The surgery in the private clinic off the Champs-Élysées involved one semicircular cut, 10 self-dissolving stitches and a discounted fee of $2,900.
But for the patient, a 23-year-old French student of Moroccan descent from Montpellier, the 30-minute procedure represented the key to a new life: the illusion of virginity.
Like an increasing number of other Muslim women in Europe, she had a “hymenoplasty,” a restoration of her hymen, the thin vaginal membrane that normally breaks during the first act of intercourse.
“In my culture, not to be a virgin is to be dirt,” said the student, perched on a hospital bed as she awaited surgery Thursday. “Right now, virginity is more important to me than life.”
Does anyone know whether Muslim men are held to the same standard?
And if such attitudes and tihs “remedy” were discovered among people of a religious community in Texas, e.g.?
Uh … if virginity is “more important to me than life,” why didn’t she remain one until married? If virginity was not that important that she didn’t remain one, why is she spending that sort of money to meet the needs of an oppressive Muslim cultural issue? Shesh, one or the other lady.
Brian
I can see the value of this in cases of rape, however. Otherwise, it’s just another way of lying to ease ones conscience and decieve ones partner.
Simul iustus et peccator” – “At the same time righteous and a sinner”
If we don’t see that we are covered by Jesus’ righteousness we will do strange things to try to create the illusion of righteousness. Mt5:48
Interesting: In one culture, viriginity means everything. In our culture, it supposedly means nothing. The pendulum has swung too far.
Just wondering:
will there be a religous rite to go along with this: “the rite of restoration” perhaps?
Rape or no either way it is false. This is just sick. If a woman is raped and becomes pregnant do you abort the fetus/baby? IMHO NO! What is done is done no matter whether it is by choice or by force. The act can not be taken back so why would one want to compound the problem by adding a falsehood or a killing?
“Uh … if virginity is “more important to me than life,†why didn’t she remain one until married? If virginity was not that important that she didn’t remain one, why is she spending that sort of money to meet the needs of an oppressive Muslim cultural issue? Shesh, one or the other lady.”
What a judgmental attitude. Let he who is without sin throw the first stone…
Oh Please Justin, she’s the one quoted that virginity was more important than life. Unless she was raped, something to which the story does not tilt, then she made a CHOICE to no longer be a virgin. It’s called the consequences of one’s actions. Who’s throwing stones?
So which is it, more important than life … or something that needs to be corrected before she meets the man of her dreams? OR, if she’s afraid what some future Muslim man will say … and given her prior choice … why would she seek a husband from that culture in the first place? All very convoluted and as another poster suggested, her marriage will begin with a lie before they even walk down the aisle.
Brian
This looks to me like yet another attempt to use surgery to make women’s bodies conform to men’s fantasies.
Libraryjim and ODC: Is it falsehood? Yes. But it’s obviously a falsehood born of great despair. The falsehood may not be justified, but it points to a greater injustice. I mean the injustice that makes a woman feel she has no live options besides lying through cosmetic surgery and truth-telling resulting in ostracism. Haven’t we met this woman in the 4th chapter of St. John’s Gospel? So used that no man would take her as a wife; so despised that she’d rather suffer in her body than suffer public shame (i.e. would rather draw water when it’s hot than draw it when the other women were at the well.)
Brian of MD: people change. I don’t know about you, but I sure did some things when I was young that I now wish I had not done. And I cherish things now that I thought were valueless when I was young. I think the Gospel both predicts my shameful behavior and celebrates my repentance. If we condemn these women and say “you made your bed, now lie in it,” how are we any different from the Muslim men who say the same thing. Shouldn’t we be saying something — out loud — about repentance, mercy, grace, forgiveness? The woman at the well knew she was sinful; these Muslim women probably know it as well, but hope to avoid suffering a far worse cultural penalty for their sin than men in their community will ever suffer for their own sin.
This surgery is perverse, and so is a culture that insists on this standard for women, while easily ignoring it for men. “Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.” Not a promise, but a part of the curse.
[blockquote] So which is it, more important than life … or something that needs to be corrected before she meets the man of her dreams? [/blockquote]
It may be life itself for her. She may not have to choose between marriage with the support of her community and singleness with the rejection of her community. How many of us would have the courage to walk away from the protection and comforts of our culture?
[blockquote]OR, if she’s afraid what some future Muslim man will say … and given her prior choice … why would she seek a husband from that culture in the first place?[/blockquote]
Who _doesn’t_ seek a spouse, or friends, or fellowship from the culture they grew up in? Again – to walk away from everything you know is not only extremely difficult, for many people it does not even pass through their imagination. One of the things an evangelist does is to suggest changes to people that they had not even considered earlier.
[blockquote]All very convoluted and as another poster suggested, her marriage will begin with a lie before they even walk down the aisle. [/blockquote]
Yes, but who owns the lie? The woman who has the surgery or the man who says “I love you” but means “I love your virginity”? Once again, we cannot put all this off on the woman. We generally hold those in power to be more responsible than those who serve them in ignorance and weakness. If a culture keeps its women ignorant and weak, it must surely share some of the blame for the wrongs those women commit as a result.
