#Female Genital Mutilation

[floweringlamb]

Cw: genital mutilation

A great punishment for ftm girls is to simply remove their clitoris :) they take hormones to try to grow the pathetic thing into a “penis”. It’s ridiculous, and can easily be remedied by snipping it off. All that hard work gone in an instant, but it’s best for them to stop deluding themselves into thinking they can have anything close to a dick. Poor thing won’t be able to orgasm, and will be stuck being used as a fuckhole to get any source of pleasure

[no-passaran]

Very important and heartbreaking news.

(Organizations to support at the end of the post)

March 19th, 2024

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/03/19/gambia-female-genital-mutilation-cutting/

Gambia moves towards ending ban on female genital mutilation

Gambia’s National Assembly has voted to advance a bill that would overturn a ban on female genital cutting, putting this tiny West African country on a path to being the first nation in the world to roll back such a protection.

Many of the women who filed into the National Assembly building on Monday to witness the proceedings had experienced the horror that comes with cutting, which has been practiced for generations here. One woman said she was taken by her family at age 8 to a ceremony in which she was pinned down and cut. Another learned on her wedding night that her vaginal opening had been sealed. A third experienced years of infections and later infertility after being cut without her parents’ permission.

The women listened stoically as members of parliament — the vast majority of them men — pounded their gavels in support as Almameh Gibba, the lawmaker who introduced the bill, described it as intended to “uphold religious rights and safeguard cultural norms and values.” (...)

Already, the United Nations says that about 75 percent of girls and women in Gambia between the ages of 15 and 49 have been subjected to genital cutting, which is often described by opponents as female genital mutilation, or FGM. Globally, more than 200 million women and girls are estimated to be survivors of female genital cutting, which can involve removing part of the clitoris and labia minora and, in the most extreme cases, a sealing of the vaginal opening. Medical experts say the procedures, which do not have medical benefits, can cause a range of short- and long-term harms, including infections, severe pain, scarring, infertility and loss of pleasure.

An activist cries and gets support during a debate among Gambian lawmakers on lifting the ban on FGM. (Carmen Yasmine Abd Ali for The Washington Post)

“It is a rollback on women’s rights and bodily autonomy,” said Jaha Dukureh, a Gambian activist whose little sister died as a result of a botched procedure and who found out on her wedding night, at 15, that she had been sealed as a baby. “It is a rollback in terms of telling women what to do with their own bodies. This is all this is.” (...)

Outside the National Assembly on Monday, women and men holding signs that read, “Girls need love, not knives” squared off against Muslim clerics who were preaching to dozens of veiled girls from Islamic schools. They cheered as one cleric told them [female genital mutilation] was justified by religion.

Inside the building, where only five of Gambia’s 58 lawmakers are women, the discussion Monday was dominated by men. Among the survivors in the audience was Sainey Ceesay, the founder of a nonprofit focused on destigmatizing infertility, who said she only recently decided to start talking about what she experienced at 8 years old. At that time, women had gathered her and a group of other girls at a house in Banjul, the capital, and used a razor to cut off her clitoris.

Ceesay, who said she suffered for years from trauma and infections and was unable to conceive, is still holding out hope that the ban will not be repealed. “At least as of today, FGM is still illegal in Gambia,” she said with a quiet sigh.

Fatty, the cleric whose support helped push the bill forward, (...) explained that it was about following the teachings of the prophet, about purity and about reducing the likelihood of cancer. (Doctors say there is no basis for this claim.)

“It is something not to reduce feeling, but to control, to balance the feelings of a woman,” he said in an interview.

When asked to clarify whether he meant women have too much desire in the absence of cutting, he nodded his head and wagged a finger.

“Too much,” Fatty said. “Too much. We can say in sex, women’s power is more than men’s power. … Women can do sex longer than men. So that is why Islam came to balance. They can be together and their desire can be balanced.” (...) [Many Islamic countries do not have FGM.]

(...) Many women note that because cutting often happens when girls are no older than in elementary school, they are never given a choice in the matter. (...)

Fatou Baldeh, an activist and FGM survivor (...), said she tries to “hold grace” for the women who continue to advocate for the practice, knowing many have not been educated and have only their own experience to go by.

But sitting in the parliamentary chambers Monday as she listened to the men debate, Baldeh said she was seething.

When one activist started wiping tears from her eyes with tissues, a lawmaker demanded that women who were crying leave the chambers, and the speaker agreed, asking them not to make a scene.

