I always thought it really strange how feminists are generally up in arms about FGM in places like the Middle East (where women are doing a good job combating it with their own language) and not so much up in arms with institutionalized surgery used to cut womens bodies in the West.
since when was this ever true
Lessons posted:
come to think of it, i read a bunch of feminist blogs fairly regularly and i can't even remember the last time FGM in africa came up. or even non-western women's experiences generally, (outside of the whole veil thing in France, where they generally came down on the right side, though that's more 'multicultural'). there's a criticism there in itself, but FGM seems more like a general background issue that something that's a problem with feminism specifically, in the west.
I think (assume, really) what were talking about is not How Awful Is Plastic Surgery?? or however many other Jezebel bourgeois first world problems we could list, but how weird it is to separate one form of patriarchal harm to women from another rather than take an internationalist view and see them as parallel roads to the same hell
babyfinland posted:
firstly, women are absolutely subject, while men can elect to pass from subject to phallus at will.
wait are you saying you're gay
cleanhands posted:Lessons posted:
come to think of it, i read a bunch of feminist blogs fairly regularly and i can't even remember the last time FGM in africa came up. or even non-western women's experiences generally, (outside of the whole veil thing in France, where they generally came down on the right side, though that's more 'multicultural'). there's a criticism there in itself, but FGM seems more like a general background issue that something that's a problem with feminism specifically, in the west.I think (assume, really) what were talking about is not How Awful Is Plastic Surgery?? or however many other Jezebel bourgeois first world problems we could list, but how weird it is to separate one form of patriarchal harm to women from another rather than take an internationalist view and see them as parallel roads to the same hell
again: the number of women who got labiaplasty on the NHS in 2009 was about 2000, out of a country of 30 million women. This constitutes 0.0067% of the population. You're likely to find ten times that many people who drink their own urine. Even if issues of consent, age, social pressures, danger, damage, and purpose were otherwise equivalent, the idea that this is some plague upon femininity comparable to countries where the rate is 30-95% is simply laughable.
if it eventually becomes the case that cosmetic surgeries have the effect of enhancing sexual response rather than diminishing it, would the argument change? that is, how much of the argument rests upon the issue of consent/social coercion, how much rests upon the issue of negative physical side effects, and how much rests upon a desire to preserve some notion of human essentialism?
Goethestein posted:cleanhands posted:Lessons posted:
come to think of it, i read a bunch of feminist blogs fairly regularly and i can't even remember the last time FGM in africa came up. or even non-western women's experiences generally, (outside of the whole veil thing in France, where they generally came down on the right side, though that's more 'multicultural'). there's a criticism there in itself, but FGM seems more like a general background issue that something that's a problem with feminism specifically, in the west.I think (assume, really) what were talking about is not How Awful Is Plastic Surgery?? or however many other Jezebel bourgeois first world problems we could list, but how weird it is to separate one form of patriarchal harm to women from another rather than take an internationalist view and see them as parallel roads to the same hell
again: the number of women who got labiaplasty on the NHS in 2009 was about 2000, out of a country of 30 million women. This constitutes 0.0067% of the population. You're likely to find ten times that many people who drink their own urine. Even if issues of consent, age, social pressures, danger, damage, and purpose were otherwise equivalent, the idea that this is some plague upon femininity comparable to countries where the rate is 30-95% is simply laughable.
do you even fucking know what the nhs is? get a brain morans
Pain during sexual intercourse
Discomfort due to rubbing on clothes
Rare hormonal disorders causing the labia minora to enlarge
Damage done after giving birth
animedad posted:
whats the revolutionary's job wrt this stuff? should we create a desirable image of a better society, or passively support the idea of limitless, irreducibly complex structures of beauty?
the revolutionary loves women regardless of their willingness to alter their appearance for the preferences of men.
also interesting - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/2006411.stm
apparently "de-programming" women from north to south korea involves having them take make-up classes.
