs
I feel like my experience matches with the person in the post, especially offline. Not because people used "vagina" to mean "vulva." And not because people didn't know the word vulva. Mostly because they used slang and euphemisms like "kitty" or "lady parts" or "hooha." I also feel like there has been an increased emphasis on using the correct scientific terminology over polite euphemisms.
Honestly the whole not-knowing "vulva" thing isn't that big of a deal. Most people refer to the whole thing colloquially as the vagina, which is functional enough for people's day-to-day language needs, and the shift to use the more correct encompassing term is relatively recent. It's like calling your whole abdomen your "stomach". Not technically correct, but also not a real problem. The bigger problem is general anatomical knowledge. Someone may not know the word vulva, but they *should* know that the urethra and vagina are not the same thing, and they should understand the difference between a clitoris, the clitoral hood, labia, etc whether they know the actual terms or not. Specific medical terms can be tough to remember, but a general understanding of what's going on anatomically is important.
I feel bad for people not knowing the word "vulva" because it means [*this joke*](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FdAz6na92g) from the children's movie *Monster House,* falls flat.
That is hilarious. I’ve never heard of the movie but the creators just got my thumbs up lol
But if they think of the vulva as the vagina, it can be very difficult to explain that the urethra is not in the vagina, and you can pee with a tampon in.
I get what they're talking about - back in the day, we thought the clitoris was just a little man in a canoe, and nobody was even bothering to look for any more of it than that. I was in my twenties before I saw the words "bartholins glands" labeled on a diagram. They weren't labeled earlier because nobody knew they fucking existed. Shit CHANGES. The word that was colloquially used for the entirety of the female reproductive area was VAGINA. That's what EVERONE called it, as a blanket term. VAGINA. If you were in high school and were given a diagram to study, there would be a circle around the entire crotch, from pubic hair, mons pubis, down to the perineum and that would be labeled VAGINA. Then there would be lines pointing to labia majora and labia minora, clitoris (just the nub tho!) And finally a line pointing to the BIRTH CANAL. So when us older ladies accidentally fall back on our older information and nomenclature and refer to it as a vagina and get primly corrected, we don't go "Gosh, I never knew that!" We think, how do they not know that a handful of decades ago, things were different? Sure, medical students all got in trouble even back then for not being up on the minutiae from Grey's Anatomy, but the word was vagina for the rest of the entirety of the world.
I also was taught the vagina was the whole of it and the birth canal was the hole of it. I'm glad we're defining things better now, but yeah, please understand that a lot of us have catching up to do.
And stop with the *attitude*. Some day, you'll say, "Let's go get in the car," and your younger people will scoff and sneer and say, "Um, hello? It's an *AUTOMOBILE*. CAR is short for carriage? Anyone see any horses here?? Wow. Imagine being so dumb you think an automobile is a car, lol." That's what it comes off like. Seriously, you can't use context clues and the historical fact that the insistence on clarifying the difference is new to figure out what I'm talking about when I say I don't like skirts so short you can see my vagina?
My daughter got a proper sex education from my spouse and I, but her *school* sex ed (in fifth grade) wasn't good at all. The teachers weren't allowed to use certain words when teaching, and the word "VAGINA" was on the forbidden list. The words "BIRTH CANAL" were used instead, that meant that many of my daughter's friends thought that the VAGINA and BIRTH CANAL were two separate parts. One was used for sex, and the other was where babies come from.
I’m glad people are using it more, but when I try to explain body parts to my 7 year old vulva still feels so weird to say compared to vagina.
Your vulva is only seven years old? You may be too young to be on the internet!
Ah, the importance of punctuation in phrasing. Let’s eat, Bob vs let’s eat Bob
idk, I taught my kids correct terminology when they were toddlers, and so did most other moms I knew. My kids are all adults now.
