Editor’s Letter
On October 29, obstetrician and gynecologist Jen Gunter spoke at The Walrus Talks in Toronto on the theme “Living Better.” Gunter’s seven-minute speech addressed misconceptions about the medical purpose of the hymen, which is culturally associated with virginity — but it also explored the role of cultural politics in spreading misinformation about women’s health. The following week, a US rapper named T.I. made waves for revealing on a podcast that he shepherds his eighteenyear-old daughter to a gynecologist for annual “hymen checks.” Gunter tweeted her rebuttal, which included the fact that human hymens (like those of elephants, cats, and dogs) exist for hygienic reasons, and the subsequent discussion went viral. (Gunter’s talk, along with hundreds of others, can be viewed on The Walrus Youtube channel.)
Weighing in on public debates about women’s health has become relatively routine for Gunter (often unofficially called “Twitter’s resident gynecologist”), who writes for the New York Times and has a bestselling new book out, The Vagina Bible. The same day she spoke at The Walrus Talks, Gunter addressed the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management about how opportunists can exploit gaps in health information to feed the growing “wellness industrial complex.”
“The fault with medicine is that we didn’t make it available [for patients] to have the conversation with us,” she said, referring to conventional medicine’s tradition of dismissing women’s complaints — making way for entrepreneurs to step in with alternative solutions, as evidenced by the plethora of social-media influencers and health websites sponsored by wellness companies and lifestylecum-wellness brands such as Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop. It’s become hard to separate fact from what someone’s trying to sell you, and the task for wellness-seekers, said Gunter, is to question where their advice is coming from: “Why would you get your health information from a wellness company that’s selling you a supplement?”
As Lauren Mckeon reports in this issue, the thin line between health information, consumerism, and popular culture poses a real challenge for anyone navigating the now $4.2 trillion (US, as estimated by the Global Wellness Institute) wellness market, including the fast-growing cannabis niche. This spring, a deluge of new pot-themed lifestyleand-wellness products will hit the market, a significant proportion of them aimed at women. Mckeon’s cover story, “New Highs,” explores the range of products on offer — from luxury rolling papers to crystal pipes — and illustrates the challenge of remaining skeptical when faced with such attractive answers to insomnia, overwork, and, well, modern life.
Several writers in this issue address the intersection of health and technology. In “Hacking Diabetes,” Jonathan Garfinkel explains how his experience living with the disease for decades led him to explore nascent but potentially life-changing hacks. In “All I Need Is Youtube,” Michael Harris, who is becoming our resident loneliness expert, writes about how the digital era fosters superficial attachments — even as the intimacies offered by strangers on Youtube and Tinder promise to banish isolation forever. Meanwhile, in “In Deep,” Hilary Beaumont dives into the reasons behind the ongoing water crises affecting many First Nations communities — in this case, it’s a systemic failure to apply the solutions and technology we already have that is jeopardizing public health.
What emerges from the stories and conversations that make up this issue is a sense of how vulnerable we all feel — not just in the face of threats to our physical health but in our generalquality of life, on that razor’s edge between feeling “balanced” and out of control. It seems the road to wellness has never been easy, but it’s obvious that the current landscape, which offers us the opportunity to be patient, doctor, and consumer all at once, can feel overwhelming. One of the factors that separates poor and good health, a life well lived and a life left wanting, is access to reliable information. In this season of New Year’s resolutions, we hope these stories provide some perspective for your own transformations.
—Jessica Johnson