Baldeh said she wanted to scream listening to the men trivialize the pain women had experienced. But she resolved to stay in the chambers, knowing the importance of the women being present, forcing the men to look at them as they cast their votes.

“We have a right to cry,” she said. “But we knew the importance of staying. So we kept our tears in.”

An activist cries during the parliamentary debate on FGM. (Carmen Yasmine Abd Ali for The Washington Post)

Full support and encouragement to the brave Gambian activists fighting to end FGM.

Support organizations and activists:

Safe Hands For Girls (survivor-led organization focused on ending female genital mutilation and child marriage, and helping women and girls who have gone through or are going through these experiences): website, X/Twitter, Instagram, YouTube.

Jaha Marie Dukureh (activist, founder of Safe Hands For Girls): X/Twitter.

Women in Liberation and Leadership (Gambian NGO): website, X/Twitter.

Fatou Baldeh (activist, in WILL) on X/Twitter.

Network Against Gender-Based Violence Gambia: X/Twitter, Facebook.

(Racists, transphobes, and other hate groups do not interact)

[digitalconcept-fl]

Thursday, October 26th, 2023

A woman has been found guilty of handing over a three-year-old British girl for female genital mutilation (FGM) during a trip to Kenya, in the first conviction of its kind.

After a trial at the Old Bailey, Amina Noor, 39, was convicted of assisting a Kenyan woman to carry out the procedure in 2006. The conviction, which carries a maximum sentence of 14 years, is the first for assisting in such harm under the Female Genital Mutilation Act 2003.

The only other successful prosecution under the act was in 2019 when a Ugandan woman from Walthamstow, east London, was jailed for 11 years for cutting a three-year-old girl.

Campaigners said the verdict showed that the introduction in 2015 of mandatory reporting of suspected FGM was working.

The senior crown prosecutor Patricia Strobino hailed Noor’s conviction, saying: “This kind of case will hopefully encourage potential victims and survivors of FGM to come forward, safe in the knowledge that they are supported, believed and also are able to speak their truth about what’s actually happened to them.

“It will also send a clear message to those prospective defendants or people that want to maintain this practice that it doesn’t matter whether they assist or practise or maintain this practice within the UK or overseas, they are likely to be prosecuted.”

Strobino added: “Part of the challenge of this type of offence is the fact that these types of offences occur in secrecy. Within specific communities within the UK, although these offences and practices are prevalent, it is often very difficult to get individuals to come forward to explain the circumstances of what’s happened to them because there was a fear that they may be excluded or pushed away or shunned, isolated from their community.”

Previously, the prosecutor Deanna Heer KC said Noor travelled to Kenya with the girl in 2006 and while there took her to a private house where the child was subjected to FGM.

The crime only came to light years later when the girl was 16 and confided in her English teacher at school.

When spoken to, the defendant said she thought the procedure was just an injection and that afterwards the girl was “happy and able to run around and play”. But when examined in 2019, it emerged that the girl’s clitoris had been removed.

Noor appeared “shocked and upset” and said that was not what she had thought was going to happen, Heer said. According to an initial account, Noor described going with another woman to a “clinic” where the girl was called into a room for a procedure.

The defendant said she was invited in but refused because she was “scared and worried”. Afterwards, the girl appeared quiet and cried the whole night and complained of pain, according to the account.

In a later police interview under caution, Noor denied that anyone had made threats against her before FGM was done to the girl.

Heer said: “She was asked whether, when she arrived at the clinic or even before then, she felt she did not want it to happen. She said: ‘Yeah I thought about it but then, you know, got it done.’”

Jurors were told the defendant was born in Somalia and moved to Kenya at the age of eight during the civil war in Somalia. She was 16 when she came to the UK and was later granted British citizenship.

The defendant described what had been done to the girl as “Sunnah”, meaning “tradition” or “way” in Arabic, and said it was a practice that had gone on for cultural reasons for many years.

Giving evidence in her trial, Noor, from Harrow, in north-west London, said she was threatened with being “cursed” and “disowned” within her community if she did not take part. She told jurors that the threat gave her “pain”, adding: “That was a pressure I had no power to do anything about.”

The alleged victim, who is now 21, cannot be identified for legal reasons.

Nimco Ali, an FGM survivor who founded the Five Foundation, a global partnership to end the cutting of girls, welcomed the verdict.

She said: “It is incredible that the mandatory reporting by teachers and healthcare professionals – that we have fought hard for – is starting to pay off. A girl was obviously failed. She was let down by the system but she got some form of justice today thanks to the policies that we now have in place.”

