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eumeliaThis is a signal boost and and it may have triggers.
Female Genital Mutilation at Cornell University by Dan Savage, viacopperbadge and Cornell Surgeon Used Vibrator To Stimulate 6-Year-Olds by Kathy Kellerher, via ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
rm.
In the name of "science" a doctor is cutting down little girls' clitorises because they are deemed too big, by whose standards, I cannot tell you.
Oh, and as a follow up to these horrifying and traumatising surgeries, these girls are then stimulated by vibrators to test if they still have sensation at the place of incision.
I have nightmares about scenarios like this.
What you can do to stop this "science" from happening? Here are some links and numbers you can use:copperbadge
There is also an article in Psychology Today, which has more info and which made me need to step back from the screen in rage.
Because, as someone else said, the vibrators is not what this is about.
It isn't about pervy surgeons having their way with little girls. Paedophiles can be, much to our distress, found in every walk of life. It isn't that he followed up on dodgy medical practices with dubious procedures.
This is about the fact that genital mutilation was given carte blanche in the name of misogyny, homophobia and "empiricism".
This is about wanting to erase, as in to make non-existent, the mere idea of female sexuality that is like that of men. That is why intersex children with clitorises that are too big will usually be said to have small penises and be assigned male gender after "corrective" surgery.
I don't want to go Godwin on this, because the Nazis are hardly the first and the last to go Mad Scientist in the name of Social Order, but my god it scares me. The notion that ones "potential" sexuality will cause such great panic that it will be, literally, cut off.
The real problem, was that this research was approved in the first place and that obviously, there was no one in fucking control of that lab!
Talk about oversight.
I am very curious to know what was going through the minds of the parents who agreed, in the name of these little girls, for this to happen. Have doctors terrorised them for so long, that their child was abnormal, that they simply handed her over? Were these parents so scared of their children?
I cannot imagine that anything short of abject terror of not being in control of your child's body would get you to do something like that. Because it is a fear many parents have regarding their daughters. When I was 11 I'd had my first hair cut in 8 years, I think my mother cried.
When I shaved my head when I was 20, I cried as my mother said to me "I can't believe you would do this", the "to me" hung off the end of that sentence like dying worm.
That is just a normal example.
I thinkrm said it best, and I'll paraphrase as to how it relates to me, that one of the most queer things about me is the ability to leverage my shame into action. I don't do it well, nor do I think I did it right when that action was needed, but it is that that makes me queer - I will not hide away because my presence causes someone else embarrassment and through that shame me into silence.
Little girls are not the arena upon which to shove your anxieties.
Gender non-conforming people are not the ones who deserve the shame thrust upon them.
Mutilation is the destructive symptom here, that it was given legitimacy in the first place is the problem.
Female Genital Mutilation at Cornell University by Dan Savage, via
copperbadge and Cornell Surgeon Used Vibrator To Stimulate 6-Year-Olds by Kathy Kellerher, via rm.In the name of "science" a doctor is cutting down little girls' clitorises because they are deemed too big, by whose standards, I cannot tell you.
Oh, and as a follow up to these horrifying and traumatising surgeries, these girls are then stimulated by vibrators to test if they still have sensation at the place of incision.
I have nightmares about scenarios like this.
What you can do to stop this "science" from happening? Here are some links and numbers you can use:
H/T
Write about your outrage and send it to Weill Cornell: http://weill.cornell.edu/visitors/contact-us.html
Or to the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs, ORIA at med.cornell.edu, (646) 962-8200
Or to the Dean of the hospital, Antony M. Gotto Jr, dean at med.cornell.edu
Or to the college's general address: Weill Cornell Medical College, 1300 York Avenue, New York, NY 10065.
If you are calling from outside the USA, the international code, to be punched in before the actual telephone number is 1*.
And of course, pass it on.
copperbadgeThere is also an article in Psychology Today, which has more info and which made me need to step back from the screen in rage.
Because, as someone else said, the vibrators is not what this is about.
It isn't about pervy surgeons having their way with little girls. Paedophiles can be, much to our distress, found in every walk of life. It isn't that he followed up on dodgy medical practices with dubious procedures.
This is about the fact that genital mutilation was given carte blanche in the name of misogyny, homophobia and "empiricism".
This is about wanting to erase, as in to make non-existent, the mere idea of female sexuality that is like that of men. That is why intersex children with clitorises that are too big will usually be said to have small penises and be assigned male gender after "corrective" surgery.
I don't want to go Godwin on this, because the Nazis are hardly the first and the last to go Mad Scientist in the name of Social Order, but my god it scares me. The notion that ones "potential" sexuality will cause such great panic that it will be, literally, cut off.
The real problem, was that this research was approved in the first place and that obviously, there was no one in fucking control of that lab!
Talk about oversight.
I am very curious to know what was going through the minds of the parents who agreed, in the name of these little girls, for this to happen. Have doctors terrorised them for so long, that their child was abnormal, that they simply handed her over? Were these parents so scared of their children?
I cannot imagine that anything short of abject terror of not being in control of your child's body would get you to do something like that. Because it is a fear many parents have regarding their daughters. When I was 11 I'd had my first hair cut in 8 years, I think my mother cried.
When I shaved my head when I was 20, I cried as my mother said to me "I can't believe you would do this", the "to me" hung off the end of that sentence like dying worm.
That is just a normal example.
I think
rm said it best, and I'll paraphrase as to how it relates to me, that one of the most queer things about me is the ability to leverage my shame into action. I don't do it well, nor do I think I did it right when that action was needed, but it is that that makes me queer - I will not hide away because my presence causes someone else embarrassment and through that shame me into silence. Little girls are not the arena upon which to shove your anxieties.
Gender non-conforming people are not the ones who deserve the shame thrust upon them.
Mutilation is the destructive symptom here, that it was given legitimacy in the first place is the problem.
no subject
Date: 2010-06-18 11:15 am (UTC)It's both disgusting and depressing what people will do and then say it was in the name of 'science.' To push your skewed views of the world onto children and to mutilate them because they don't conform to them is just fucked up.
I have emailed both the dean and the ORIA regarding it because, shit. I need to go take a shower.
no subject
Date: 2010-06-18 11:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-06-18 12:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-06-18 12:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-06-18 12:24 pm (UTC)Sort of OT
Date: 2010-06-18 04:50 pm (UTC)Re: Sort of OT
Date: 2010-06-19 08:28 am (UTC)Check out my next post.
no subject
Date: 2010-06-18 10:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-06-19 08:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-06-19 08:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-06-19 08:28 pm (UTC)When you do, please link to the follow up I wrote, because I committed intersex erasure and I don't want that perpetuated.
no subject
Date: 2010-06-19 08:29 pm (UTC)