Between tampons/pads, bras, thinner/less quality clothing for as much or more $$$, and socially pressured skincare/makeup/hair product, the overall cost I would guess would be equivalent or more than the nutrition for a few hundred calories per day. There are a lot of factors forcing or pressuring women to spend more money or recieve social reprimand, lowered job prospects, etc. (As in the article! Keeping girls in school!)

Men also get pressured in other ways, but very rarely are they directly monetary/consumptive the way women are in my opinion.

If you've grown up with the pressure you don't notice it because it's there all the time. It's just normal. It's really easy to say "look how much the other gender caves to societal pressure" because you don't notice it when you do it.

How much more is a man making in salary compared to a woman doing the same job? In any country? You can't compare the small ammount of less food needed in calories compared to the large difference in salary for a man, the extra food does not warrant the difference.

You as a man can choose not to east as much as you need. You grow a bit less and need less food. A woman can't choose not to leave the house 5 days per month if she want's to keep a job. Yes, we can keep arguing over this but I though we were done with this already 50 years ago. I'm a bit surpriced to see it to be honest. We talked about this in school when I was 12, 30+ years ago. (Sweden)

Last year one county here started with free menstruation protection for 12-23 year olds [0] (swedish...) Apparently Scotland was first in the world 2017 [1]

[0] https://www.svt.se/nyheter/lokalt/stockholm/gratis-mensskydd...

[1] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/scotland-fir...