Posted on 05/06/2007 6:27:51 PM PDT by Pokey78
A debate is raging among doctors over Muslim women who demand operations to reconstitute their hymens before marriage and medical certificates stating that they are virgins.
The controversy has flared in France, where gynaecologists say that they are facing a growing number of requests from women desperate to avoid the repudiation that can follow the loss of chastity.
The phenomenon, which is also dividing doctors in other European countries, America and Africa, is denounced by critics as a sign of social regression driven by Islamic fundamentalists.
Jacques Lansac, Chairman of the French National College of Gynaecologists and Obstetricians, is leading the campaign against what he describes as an attack on the dignity of women. He has also issued advice against hymenoplasty a surgical operation that involves reconstructing the membrane usually broken during the first act of sexual intercourse.
Professor Lansac told The Times: We get more and more women coming in and saying that their brothers or fathers will kill them if they find out theyve slept with a man. But its important to say no, because if we dont were giving in to the fundamentalists.
However, he said that some doctors were ignoring his advice in the hope of protecting patients from ostracisation or violent beatings.
Isabelle Lévy, an author who studied the issue for her book Religion in the Hospital, said that the search for chastity certificates and hymenoplasties stemmed from conflicting pressures among the five million French Muslims.
On the one hand, young Muslim girls born in France go out a lot more than they used to. They are modern and they have adventures like other Europeans which never happened in the past.
But on the other hand, fundamentalism is spreading and these girls are getting sent back to their countries of origin to marry. And they will be rejected if it is found out that they are not virgins. The plight was evident from the account of one woman of North African origin on a French internet chat forum.
She slept with her boyfriend because he said that he was mad about me and wanted to marry me and I believed him because I was madly in love with him.
But he left her when she fell pregnant. The woman had an abortion, which she kept secret from her family until her mother discovered a letter from the clinic.
She fainted and afterwards it was total despair tears, insults, blows, disappointment and finally a dressing down.
She has asked her gynaecologist to redo my hymen because she says that if not it will ruin my future.
Several private French clinics carry out hymenoplasties.
But some doctors agree to undertake the operation in public hospitals, where it is funded by the welfare state, a practice that is not in theory authorised by officials.
Dr Stéphane Saint-Léger, head of gynaecology at Aulnay-sous-Bois hospital, outside Paris, refuses virginity certificates because its not a medical problem whether youre a virgin or not.
But other doctors are prepared to deliver them. Jacques Milliez, head of the department of gynaecology and obstetrics at Saint-Antoine hospital, Paris, told Le Monde: I worked in Algeria as a junior doctor and when I was on call at night I saw these young women whose throats had been slit because they were suspected of having lost their virginity. So if someone asks me, I sign the certificate.
No it doesn't.
Not that long ago, it was much more common in America than it is today.
And although we didn't wear burkas, most American women did dress much more modestly than today.
The Mideast is nuts for other reasons, which has caused them to go overboard.
Their violent obession with extreme female modesty must spring from a sense of insecurity from most young men's poor economic prospects,
And from the physical decrepitude of old men wealthy enough for a harem.
I'll put it simply:
A woman who resists temptation before marriage, is better prepared to resist temptation after marriage.
No round-heeled wife for me, thank you.
JUST MAYBE WE CAN ALL CONTRIBUTE TO A FUND TO HAVE THIS DONE TO ROSIES MOUTH!
If Islam prevails . . .
What can we expect from a demonic religion passed on as the real thing by a demonic man who made up his moon god and slept with little girls. The whole thing is satanic.
Now that is a good point I hadn't considered. As I understand your statement, a woman who is impregnated by a "bad boy", but who manages to raise sons successfully (with help of the "sucker", would see her genes carried to more grandchildren because of the "bad boy" genes. Hmmm. That is quite interesting.
Not being an evolutionary biologist, I can't speak knowledgeably about the representation of that strategy in observable nature, but I must say it makes sense.
(And of course, we're assuming that at lest some "bad boy" characteristics can be transmitted genetically, etc. etc.)
Good point.
> The Mideast is nuts for other reasons, which has caused them to go overboard.
Including being out in the hot desert sun too long...
> Their violent obession with extreme female modesty must spring from a sense of insecurity from most young men's poor economic prospects, and from the physical decrepitude of old men wealthy enough for a harem.
You've undoubtedly hit that nail on the head. Now, your mention of harems brings up another sidelight, which I don't claim to have an answer for, but perhaps you have some insights.
As I have heard it, in some cases, the eunuchs who guarded the harems were castrated (testicles removed) but were otherwise intact, meaning that they could perform intercourse, and presumably (since they still had prostates) could climax. But no offspring, guaranteed. (In some harems all genitalia were removed; I'm not speaking of those here.)
There was a tacit allowance whereby the eunuchs could fool around with the wives, since doing so couldn't produce false heirs to confuse the family lineage. This was allegedly viewed by the ruler of the harem as a mixed blessing -- on the one hand, other guys were boffing his wives; on the other hand, the wives were happier and entertained (important, if one has, say, 100 wives), and after all, the ruler owned the eunuchs and could have them killed if they got too out of line.
I haven't gone looking for citations on that story, but if true, it suggests that chastity was less prized than knowledge of paternity. Or it could be the story isn't true...
Although the majority of societies have accepted polygamy, that does not mean having an unlimited number of wives is a good thing.
I suspect societies that support some men wealthy enough to afford vast harems staffed by eunuchs, are societies that have exceeded the natural balance of power among their members, resulting in great poverty at one end and excess riches at the other end.
Either extreme is likely to produce aberrant behavior—so one should not take the behavior practiced by the desperately poor or the idle rich as representative of normal human behavior.
Indeed, I found that one was quite enough.
> I suspect societies that support some men wealthy enough to afford vast harems staffed by eunuchs, are societies that have exceeded the natural balance of power among their members, resulting in great poverty at one end and excess riches at the other end... Either extreme is likely to produce aberrant behaviorso one should not take the behavior practiced by the desperately poor or the idle rich as representative of normal human behavior.
That's an excellent point. Well stated!
So, let me get this straight. Euro doctors have an ethical problem with restoring the hymen with plastic surgery to disguise sexual activity, but no ethical problem with performing the abortion to disguise sexual activity?
I have heard that the hymen can be torn by doing many other things outside of sex. (Riding a horse, for instance.) To assume a woman is not a virgin based on that evidence alone is ignorant.
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