She added: “We have to address FGM in the UK and everywhere by working together to address the root causes of the issue.”

Research in 2014 estimated that 137,000 women and girls are affected by FGM in England and Wales. Ali said this estimate needed updating urgently.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Jasmine Mithani at The 19th:

A network working to end female genital mutilation and cutting (FGM/C) in the United States and globally says President Donald Trump’s January 28 executive order attempting to restrict gender-affirming care for transgender youth “wrongly and dangerously” conflates the two.

Opponents of transgender rights have sought for several years to co-opt anti-FGM/C laws to further gender-affirming care bans, mostly in state legislatures. The executive order builds on these efforts by directing the Department of Justice and state authorities to review and prioritize the enforcement of laws banning FGM/C, which are unrelated.  FGM/C is a human rights violation and one of the most extreme forms of gender-based violence. According to the World Health Organization, FGM/C “comprises all procedures that involve partial or total removal of the external female genitalia, or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons.” It is practiced across many cultures and takes many forms, and is most commonly performed on young girls who are unable to consent. There are no health benefits to FGM/C, and it is more likely to cause medical complications.

In contrast, gender-affirming genital surgeries like phalloplasty or metoidioplasty are medically necessary and done only with the consent of the patient. The World Professional Association for Transgender Health, the international body that publishes research-backed standards of care, does not recommend genital gender-affirming care surgeries for patients under 18. Extensive documentation from medical professionals is required for any medically necessary gender-affirming care surgery.  It is estimated that in 2012, over half a million girls in the United States had either undergone FGM/C or were at risk based on the country of origin of their parents. Survivor advocates think the number could be much higher now.

FGM/C has been a federal crime since 1996. The law has been revised several times — most recently in 2020, when Trump signed the STOP FGM Act, which prevented defendents from using religious or cultural reasons to avoid prosecution. 

[...] Anti-trans extremists have warped these laws to ban health care for trans people “despite clear medical and ethical distinctions,” said Ash Lazarus Orr, press relations manager at Advocates for Trans Equality. Orr also pointed out that this rhetoric excludes non-consensual surgeries performed on intersex youth. Many bans include a carve-out ensuring “corrective” surgeries remain legal for minors with intersex characteristics. Republican lawmakers in Idaho and Texas introduced bills in 2022 that would remove the word “female” from current legal codes banning FGM/C. Anti-FGM/C advocates helped defeat those bills, but Idaho ended up passing a separate law banning gender-affirming care for transgender youth the next year. Excluding the word “female” means these laws no longer prevent FGM/C because they then refer to something else entirely, said Kaitlin Mitchell, policy and advocacy coordinator at the U.S. Network to End FGM/C. Using the laws to restrict gender-affirming care instead of addressing the specific issue they were designed to make it harder for advocates to campaign for more funding or research on this little-known, severe form of gender-based violence.

Donald Trump’s false and transphobia-laden characterizing of gender-affirming care for trans youths as “mutilation” served as the basis for Executive Order 14187, which bans gender-affirming care services for trans youths and adults under 19.

The false characterization of GAC as “mutilation” trivializes the real issue of female genital mutilation.

[haggishlyhagging]

I am against female circumcision and other similar retrograde and cruel practices. I was the first Arab woman to denounce it publicly and to write about it in my book Woman and Sex. I linked it to the other aspects of female oppression. But I disagree with those women in America and Europe who concentrate on issues such as female circumcision and depict them as proof of the unusual and barbaric oppression to which women are exposed only in African or Arab countries. I oppose all attempts to deal with such problems in isolation, or to sever their links with the general economic and social pressures to which women everywhere are exposed, and with the oppression which is the daily bread fed to the female sex in developed and developing countries, in both of which a patriarchal class system still prevails.

Women in Europe and America may not be exposed to surgical removal of the clitoris. Nevertheless, they are victims of cultural and psychological clitoridectomy. ‘Lift the chains off my body, put the chains on my mind.’ Sigmund Freud was perhaps the most famous of all those men who taught psychological and physiological circumcision of women when he formulated his theory on the psychic nature of women, described the clitoris as a male organ, and sexual activity related to the clitoris as an infantile phase, and when he maintained that maturity and mental health in a woman required that sexual activity related to the clitoris cease and be transferred to the vagina.

