Female Genital Mutilation: Yes, it exists!

Recently a page that I have been following on Facebook posted quite a few articles on Female Genital Mutilation and that’s pretty much how I got to know about this horrific practice which is still prevalent, in the 21^st century in various places on the globe! Call it tradition, culture or religion; society always finds a way to oppress its daughters and comes up with senseless arguments to support its actions.

Female genital mutilation or FGM is the partial or complete removal of the female external genitalia or any other kind of injury to female genitals for non-medical purposes. The circumcision is carried out by older women in the family or some female relative or barbers or members of secret society etc. These people may or may not have any medical training to perform such operations. Usually there’s no anesthesia, antiseptic or sterilization of the cutting devices involved. The cutting devices used may be special knives, scalpels, razors, blades, glass, sometimes even bare fingernails. Girls may be subjected to these practices at any time: when they are a few days old, during their childhood, puberty, before marriage or before childbirth etc. There are two main reasons that parents make their daughters go through this. Firstly, Religion: lots of Muslims believe that such practices are highly recommended in Islam despite the fact that no Islamic laws or Quran verses even mention female genital circumcision, let alone making it compulsory. Second reason is obviously women safety and controlling of female sexuality.

Here’s the fact sheet on FGM by WHO. So basically in some cases, the clitoris or the clitoral hood is removed so as to reduce the sex drive of girls as a method of prevention of premarital sex among girls. Often their vaginal opening is sealed completely except for a small orifice to enable urination and menstruation. This seal is again surgically removed before marriage and widened further before childbirth. The main objective of all these practices is to direct the female sexuality. These practices are usually done in secret and are often termed as an occasion where a girl embraces womanhood. These girls are forced to give up their femininity in order to embrace womanhood. Her body itself is considered cleansed only after she gets rid of parts of her God-gifted self. There’s also the custom of breast ironing where her breast tissue is compressed or pounded using hot iron so as to make them look less feminine and thus less attractive to prevent them from being sexually harassed or raped. What’s worse is that even people in the UK are starting to use this method to protect their girl child.

These practices affect the physical and mental well being of probably millions of girls across the world. Mostly, the physiological damage is irreversible and makes normal life extremely painful. A woman is neither considered pure nor safe in her original body and the uneducated society dictates their life. Thank you for reading. Here are a few places wherein you can make an impact:

http://www.cawogido.co.uk/
http://busts4justice.com/2011/09/20/association-of-aunties-tackling-breast-ironing-in-cameroon/
https://www.facebook.com/StopFgmMiddleEast?fref=nf

To Vote or Not To Vote?

Every citizen of India is given a number of fundamental rights. One such fundamental right is the right to vote. In a country with such a huge and diverse population, one’s voice tends to get lost. Hence our votes act as our voices. However small, when put together they form the vociferous Voice of our Nation, our state, our municipal corporations etc. Yet, in the Municipal Corporation Elections of Kolkata, October 2015, the voices of the common people were snatched away from them in broad daylight.

For the Ruling Party, the poll results of Salt Lake were especially important so as to prove to the Nation that they are not losing out on the trust of the sophisticated, urban voters. In fact, one of their legislators (who care which one) guaranteed that if any voter with a valid voter card is unable to exercise his right to vote, then he’ll fight for their cause! But as we all know, some people and some political parties are just full of lies. The elections held on October 3, 2015 at Salt Lake were extremely peaceful. It was so peaceful that residents couldn’t recall when the last time that elections were accompanied with such calm environment was! Hundreds and thousands of goons, bouncers and villagers flocked the polling booths. They forcefully stood in the queues meant for the voters. When reporters quizzed them about their address, they came up with answers that shocked the hell out of the original residents of those areas. Leaving a few, most residents turned up to the polling booth only to realize that their votes had already been cast and the booths were under the complete control of outsiders!

Luckily I was the second voter (and the first female voter) from my block. Hence I was able to exercise my right. However my neighbors who turned up later, informed us of the mass rigging. The first couple of hours were peaceful, the next couple filled with turmoil and after that the only votes cast were purely false in nature. Polling agents of the Opposition Party were threatened, harassed, beaten up and finally they were forcefully removed. In my ward, even the candidate (who is a favorite of the locals) was beaten when she refused to comply with the threats of the Ruling Party. The news channels were overflowing with horrifying images and videos of people being inhumanely thrashed for standing up against oppression. Even reporters and photographers were not spared. The funniest part was the role of the police. At some places the police, residents and opposition party members tried to chase away the false voters only to be greeted with bombs. However in my ward, the police didn’t even raise their head to look the complainants in the eyes. They simply didn’t budge their asses from their seats!

The person appointed by the Chief Minister concluded that the election procedure went smoothly without any disturbance. The areas where re-election were announced turned out to be the handful of those areas which indeed had a serene voting environment on the original day (no sarcasm here), even though most people didn’t turn up out of either fear or the realization that their votes really do not matter especially in a state which is being run by a bunch of greedy good-for-nothing hooligans.

The S-word We Don't Talk About

I think it’s time to address the elephant in the room which keeps creeping in every now and then but never gets the attention it deserves. So I guess it’s time we talk about the topic which is a taboo in India. If you guessed “SEX”, then you are BANG on target! It comes as a huge surprise that the same country which gave the world Kama sutra doesn’t permit sex education as a fundamental right to its children and that is something that has to change soon if we intend to bring a positive change to the society.

Firstly, I found a question which is asked pretty often on the internet: How is it possible that sex is a taboo in India when it has such a huge population? This question, my friends, is its own answer. Necessity is the mother of invention. By virtue of nature when man is hungry, he gets desperate to locate food. When man is horny, he gets desperate for sex. Almost every smart kid will eventually find out about sex, that’s the Law of Nature. As elders it’s our responsibility that they find out about it from reliable sources and don’t get misled. If you do not attend to this topic at all, then how are you going to teach the children about the difference between ‘good touch’ and ‘bad touch’ or the importance of ‘consent’ in any form of sexual activity? If hunger is treated as a sin, then eating will become a crime and people will find unscrupulous ways to meet their needs. A smart kid is supposed to be curious and question the unreasonable unjustified notions of society. If you refuse to entertain their questions, you are only blunting their inquisitive nature.

Indian parents’ reaction to sex is ridiculous! Is there any other activity which is considered a sin at a certain time frame with a certain set of people, and a virtue at a different time frame with a different person? I don’t think so! Women will continue to be objectified and continue to remain helpless about it unless at least basic sex education is introduced. People need to explore their sexuality in order to uncover their own identity. A large chunk of divorces in India happen due to sexual dissatisfaction and lack of sexual balance. An Indian woman is expected to ‘save’ her virginity for her husband. Yet often, after getting married, she and her husband both find out that they don’t complement each other’s needs. That’s a sad situation. Some people are not heterosexual and since talking about sex in society is not allowed, they do not find out about it till it’s too late and has already caused enough damage to lives. How are you supposed to teach boys to respect girls when you won’t even talk about girls with them? The way sex is treated in our society, it’s like we were not born through reproduction, but photosynthesis!

As parents I’m sure talking about sex is extremely awkward but the West call it the ‘Birds and Bees Talk’ and there are some TED talk videos which does it so well that you would wish they were the official instructors for sex education in your child’s school. We need to stop going all hush-hush at the mention of sexual topics because that is what gives children the impression that we are hiding something from them, as a result turning up their curiosity quotient. Do hit a like or leave a comment if you agree.