I thought this article in todays UK press The Independent was interesting
West is accused of double standards on female circumcision
By Jeremy Laurance, Health Editor
Published: 17 July 2006
A leading doctor has accused Western plastic surgeons who perform cosmetic surgery on the vagina of undermining the battle against female circumcision in other parts of the world.
Writing in the British Medical Journal, Ronan Conroy, senior lecturer at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, says the growing acceptance in Britain and elsewhere of so-called "designer vaginas" was exposing Western double standards.
"The practice of female genital mutilation is on the increase nowhere in the world except in our so-called developed societies," he writes. "Designer laser vaginoplasty" and "laser vaginal rejuvenation" are growth areas in plastic surgery, representing the latest chapter in the surgical victimisation of women in our culture."
At least three London clinics offer "vaginal tightening" after childbirth, "cosmetic vaginal surgery" and "labioplasty" - reduction of the size of the labia, advertised on the internet. Some British women travel to the US for treatment, which is carried out by gynaecologists specialising in reconstructive surgery, using a scalpel or laser.
The World Health Organisation defines female genital mutilation as: "All procedures involving partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs whether for cultural, religious or other non-therapeutic reasons."
Mr Conroy writes: "It is Western medicine which, by a process of disease mongering, is driving the advance of female genital mutilation by promoting the fear in women that what is natural biological variation is a defect."
There was an assumption by Western critics that in the developing world the practice was forced on young girls. In fact, it was often welcomed as the mark of entry into adulthood and they were proud of it, he said. "The high moral tone with which those in richer countries criticise female genital mutilation would be more credible if we in the North had not practised and did not continue to practise it," he added.
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I think this is back to that whole new thang of women now no longer looking like REAL women but these strange praying mantis with huge fake lips and fake breasts and botoxed faces and tidy labia cunts. It's all rather alien.... funny how the pinga plastic surgery didn't catch on as much!