Plastic Surgery or Genital Mutilation?

[Selena_Kitt]

West Accused of Double Standards in Female Circumcision

 

[CrimsonMaiden]

I don't see how a comparison can be made between the removal of a clitoris and surgeries done for adult, consenting women to enhance their self-image or feelings of sexual pleasure.

 

[minsue]

I don't see how a comparison can be made between the removal of a clitoris and surgeries done for adult, consenting women to enhance their self-image or feelings of sexual pleasure.

Ditto.

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

It's a silly comparison. I am strongly to either form of circumcision, and refuse to compare it to elective plastic surgery.

 

[Stella_Omega]

West Accused of Double Standards in Female Circumcision

The media has trained Western society to ignore subtleties in favor of BLACK and WHITE.

 

[minsue]

The media has trained Western society to ignore subtleties in favor of BLACK and WHITE.

You mean there's something in between?

 

[3113]

I don't think any woman should be pressured or shamed into changing her looks by any culture. But it's nonsense to compare adult women making a cosmetic decision to the mutilation of little girls because of cultural/religious beliefs or pressures on the parents. Especially procedures that can lead to terrible results including infection, death, horrific pain and complications during childbirth, etc.

If, at adulthood, a woman freely wants to mutalate herself for her own reasons--cosmetic or religious--that's her business. But let's let children's genitlia alone. Honestly. Let's leave it alone unless it's going to cause them severe problems urinating or something else. Leave it alone and let them decide what they want and need once they are old enough to make such a decision.

And my opinion on this goes for male circumcision as much as for female.

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

I don't think any woman should be pressured or shamed into changing her looks by any culture. But it's nonsense to compare adult women making a cosmetic decision to the mutilation of little girls because of cultural/religious beliefs or pressures on the parents. Especially procedures that can lead to terrible results including infection, death, horrific pain and complications during childbirth, etc.

If, at adulthood, a woman freely wants to mutalate herself for her own reasons--cosmetic or religious--that's her business. But let's let children's genitlia alone. Honestly. Let's leave it alone unless it's going to cause them severe problems urinating or something else. Leave it alone and let them decide what they want and need once they are old enough to make such a decision.

And my opinion on this goes for male circumcision as much as for female.

Precisely.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

Two things stood out to me:

The World Health Organisation defines female genital mutilation as: "All procedures involving partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs whether for cultural, religious or other non-therapeutic reasons."

Couldn't plastic surgery be seen as therapuetic??

Mr Conroy writes: "It is Western medicine which, by a process of disease mongering, is driving the advance of female genital mutilation by promoting the fear in women that what is natural biological variation is a defect."

he picks up an interesting point here, but I think he runs a bit too far with it... the vaginal changes that occur after childbirth *are* a natural biological variation... and every woman is different... it's probably no different than any body image issue... women often look at the ideal and want to embody it, and if they can afford to pay for it, why not? But then, what message does that send...?

But I agree, he takes his analogy a *little* too far here...

 

[CharleyH]

I don't see how a comparison can be made between the removal of a clitoris and surgeries done for adult, consenting women to enhance their self-image or feelings of sexual pleasure.

Agree - mostly. I am not exactly of the mind to understand them, but choice is choice and has nothing to do with the other, except in a more symbolic way to the woman's personal pressures and needs of wanting this particular type of surgery - which is a good discussion.

Long have we argued the difference between physical and emotional abuse and societal pressure, and long will we continue these arguments - thank the powers that be.

But, if my husband wants a virgin, like he wanted my big tits? Well damn - I can give it now! Too bad I can't get a bigger penis and molded to my specifications thru cosmetics out of him, though.

 

[minsue]

Agree - mostly. I am not exactly of the mind to understand them, but choice is choice and has nothing to do with the other, except in a more symbolic way to the woman's personal pressures and needs of wanting this particular type of surgery - which is a good discussion.

Long have we argued the difference between physical and emotional abuse and societal pressure, and long will we continue these arguments - thank the powers that be.

But, if my husband wants a virgin, like he wanted my big tits? Well damn - I can give it now! Too bad I can't get a bigger penis and molded to my specifications thru cosmetics out of him, though.

After my sister in law gave birth, the doctor stiching up her episiotomy offered to my brother to put some extra stiches in to make her "nice and tight" for him. He damn near decked the guy. What I do wish he had done is REPORT the bastard. God only knows how many men took him up on the offer.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

After my sister in law gave birth, the doctor stiching up her episiotomy offered to my brother to put some extra stiches in to make her "nice and tight" for him. He damn near decked the guy. What I do wish he had done is REPORT the bastard. God only knows how many men took him up on the offer.