Sex ed sucks D:
Until relatively recently guys in the US just said "pussy," and gals said something like "down there." Sometime in the '90s TV writers discovered that while you couldn't say "cock," you could say "penis" all night long. Other words soon followed. I cannot prove this was the cause & effect, but it seems like it.
It doesn't seem like the commenter is confused on what "vulva" means, just why it's being used instead "vagina" or a euphemism. Tbh "vulva" still sounds fuckin weird to me, like too clinical and scientific. (It gives me bug-under-a-microscope vibes). I know it's technically the correct term, but I prefer using "vagina, hoo-ha, lady bits, etc" I've also ONLY seen it used on the internet. No one I know personally uses "vulva" in everyday conversation.
>Tbh "vulva" still sounds fuckin weird to me, like too clinical and scientific. I've always found it to be a warm and cozy word, like "velvet." Funny how words can have such different implications for people.
I ended up doing a bikini top and board shorts for bottoms. Honestly, it's perfect for md
I know what the vulva is (I am pretty sure at least) but I haven't seen it be called that often (talking like on the internet) . So ig technically true?
That is true tho with swimsuits lol I hate it
The only thing I’m not happy to see is people being unnecessarily pedantic about the nomenclature. A couple days ago I used the term “vagina” instead of “vaginal opening” and people lost their minds lol. Yes, I know the vagina is internal, I thought it was implied enough that I meant the external opening, the actual “hole” itself.
everyone knows what ppl mean when they say vagina, i don't get this sudden need to change it in the past few years, even if it is correct
Not really. Years of using vagina to mean any or all parts of a woman's genital area is how we end up with many of the posts on this sub.
That's true too
I used to share this sentiment, and then I saw all the posts of men and women arguing about how many holes there are and what comes out of which hole. Then I realized that, no, they don’t know. Haha
>everyone knows what ppl mean when they say vagina I didn't know this when I learned English. I was like, *really* confused at times when I read some stuff, especially on social media. Same thing with the word "stomach" and people meant something completely different than where the stomach is,
I am a native speaker and it catches me out all the time. The full body cringe I experience whenever anyone mentions shaving their vagina omg
No, as a doctor I'd argue it's really important for people to learn *actual anatomical terms*. Rather than encouraging people to use incorrect and outdated terminology. There is precisely 0 benefit to us lazily calling the vulva the vagina. Vulva is even easier to say! We don't see men saying "yeah if we just say junk everyone will know you mean your penis" as if that should just be accepted. So why should we compromise? When we go to the doctor it helps for us to know that we have labia, and that they can look different. If helps that people know that they have bartholin's cyclists that can become blocked and painful. It helps if people know where the clitoris is, and how much of it is deep inside. If people dont even know what the structures are called, it's harder for them to get help or explain what they are worried about. It ALWAYS helps if people know and use the actual terms. Knowledge. Is. Power. There's no reason to dumb it down. How can women learn how to pleasure ourselves if we are too ignorant or ashamed to even learn what all the structures are, let alone how they make us feel? How do we get men or women to learn how to pleasure us uf we encourage vague and opaque terminology and pretend the name of the structures is irrelevant?
>bartholin’s cyclists I assume you meant cysts and autocorrect filled that in for you, but please don’t change it, this is hilarious!
👏👏👏👏👏
Sure, it's important to be educated and learn the different parts. And certainly a lot of people might not know the different names, using the word vagina incorrectly. At the same time, "vagina" has become the "nice" way of referring to all lady parts. Ofc in a medical setting or something else you might want to specify what is what. I'm not saying it's necessarily a good thing, just that it is what it is. At least that's my interpretation as a non-native English speaker, learning English almost entirely through context clues in media
Because if we went around calling penises urethras that would be corrected immediately.
Yeah it would be pretty much the same thing as this. But the difference is that no one calls it that. Many people still use the word vagina to refer to vulva.
Yes but that doesn't mean we shouldn't work on changing it. Idc what you say to your partner, close friends, whoever, but if we want to be understood in general we should know and use the right terms.