NounsareVerbs posted:animedad posted:
whats the revolutionary's job wrt this stuff? should we create a desirable image of a better society, or passively support the idea of limitless, irreducibly complex structures of beauty?the revolutionary loves women regardless of their willingness to alter their appearance for the preferences of men.
also interesting - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/2006411.stm
apparently "de-programming" women from north to south korea involves having them take make-up classes.
heres a fucked up thing: google 'double eyelid surgery'
jools posted:
lmao the women who got a labioplasty on the NHS would have gotten it for what the NHS judges to be genuine medical reasons
did you read my earlier post about 5,000 inquiries being made last year to one of the largest cosmetic surgery firms in britain? i think you may have, considering that you quoted the same article.
The female population of Great Britain is roughly 30 million. Of that 30 million, let's say 10,000 chose to inquire in 2010 about labiaplasty, or 0.034%. Inquired, not went through with it.
let's say i'm off by a factor of 10. we're still talking about more than 100 times less than in countries where FGM is practiced, and once again, in the former case, exclusively practiced on consenting adults.
jools posted:
For a graphic depiction of this "problem", there is a video clip on the website for Channel 4's Embarrassing Bodies series. It features a woman in her 40s who desperately wants her labia reduced. A consultant tells her that she has a "normal variant" but then recommends cosmetic surgery to remove the "excess skin". There are many heartbreaking responses on the website from teenagers: "I have the same problem as the lady in the video. My labia is way too long and feels horrible. I just want to cut it off." "Mine are a little bit bigger than that. If she needed surgery, do I need it too?" "I hate my problem. I'm 13 – is it free on the NHS?"
cosmetic surgery on the genitals of teenagers who are unhappy with their bodies is wrong and should be disallowed, unless of course they wish to have their natural genitalia completely destroyed and rebuilt cosmetically into a nonfunctional approximation of those of the opposite sex. in that event opposition is deeply bigoted.
NounsareVerbs posted:
double-eyelid surgeries are meant to make asians look like europeans or something? that's all the difference i saw.
given that gender and race are both social constructs, should a person who believes themselves to be trans across racial lines be supported & respected. for example, a socially awkward jewish kid from brooklyn who LOVES wu-tang and believes himself to be black. do we give him the melanin injections & nasal reconstructive surgery or is this just Fetishisation Of The Other
discipline posted:
goatstein has a weird idea about the term "consenting adults"
i take the term to mean "people over the age of 18 who make decisions without clear and present duress." as a side note, regarding social pressures i find it interesting that the same people who defend the practice of wearing the burka or veil by the argument that women are making the choice to do so are the same people who think that labiaplasty is unconscionable because women* are being forced by society to engage in it. it is basically beyond credible argument that the social pressures on islamic females to dress in a certain way are greater than the pressures on western women to tighten up the ol' meat sheets, and this is borne out in the likelihood that they will actually do so.
* an infinitesimal fraction thereof
deadken posted:NounsareVerbs posted:
double-eyelid surgeries are meant to make asians look like europeans or something? that's all the difference i saw.given that gender and race are both social constructs, should a person who believes themselves to be trans across racial lines be supported & respected. for example, a socially awkward jewish kid from brooklyn who LOVES wu-tang and believes himself to be black. do we give him the melanin injections & nasal reconstructive surgery or is this just Fetishisation Of The Other
what about forums avatars?
Some Say that e.g., white posters who don images of figures from another cultural background, e.g., black revolutionaries, are leveraging white privilege to do so.
Others Say nah.
deadken posted:NounsareVerbs posted:
double-eyelid surgeries are meant to make asians look like europeans or something? that's all the difference i saw.given that gender and race are both social constructs, should a person who believes themselves to be trans across racial lines be supported & respected. for example, a socially awkward jewish kid from brooklyn who LOVES wu-tang and believes himself to be black. do we give him the melanin injections & nasal reconstructive surgery or is this just Fetishisation Of The Other
*wears blackface* so campy lol im subverting racism *eats watermelon, wears a shiteating grin*
