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From: steven@qubix.UUCP (Steven Maurer)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Re: "sexist" surgery
Message-ID: <754@qubix.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 6-Jan-84 16:06:03 EST
Article-I.D.: qubix.754
Posted: Fri Jan  6 16:06:03 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 7-Jan-84 05:44:00 EST
References: <6348@watdaisy.UUCP> <262@denelcor.UUCP>, <440@orca.UUCP>
Organization: Qubix Graphic Systems, Saratoga, CA
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    I am responding to an article in net.women.only, in net.women,
    for obvious reasons.               -Steve


>   Clitorectomies are still practiced in Africa among many tribes.  As
>   a maturity ritual, adolecent girls are held down while thier
>   clitorises are scraped off with a sharp stone.  The wound is then
>   crudely stiched.  Many girls die of infection.  The process is done
>   because since these tribes practice polygyny (one husband, many
>   wives), and it is impossible for a man to satisfy all those women,
>   this way, the woman won't be sexually interested, and therefore
>   won't stray.  When educated women in these countries try to get 
>   these rituals stopped, they are accused of having no respect for
>   tribal tradition.
    
    ............

Ariel (more fuel for the fire) Shattan
decvax!tektronix!tekecs!ariels


==============

	Excuse me, Ms Shattan, but where is your degree in Anthropology?

    I only took 3 courses of study in the field, but at least I can see
    that you have not the least idea of what you are talking about.  It
    is true that in many tribes (in Africa and elsewhere), a sexuality
    ritual is performed upon boys and girls upon coming of age.  And it
    is also true, that often these rituals include laceration of the
    sexual organs.   However, about your fantasies about "poligomy" and
    the unsatisfaction of women in these cultures, I can only laugh.

	Why do I laugh at your culturally-bogoted opinions??

	First: Where pologmy is practiced, it is the exception, rather
		than the rule.   This is rather plain to see, because
		if it were not, there would be a lot of frustrated MEN
		hanging around (the ones lacking wives).  If it were true
		that "Many girls die of infection.", there would be an
		even smaller female to male ratio.   (Of course, few girls
		die of infection, about the same as the number of boys who do).

	Second: There has been no evidence in any non-victorian culture
		of any desire to impair the sexuality of a youth through
		these rituals.   Paint, however, tends to wash off.  So
		influcting scars is the general rule.

	Third: These tribes also perform circumcision, and quite often
		put scars on the penis.   This is not mentioned in any
		protest, because we have much the same tradition.

	Fourth: If you protest that the clitorous is the be-all, end-all,
		of female pleasure in coitus, whereas the male gets off
		with a relatively minor lacerations -- I would point you
		to a book called "The G-Spot" (you might be missing out
		on a lot).    Women from these countries, interviewed, have
		said that they enjoy sex, and even have orgasms;  this is
		ignored by our cultural bigots.

	Fifth: The modern myth about "circumcision being healthy for the
		woman", has not been proved.  Only one, (now believed biased)
		study supported it.   Circumcision is just as physically
		unnatural as clitorodectomies, its only reason for existance
		is because it is a decendent of the same tribal ritual so
		many europeans find objectional now.

    I do not, in any way, support these practices.   However, I also do not
    like to read uninformed culturally-bigoted opinions.   We must assume,
    that the rituals refered to are important to the cultures involved,
    because under colonial rule, they could not be stamped out.

    Steven Maurer