Aisha Azar

Dear Shanazel,
I think you put the wrong emphasis on my wording. I did not say it was a "cultural event" in the South, nor did I even imply such a thing. YOU decided to read it that way. This was obviously not one woman's experience as I said it happened to her cousin and that doctors were considering having her circumsized as well. I am trying to find something more about it. I just tried to open an article on the web about female circumcision in Alabama, but it had a virus so my computer would not let me into it. My friend is not from Alabama, but the way, but a different southern state. I am sorry that this has upset you so much.
Right now I have to go and get ready for a performance this A.M., but when I get home, I will try to find some info about it.
Regards,
A'isha

Shanazel

A'isha, how else do you expect someone to take the statement . You relate the practice specifically to the South, not the United States or North America or the Western Hemisphere in general. I don't think you are being deliberating insulting, but yes, I am indeed very upset, and I don't get upset all that often. I am not interested in or impressed by internet research into the matter, either. If you would care to do in depth research via medical journals, extensive interviews with witnesses whose evidence can be corraborated independently, case histories, etc. I might be interested and/or impressed. You spoke to one woman. One. This is not enough on which to base a statement like If someone tells me they were attacked at gunpoint in Bugs Bunny, PA, it would not make sense to say, "it is not uncommon for women to be attacked at gunpoint in Bugs Bunny, PA- I'm talking middle class white girls here."

Aisha Azar

Dear Shanazel,


I believe that I already said I was wrong in putting it that way. if that is not good enough, then again, I don't know how I can make it better for you.

Regards,
A;isha

Aisha Azar

Dear Shanazel and other interested parties,
Here are two sources, among many others that I found:

Patricia Robinette
She wrote a book called "The Rape of Innocence" that deals with female circumcision in the United States, starting in the 1800s and the reason for many female circumcisions was to stop female children from masturbating, according to this woman. She is a hypnotherapist and you can read more about her credentials and her book at her website.


C. F. McDonald, M.D. (September, 1958). Circumcision of the Female. GP , Vol. XVIII, p. 98-99.


There is a LOT more out there, but this might serve to prove that maybe my friend was not just making things up.


Regards,
A'isha

Mosaic

I also find circumcision abhorrent, for either gender, and strongly believe if it wasn't meant to be there then we would not have been born with these "bits"!

As for female circumcision having an effect on dance ... I honestly can't see how it could. People heal, and everything becomes "natural" so to speak, to have an effect ( physically) on dance then it would be noticeable in any torso/leg/hip movements, which means any person who had gone through circumcision would actually walk differently or move differently. Emotionally, well that is hard to say, but most people who are circumcised accept it as part of their culture/life and just get on with the business of living.

Sure like anything, some traumas can and do have long lasting effects, but as a general thing, I don't think so ... that is my thoughts and feelings anyway.
~Mosaic

da Sage

"it was not uncommon for baby girls in the South to be circumsized in the states into the 1950s. ( I am talking middle class white girls here!) "

I have never heard of this "trend" either, despite living in the South among very candid people. All the documentaries I've seen on child genital surgeries featured people from other parts of the country.

I expect that this is something that was done all over the United States (and has greatly lessened in recent years). When a girl had "ambiguous" or larger genitalia, doctors in the rigid-gender-roles 50's would be quick to advise the parents to "fix" it with surgery.

I expect that this happened mostly with the wealthier part of society, because they could pay for the surgery. For that reason, I theorize that the practice was less widespread in the poorer South (but I do see how it could be most common in middle/upper-class girls).

Aisha Azar

Dear daSage,

The family that I was discussing is middle class, and according to several articles I read, the practice was a "trend" if you will, in the States, though not as common of course as male circumcision. It does not seem to have been something that just happened in the wealthier families, but then medical costs were not so outrageous then as they are now. It was done for several reasons, only one being a larger clitoris. One M.D. opinion in a practitioner magazine from the 1950s was that females need to be circumsized for the same reasons males do; "hygiene", which is of course, nonsense. I think I read that the practice of circumsizing females was made illegal in the 1970s, though don't quote me on the date. It probably was practiced all over the U.S., though some areas probably more than others. There was one article that I could not get into that specifically discussed the practice in the state of Alabama. I did not find any on any other specific states. This does not mean that they don't exist, but only that this was the only one I found.
It seems at every turn when we find something to point out as hideously wrong that happens someplace else, as soon as we look closely, we can find the same thing here! Talk about living in a glass house..... This does not make any of it alright, but I think we need to realize that we are as culpable in most crimes against the heart and soul and body, as any other country. At least in this case we have made strides in fixing the problem of female cirumcision. Now we need to get to work on male circumcision!! By the way, folks, female circumcision is illegal in many North African countries including Egypt. The practice still continues and I bet it is still going on here in some places, too.
Regards,
A'isha

Shanazel

I read Robinette's book in college for a biology class about 1975, and did not at any point suggest your friend made anything up.

I realize you don't understand exactly what it is you have done wrong, or why I have been so upset by this. Let me try once more to explain what it is that upsets me so about your comments. The American South has its share of problems, but I have been faced so often with people who firmly believe in the red-necked, backward, uneducated, inbred stereotype that it is a real irritant to come across one more sweeping derogatory presentation. An apology is not the point- I would like for you to understand why what you said is hurtful, and not just blow it off as me being determined to take offense where none was meant.

I don't hold it against you, A'isha. If you can't understand, you can't.

da Sage

Hi Shanazel,

You must have lived away from the South for many years, because you sound almost as intelligent and educated as the rest of us.

*sarcasm off*

Aisha Azar

I understand exactly what you THINK I have done wrong. I also understand why you were upset and that is why I apologized in the first place. My statement was no slam to the South or any other part of the country. You just chose to make it one. I am from New England where we are all considered to be dour, with no sense of humor, a no nonsense attitude, and very strict and mean spirited as well as way too thrifty, etc. I guess I could get really upset about that comic strip "Nonsequiiter" , that makes fun of all of the New England characteristics, but I find stereotypes to be so utterly ridiculous that they do not matter. Each area of the country has its negative reputations to overcome. It is not that I do not understand your attitude, it is that you chose to completely take what I said out of context and make it a personal communication about the "lowly South": instead of understanding that my reference was to a personal situation in which the person was from the south, not that all southerners were circumsized. For that matter, it looks like the practice was a lot more common that you thought, from what I have been reading. I can understand your attitude perfectly. It is the attitude of someone who is overly sensitive to the point that she perceives criticism where there was none.