No doubt the physical ablation of the clitoris appears a much more savage and cruel procedure than its psychological removal. Nevertheless, the consequences can be exactly the same, since the end result is the abolition of its functions so that its presence or absence amount to the same thing. Psychological surgery might even be more malicious and harmful because it tends to produce the illusion of being complete, whereas in actual fact the body may have lost an essential organ, like a child born an idiot yet provided with brain substance. It can create the illusion of being free, whereas in actual fact freedom has been lost.

To live in an illusion, not to know the truth, is the most dangerous of all things for a human being, woman or man, because it deprives people of their most important weapon in the struggle for freedom, emancipation, and control of their lives and future. To be conscious that you are still a slave still living under oppression is the first step on the road to emancipation.

-Nawal El Saadawi, “Preface to ‘The Hidden Face of Eve’” in The Essential Nawal El Saadawi: A Reader

[rapeculturerealities]

‘Over my dead body’, say Gambian mothers amid efforts to lift FGM ban | FGM | Al Jazeera

In  2015, the Gambian parliament took the historic step to pass the Women’s (Amendment) Act of 2015, which criminalised FGM and made it punishable by up to three years in prison – a significant shift after years of advocacy.

But recently, on March 18, politicians voted 42 to 4 to advance a controversial new bill which would repeal the landmark FGM ban if it passes following further consultation and expert opinion from specialised government ministries.

[blorbocedes]

Would you consider circumcision a form of body mutilation? It's not like little boys can consent, I personally didn't think abt bc it's a normal part of society here but then I learned about female circumcision and yeah.... slippery slope

I would not consider female genital mutilation and male circumcision as direct equivalents because FGM is done specifically to control women's sexuality, ensure she does not have pleasure during sex and leads to lifelong chronic infections down there. chronic utis. hurts to pee your whole life. painful periods. complications giving birth. there's no health benefits and is extremely painful

male circumcision is also done due to religious/cultural reasons but the religious explanation is for hygiene/cleanlines and lowers rate of certain cancers/stis. their sex lives aren't miserable bc of it, experiencing the same pleasure during sex as uncut guys. but in the first world the medical benefits are negligible so if you're not culturally religious there isn't much reason to do it

our views on it is culturally dependant. if you grew up where cut dicks is the norm it's no biggie, if you grew up where it isn't then it's a violation. like in a lot of places babies/toddlers have their ears pierced on their first birthday or extremely young, then I saw ppl on twitter calling it bodily mutilation because you're making a permanent cosmetic change on a child that can't consent. I personally had my ears pierced at 3 so I'm very idgaf, bc it's preferable I don't remember the pain vs I would have the pain + healing + potential infections if I had to get it now. but maybe I would feel differently if I was in a society that didn't wear earrings and if nobody around me had ear piercings

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Arin Waller at LGBTQ Nation:

President Donald Trump’s plans to pull federal funding from medical institutions that provide gender-affirming care will remain blocked after a federal judge found, for the second time, that Trump lacked the proper executive authority to make such an order.

U.S. District Court Judge Lauren J. King, an appointee of President Joe Biden, initially issued a 14-day pause on Trump’s directive which sought to stop federal funding for research and educational grants to medical schools and hospitals that provide gender affirming care to people under the age of 19. King initially issued her pause in response to the attorneys general of Washington, Oregon, and Minnesota filing a motion to sue the Trump Administration. The attorneys argued that Trump’s executive order restricting gender-affirming treatment is an unconstitutional violation of a state’s right to govern. Colorado later joined the lawsuit, bringing the total number of plaintiff states to four. The judge’s order went into effect on February 14 and was set to expire by February 28. However, King scheduled an injunction hearing for the day the order expired, and she held arguments to determine whether to extend the block. She ruled in favor of approving a preliminary injunction, blocking the order’s enforcement in the four plaintiff states.

During the hearing, the states argued that Trump’s order, by attempting to dictate the medical care that state residents can receive, unconstitutionally violated the Due Process Clause in the Fifth Amendment and the states’ rights guaranteeed by the Tenth Amendment. The plaintiffs further argued that withholding funding appropriated by Congress also violates the Constitution’s separation of powers. [...] The only section from the order she didn’t block was the order’s provision against female genital mutilation. Female genital mutilation is already illegal in the four plaintiff states and no evidence indicates that the states plan on performing such procedures.

King’s ruling marks the second time two separate federal judges have issued injunctions against Trump’s order on gender-affirming care. The first, issued by U.S. District Judge Brendan Hurson, an appointee of President Joe Biden, declared that Trump issued his ban without legal authority, making his orders an unconstitutional form of discrimination. Hurson’s ruling blocked Trump’s order nationwide. King’s injunction will remain in effect until the case is resolved. The DOJ would need to appeal King’s decision to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to have her injunction discontinued. The Circuit Court justices are majority Democrat, making an appeal unlikely until a resolution is reached.

