Lets talk about… body modification
This is such a wide and diverse topic. Controversial. Like boiling a frog we are comfortable with the gentle cooler manifestations of the practice, but are we in danger of boiling alive as the accepted mutilations become more extreme?
Body modification is defined as the deliberate altering of the human body for non-medical reasons, such as sexual enhancement, a rite of passage, aesthetic reasons or self-expression.
Most of us think of female genital mutilation or facial piercing when we think of body modification. But these are only the more extreme manifestations of a sliding scale. Cutting our hair and piercing our ears don’t really register as body modification, but indeed they are. The list of body modifications the ‘regular’ western woman may willfully undergo, many on a regular basis, is huge:
- Hair cut
- Hair perm
- Hair straightening
- Hair colouring
- Eyebrow shape
- Underarm hair removal
- Leg hair removal
- Pubic hair removal
- Arm/face hair removal
- Manicure
- Pedicure
- Tanning/ Melanin pills
- Ear piercing
- Belly piercing
- Tattooing
- Breast implants/Breast lift
- Tummy tuck
- Liposuction
- Botox
- Tattooed makeup
I know I am ‘guilty’ of a number of the above. I don’t know a woman who isn’t. Even my grandma vainly perms her hair and during the second world war stained her legs to mimic the appearance of her absent stockings. We do these things of our own volition - willingly following the conventions of our culture. Endlessly making ourselves more attractive to our desired mates. Continually pandering to, for the most part, the male gaze.
We do it to feel beautiful, often without thought as to why these arbitrary characteristics are deemed beautiful. Why is it that perky breasts, shaven armpits and pubic mounds are beautiful when they effectively rob a woman of her womanhood and visually return her to the realm of a child. Are women more attractive when they appear less fertile, less powerful?
We do it because it is what women do, unaware of the point when we made the decision that these standards are sufficiently important they are worth painfully or permanently altering our bodies to achieve them. How is this forgotten decision any different from mothers in Cameroon who Iron their pubescent daughters’ breasts with hot stones? Or the 2 million mothers world-wide who help hold down their daughters as their clitoris is removed, by way of an initiation into womanhood and to curb their sexual desires (often with no anesthetic).
Yes these are extreme, but the recent internal bra (soon to become a part of a breast lift) is equally as painful and unnecessary. It is only more palatable to our delicate sensibilities because it is performed by doctors in hospitals on consenting adults.
My question is this: If clitorises were removed, in the pristine theater of a renown plastic surgeon, would we find it any less offensive?
