by Katie
The vagina felt like the last vestige. The bit of the female body that was not attacked on a daily basis, not like the stomach, the skin, the breasts or the behind. At least it was protected by an element of taboo, the one that's not allowed on the front of FHM or Maxim magazine.
But the demands for vaginoplasties, labial rejuvenations and other cosmetic surgeries are increasing dramatically. The last vestige has been hit. We're voluntarily having it cut, nipped and sliced for the patriarchal voyeur, and paying for the privilege too. Historically, the vagina has been exploited as something dangerous, something criminal to be constrained and controlled; in certain cultures female circumsicions continue to be a cultural device aimed at girls before they become women (in fact, female genital mutilation [FGM] is obviously not to be sidelined or marginalised. It is a horrific practice and perhaps the subject of an entirely different article because it deserves full attention).
Katie, 25, waits for the third wave of feminism in the UK, whilst trying to keep her self esteem political and healthy against all odds.
She graduated from Goldsmiths College in 2006.Meanwhile, "[The website] Plasticsurgerybeverleyhills says that the demands for these procedures (vaginoplasty or vaginal rejuvenation) is increasing. The surgeries are not designed to heighten sexual pleasure; they are designed to exclusively render the vagina more "attractive", warning that large labia can give a 'ragged appearance' to a vagina if not 'corrected'." (Levy, 23: 2006). The BUPA website asks you to consult the online nurse so you can "look the way you've always wanted".
They are saying my vagina should be 'corrected' because one of my labia's is a little on the large side. They're saying I should pay a great deal of money, not so I can increase my pleasure or heighten my orgasm but to please the ‘voyeur' of my vagina.
Scarring from these procedures could numb sexual pleasure even more, so not only will it not make sex more fun, the procedure will lessen my enjoyment! Please tell me who benefits from these 'procedures' and why the voyeur relationship is more significant than a woman's own relationship with her vagina, or the sensations she feels?
Has society taken the 'woman' or the 'female experience' out of the vagina, and laid it out like silly putty for everyone else to play with? To mould to their liking? This admittedly has happened to the rest of the western female body but surely the vagina is different - the last vestige - because it's tucked away, it is discrete and not on show like how other body parts are dissected and pillaged.
On V-day 2006, London, I saw the Vagina Monologues at my post grad college. There, I saw chocolate vaginas, and clay models women had made of their vaginas too - I loved the openness (vaginal and emotional). I loved shouting "Cunt" with a hundred other individuals. It was my first collective experience of feminism and my single experience of seeing the different shapes and the varying beauty of the vagina.
It's not like women are being forced at gunpoint to get their labia slashed and their innards sculpted to another's vision. So why are women remaining estranged from their vaginas or having bad self-image cultivated toward that part of their body, potentially ending in reconstructing it to someone else's ideal - whose fault is it and what makes it happen?
It is very difficult to experience the joy in variety or difference when all we get is one version or images which have been waxed, cut and snipped, moulded and photo-shopped to one persons ideal. If this ideal is perpetuated through the image it eventually gets perpetuated by the women who have themselves cosmetically enhanced and constructed.
Some women feel nothing but shame. Some women still see their vaginas as being more connected to their partner or their husband than connected to themselves. Some want to ignore its existence entirely. There is great pain in mocking or humiliation directed towards the genitals and it often comes to women from men in the shape of ridiculing how they smell, how they look, their natural hair, forcefully oppressing how it desires to feel and censoring the images we can have available.
I would like to call out for more images of real vaginas, more joy for and enjoyment in real vaginas, and copies of the Vagina Monologues to make its way into every school in the UK and beyond.
The more we enjoy variety and difference the less time we waste, and the less of our money we spend on moulding our vagina for another person's pleasure.
"Hands off."
Picture: via Lamithyuvo flickR