This is great news: Donald Trump’s anti-trans executive order banning gender-affirming care for trans people under 19 (EO 14187) has been blocked in the courts.

See Also:

The Advocate: Federal judge blocks Trump’s gender-affirming care ban—again

[nando161mando]

EGG PRICEZ ⬆️ RETRIEMENT FUNDZ ⬇️BUT HEY AT LEAST SOMEONE GONNA LOOK AT MY GENITALZ 2 GO PIZZ IN THE BATHROOM🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸

[digitalconcept-fl]

If I may be open for a moment- (it is my blog and I can be open if I like, but) I have only recently begun interacting with others recently despite having this blog for so many years, it worries me to post any private or personal ancedotes on here but-

FGM terrifies me.

The first time I had ever heard of it was from an episode of Law and Order: SVU when it originally aired in 1997, and I was 4 years old. I didn't know was "genitals" were, or "mutilation" was, so I asked my mom. She looked at me, I distinctly remember her eyebrows creasing in the middle and her eyes just looking so sad and saying, "its when they cut girls private parts. It hurts them." She made a slicing motion with her hand against her arm. I remember being glad they arrested the person responsible for this crime.

The second time I had heard of Female Genital Mutilation was Khadija Gbla's Ted Talk in 2014:

I'm not sure if it was on tumblr originally, but it came with the chart she speaks of. I remember not being able to sleep that night because I was hyperaware of my own body parts and it mixed with complete sorrow for all the women and girls of the world that have had this performed on them.

If you are aware that a child is danger of being mutilated, SaveTheChildren is an organization I have personally donated to that has a anonymous hotline that you can use to report it.

[d3nt4l-d4m4g3]

have you heard experiences from women who take/used to take testosterone and then lose the ability to orgasm?

Yes, it's not common but it's a result of "bottom growth" or clitoromegaly. It seems that in a minority of cases the clitoral tissue grows faster than the nerves, and it blunts their sexual sensation permanently.

The writer of this Reddit post says "Orgasms feel like hiccups now, they last less than 5 seconds, the whole body sensation, gone."

The writer of this post says, "I can still cum with a vibrator but it feels so much less intense than before, and sometimes feels like nothing even while cumming. I think my clit is just massively desensitized now from taking T. I hate having sex now (and haven’t in a while) because I don’t get very turned on no matter what..."

The writer of this post, one year after stopping testosterone, states, "My sex drive is almost nonexistent and my orgasms barely feel like anything."

[coochiequeens]

Gambia's parliament of 58 lawmakers includes five women. If the bill eventually passes through parliament, President Adama Barrow is expected to sign it into law. He has not spoken publicly about the legislation."

Ladies, this is why "every vote counts" means everywhere elections are held. Vote more women into office

Lawmakers in Gambia have referred a repeal of the 2015 ban on female genital cutting for further committee discussions

By ABDOULIE JOHN Associated Press and JESSICA DONATI Associated Press

March 18, 2024, 8:49 AM

SERREKUNDA, Gambia -- Lawmakers in Gambia referred an attempted repeal of the 2015 ban on female genital cutting for further committee discussions on Monday.

Gambian activists fear a repeal would overturn years of work to better protect girls and women. The legislation was referred to a national committee for further debate and could return to a vote in the weeks and months ahead.

Activists in the largely Muslim country had warned that lifting the ban would hurt years of work against a procedure often performed on girls younger than 5 in the mistaken belief that it would control their sexuality.

The procedure, which also has been called female genital mutilation, includes the partial or full removal of external genitalia, often by traditional community practitioners with tools such as razor blades or at times by health workers. It can cause serious bleeding, death and childbirth complications but remains a widespread practice in parts of Africa.

Jaha Dukureh, the founder of Safe Hands for Girls, a local group that aims to end the practice, told The Associated Press she worried that other laws safeguarding women’s rights could be repealed next. Dukureh underwent the procedure and watched her sister bleed to death.

“If they succeed with this repeal, we know that they might come after the child marriage law and even the domestic violence law. This is not about religion but the cycle of controlling women and their bodies,” she said. The United Nations has estimated that more than half of women and girls ages 15 to 49 in Gambia have undergone the procedure.