This causes VERY SERIOUS problems later on, if it's actually performed...

and this is actually a common thing for docs to say and joke about... more common than you'd expect, even nowadays...

as a doula, I report 'em... every time...

 

[CrimsonMaiden]

This causes VERY SERIOUS problems later on, if it's actually performed...

and this is actually a common thing for docs to say and joke about... more common than you'd expect, even nowadays...

as a doula, I report 'em... every time...

I guess I'm lucky that the only time I got stitched, I had a female doctor. That's just awful.

 

[minsue]

This causes VERY SERIOUS problems later on, if it's actually performed...

and this is actually a common thing for docs to say and joke about... more common than you'd expect, even nowadays...

as a doula, I report 'em... every time...

I'm glad you do. I was furious when he told me that.

 

[CharleyH]

After my sister in law gave birth, the doctor stiching up her episiotomy offered to my brother to put some extra stiches in to make her "nice and tight" for him. He damn near decked the guy. What I do wish he had done is REPORT the bastard. God only knows how many men took him up on the offer.

Yes - we are all still chattels.

 

[SEVERUSMAX]

This causes VERY SERIOUS problems later on, if it's actually performed...

and this is actually a common thing for docs to say and joke about... more common than you'd expect, even nowadays...

as a doula, I report 'em... every time...

That's good. Someone needs to report that. It's one thing when they opt for it. It's another when they are stuck with it.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

Female circumcision is mutilation. Abuse. Torture! It can kill a girl - and if it doesn't, it can seriously threaten her health for the rest of her life, not to mention the pain and discomfort she suffers.

Plastic surgery is an extreme form of cosmetic, and even though I think women are being brainwashed by society and media how their bodies should look and feel, to the extent where they actually feel that their own bodies are UNNATURAL because they don't fit the made-up image of what a woman's body SHOULD be like... I still must agree, the women who ask to have their vaginas tightened up and "re-juvenated", are grown-up women, in the legal sense atleast, and comparing plastic surgery with female circumcision is just an excuse to avoid discussing the REAL topic, which is the mutilation of female sexual organs.

 

[mack_the_knife]

I think the real topic should be how ridiculously influenced many people are by the various media outlets, not any one of the hundreds of bizarre things it drives people to do in order to try to match up to the hyped vogue du-jour. Of course, don't expect major media outlets to give the topic much true analysis.

 

[MagicaPractica]

As others have said, the female circumcision does not remotely compare to elective cosmetic surgery, which I"m not huge on either. The first person account I read by the famous model (can't recall her name at the moment) whose mother was pressured into letting this be done to her as a preteen girl said that it was done by something like a medicine woman of the tribe with, I believe, a stone knife. There is no modern anasthesia etc and often leaves a girl in horrible pain for the rest of her life. It''s no small matter either that it basically destroys her ability to enjoy sex.

 

[Svenskaflicka]

As others have said, the female circumcision does not remotely compare to elective cosmetic surgery, which I"m not huge on either. The first person account I read by the famous model (can't recall her name at the moment) whose mother was pressured into letting this be done to her as a preteen girl said that it was done by something like a medicine woman of the tribe with, I believe, a stone knife. There is no modern anasthesia etc and often leaves a girl in horrible pain for the rest of her life. It''s no small matter either that it basically destroys her ability to enjoy sex.

Waris Dirie. And I think it was a piece of sharp glass, wasn't it?

 

[MagicaPractica]

Here is a good explanation of FGM. Not sure about the glass, you're probably right. I just know that this is wrong in capital letters with flashing neon lights, and I'm one of those who usually considers things in shades of grey.

http://www.pbs.org/speaktruthtopower/issue_female.html

 

[RapeMask]

i think the key to this blokes argument lies in the following, and i for one dont have the resources to discredit him:


'The World Health Organisation defines female genital mutilation as: "All procedures involving partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs whether for cultural, religious or other non-therapeutic reasons."

Mr Conroy writes: "It is Western medicine which, by a process of disease mongering, is driving the advance of female genital mutilation by promoting the fear in women that what is natural biological variation is a defect."

There was an assumption by Western critics that in the developing world the practice was forced on young girls. In fact, it was often welcomed as the mark of entry into adulthood and they were proud of it, he said. "The high moral tone with which those in richer countries criticise female genital mutilation would be more credible if we in the North had not practised and did not continue to practise it," he added.'

firstly, id wonder how the 'world health organisation' got its definition of genital mutilation together. by this definition, whether there is consent or not the plastic surgery case is a genital mutilation. this would allow the doctor to describe it as such. it may be that the definition should be changed to allow for a distinction between a case where it is forced on someone and a case where it is consensual, but what would be the rest of the worlds take on this redefinition? how does the world health organisation come by its terminology and who is involved in its production?

secondly, there is this idea that it isnt forced on young girls and that it is fully understood and welcomed as a coming of age. this has always made perfect sense to me that it would be understood like that. in a sense, i would say that the way that the west produces complexes about our bodies and then offers up plastic surgery to make it right is a far worse practise in that there is a sort of emotional terrorism that governs the choice and the consent. as the doc says western medicine is producing the idea in women that natural biological variation is instead a defect which can be cured. such an interpretation could only come from a society where such a 'cure' has been developed - it is in a sense the existance of plastic surgery and its availability as an option that produces the discourse that says a stretched vagina is a damaged one. other social technologies of the west are already very keen to damage the self-image of women (and on a growing scale men) in other ways to illicit this sort of consent.

id say the doc has a point, but id reverse it. id say leave other countries and their practices alone and start thinking a little more critically about your own social short comings.

West Accused of Double Standards in Female Circumcision

 

[3113]

There was an assumption by Western critics that in the developing world the practice was forced on young girls. In fact, it was often welcomed as the mark of entry into adulthood and they were proud of it, he said.

Too many stories from women who'd gone through this have a very different point of view. There are stories of girls who run away from their tibes so that they can avoid this terrible proceedure. If they're captured and brought back, it's forced on them. Somehow, that doesn't sound like women "welcoming" it as a mark of adulthood.

And many women who do go through it voluntarily later confess that they didn't know what what going to happen because they're not sexually educated about their own bodies. It's difficult to say that a woman welcomes a mark of adulthood if she's ignorant about her own genitalia.

That is one point in favor of the cosmetic surgery. At least the doctors tell the women exactly what's going ot be done and what the likely results and side-effects will be. Hell! If a woman gets her clit pierced she gets a lecture from the licensed piercer on what's going to happen and what possible problems and side-effects there will be.

I think this fellow is protesting too much. It's really pretty hard to say that women "welcome" what they (1) feel forced to do thanks to cultural and religious pressures, (2) feel forced to do because the patriarchy, which views them as chattel, will value them even less if they don't do it, (3) don't fully understand the consequences of the procedure.

If the societies where this takes place treat women as equal citizens, give them equal education, and educate them completely as to the consequences of this procedure and IF the women who get this procedure are, effectively, adults, then he can protest that the west's criticism is invalid. Till then, he just sounds like a guy who wants to keep things status quo.

 

[RapeMask]

most of the language of this article really troubles me. constant in phrases like 'this assault on their bodies,' 'prior to the age of consent', 'psychological health consequences', all of which imply a very rigid western perspective of truth and framework for horror. furthermore, the application of the physical health consequences all apply a western framework for truth on what is right and wrong and take no account of the traditions, beliefs and feelings of the societies being evaluated and condemned. their horrors are not our horrors.

regardless of our knowledge of disease and bodily health dysfunction and regardless of those psychological truth systems which define 'psychological health problems', a society must be evaluated from within its own context. you cannot go into a society and tell it it is wrong and ask it to revolutionise all its habits and social rites - its impossible, iraq sprining to mind...

what you can do, is permeate knowledge and see how the society alters in relation to the assimilation of this knowledge. while we are about it, we could perhaps tell them how sex isnt worth having unless you have a 12' dick and should they want one, we can sort them out. i mean, whats the point of letting the women keep their clitoris otherwise? ultimately, weve just reversed the mutilation game making sex a god rather than a sin. thats the basis of our own mutilations.

Here is a good explanation of FGM. Not sure about the glass, you're probably right. I just know that this is wrong in capital letters with flashing neon lights, and I'm one of those who usually considers things in shades of grey.

http://www.pbs.org/speaktruthtopower/issue_female.html

 

[3113]

while we are about it, we could perhaps tell them how sex isnt worth having unless you have a 12' dick and should they want one, we can sort them out.

Apples and oranges. How does telling them how to have sex equal trying to change their minds about forcing a procedure on young women that can KILL THEM or leave them in agony for the rest of their lives and especially during childbirth?

I agree that there are right ways and wrong ways to make changes, and it would be far better if the changes came from within than from without. That said, I take offence to your comparison of those trying to alter views on this procedure as equal to those trying to alter views on enjoying sex.

Sex has nothing to do with this. If they were chopping off little girl's feet, the west would feel pretty much the same about it.

Feel free to argue with us about how we're not getting it, but please try to compare apples with apples if you're going to do so.