The bill is backed by religious conservatives in the nation of less than 3 million people. Its text says that “it seeks to uphold religious purity and safeguard cultural norms and values." The country’s top Islamic body has called the practice “one of the virtues of Islam."

Gambia's former leader, Yahya Jammeh, banned the practice in 2015 in a surprise to activists and with no public explanation. Since the law took effect, enforcement has been weak, with only two cases prosecuted.

On Monday, a crowd of men and women gathered outside Gambia's parliament, some carrying signs protesting the bill. Police in riot gear held them back.

Gambia's parliament of 58 lawmakers includes five women. If the bill eventually passes through parliament, President Adama Barrow is expected to sign it into law. He has not spoken publicly about the legislation.

The United States has supported activists who are trying to stop the practice. Earlier this month, it honored Gambian activist Fatou Baldeh at the White House with an International Women of Courage Award.

The U.S. Embassy in Gambia declined to say whether any high-level U.S. official in Washington had reached out to Gambian leaders over the bill. In its emailed statement, Geeta Rao Gupta, the top U.S. envoy for global women's issues, called it “incredibly important” to listen to the voices of survivors like Baldeh.

The chairperson of the local Center for Women’s Rights and Leadership, Fatou Jagne Senghore said the bill is “aimed at curtailing women’s rights and reversing the little progress made in recent years.” The president of the local Female Lawyers Association, Anna Njie, said the practice “has been proven to cause harm through medical evidence.”

UNICEF said earlier this month that some 30 million women globally have undergone female genital cutting in the past eight years, most of them in Africa but some in Asia and the Middle East.

More than 80 countries have laws prohibiting the procedure or allowing it to be prosecuted, according to a World Bank study cited this year by a United Nations Population Fund Q&A published earlier this year. They include South Africa, Iran, India and Ethiopia.

“No religious text promotes or condones female genital mutilation,” the UNFPA report says, adding there is no benefit to it.

Girls are subjected to the procedure at ages ranging from infancy to adolescence. Long term, it can lead to urinary tract infections, menstrual problems, pain, decreased sexual satisfaction and childbirth complications as well as depression, low self-esteem and post-traumatic stress disorder.

[haggishlyhagging]

The sado-ritual of excision and infibulation bestows acceptability upon gynocidal behavior— even to the extent of making it normative. This is illustrated in the precept of the president of Kenya, Jomo Kenyatta, that "no proper Gikuyu would dream of marrying a girl who has not been circumcised," since this operation "is regarded as the conditio sine qua non for the whole teaching of tribal law, religion, and morality." With these words, one chief in the Higher Order of phallocratic morality dictates its chief lesson: that women should suffer. Typically, the justification for the atrocious ritual under the reign of phallic morality involves a reversal in which the unnatural becomes normative. Only a mutilated woman is considered 100 percent feminine.* By removal of her specifically female-identified organ, which is not necessary for the male's pleasure or for reproductive servitude, she "becomes a woman." At first the reversal might seem astonishing, if one hears the term woman as representing a state of natural integrity. But if we understand this term to refer to an embodiment of the feminine, which is a construct of phallocracy, then the meaning of the expression becomes clear.**

* It is interesting to compare these attempts to feminize women with the feminization of male-to-constructed-female transsexuals. The latter, who consider themselves to be "women" (referring to "other" women as "native women") undergo operations which remove the testicles and penis and give them artificial vaginas, but no clitoris. Both of these mutilating attempts at feminization receive a large amount of legitimation by phallocracy. See Janice Raymond, The Transsexual Empire: The Making of the She-Male (Boston: Beacon Press, 1979).

** It may be helpful in this connection to recall Simone de Beauvoir's famous axiom: "One is not born, but rather becomes a woman." (The Second Sex, trans. and ed. by H. M. Parshley [New York: Vintage, 1974], p. 301). In this book of course, I use the term women to refer to females generally and reserve the term feminine to connote the male-created construct/stereotype. However, woman is often used by others to refer to the androcratically constructed (destroyed) female, who is, of course, considered "natural." There is, for example, the "total woman" of Marabel Morgan, and the "true woman" of Pope Pius XII and Pope Paul VI.

-Mary Daly, Gyn/Ecology

[sheltiechicago]

The Right To Play

For this project, I worked with girls from Kakenya’s Dream in Enoosaen, Kenya who have avoided FGM and child marriage, showing what the world can look like when girls are given the opportunity to continue learning in an environment that supports them and their dreams."

By Lee-Ann Olwage

2023 Sony World Photography Awards