Oops. Omit the “not” from the second sentence in #11.
Shall I remark that for countless centuries women have been using every available means to make themselves out to be something that they are not? And look, #10 tells us this is all men’s fault! Shame on us. Women are, it appears, unable to make decisions for themselves, and it is because of men’s coarse and peccant tastes that they puff up their breasts, Botox their foreheads, puff up their lips, vacuum off their fat, dye their hair and some more things only I forget what right now. And it is so effective! Look at all the men they catch thereby!
A fake hymen is a fake just as fake breasts are a fake. And we note that now men do the same things: color the hair, puff up the abs, get hair transplants, vacuum off the fat, and get waxed. And of course, we all note that these wretched human-substitutes do not mind lying to themselves with impunity and so do not mind lying to others. Do you suppose this sorry woman will not REALLY think that she has her maidenhead back and that all is sweet and sound and just as it used to be? How American the fake maidenhead is! Everyday let us make ourselves anew… often literally! #!0 cites the Bible at the end. Is it possible the Bible has a more penetrating, a sounder view of fundamental human nature than #10? L
Larry,
Thank you. You’re exactly on target. Blame the culture… blame youthful indiscretions … blame men because it’s what they want, but certainly don’t ever acknowledge individual choice and consequences and the truth that lies beneath the physical exterior. Shesh.
Brian
Read to the end of the article, y’all. This particular woman says that she wasn’t able to procure the certificate of virginity, which means she went to a doctor previously, [i]expecting[/i] to receive one. She recalled an incident when she was 10 yrs. old, horseback riding, which produced blood pre-puberty. True or not, who knows? I’m giving her the benefit of a doubt.
#15, that’s why it’s always good to “read it all” before commenting, something I myself don’t always do.
I’m not sure why we need to assign “blame” at all. Yes, cultural norms are incredibly powerful. Yes, people make their own choices. I do think Laocoon has the best approach. Whether the ultimate citation is valid, the reference to the woman at the well, I think, is rather powerful (the woman in John 8 also comes to mind). None of this is for us to judge, at least not so quickly…based on an article, particularly when most of us didn’t “read it all”.
I can’t believe the amount of male chauvinistic hyperpiety I see in some of these responses!
You ask why she simply didn’t remain a virgin since “virginity was more important than life.” Sorry, life is full of bad choices and I submit that, like Laocoon writes we have ALL “things when I was young that I now wish I had not done.”
Let him who is without sin cast the first stone.
And remember: It has only been in the last few decades that women could take any sort of charge over their lives.
I suspect that a non-Christian who encountered this thread would find very little in it to make Christianity seem at all welcoming, Jesus-like, or compelling. Much strident judgmentalism; minimal unconditional love.
I have a great deal of empathy for the woman in this articl. She is a victim of her own actions, and those of a totally perverted society.
Living a lie as she is planning to do will not bring happiness, because she knows the truth. It might save face for her family, but she has to live with the truth. This is why many people turn to alcohol, rugs, and suicide, because they can not handle their personal truth. I have no sympathy though, because she created the circumstances. That said, has anyone offered her any alternative, such as Christianity? She could be forgiven, but never could be a virgin again. As some of the bumper stickers say, Christians are NOT perfect, just forgiven.
Dr Joan,
Well, if we’re going to start flipping around the warmed-over 70’s labels … what does it mean when we put choice, feminism and virginity into the bag of personhood, shake firmly, and out spills a demand for compassion toward those who make this sort of decision? The fact that a clinic is prepared to make money off of women who want to “undo” their choices so they’ll be more attractive to men is, IMHO, the real culprit here.
So rather than simply come at this as a problem of lacking Christian charity and way too much overt judgment, perhaps some here could examine what it means that women will spend that kind of money just so they will “fit in.” If they were willing to engage in sexual activity, why are they now hoping to turn back the clock on those decisions and why would they want to? I would have thought the feminists here would spend more time whacking a culture that forces her to consider such a procedure in order to find a mate. And since the article suggests she’s living in France, maybe the problem is the larger secularized understanding of sexuality that is also part of the problem, yes? So I remain unconvinced. If virginity is so important in that culture, why are women taking that risk OR even more importantly, why are they willingly going back into that culture where they’ll like raise another generation of similarly confused daughters?
Brian
[blockquote]”In my culture, not to be a virgin is to be dirt,” said the student, perched on a hospital bed as she awaited surgery Thursday. “Right now, virginity is more important to me than life.”[/blockquote]
In many Middle Eastern countries, and even in immigrant Muslim communities in Europe, for a woman to not be a virgin may literally mean death, and it would be justifiable for the family to kill her to restore the family honor. (Thankfully, these cases are being prosecuted more often.) The publicity surrounding the rejected French bride may have prevented an honor killing. Don’t forget that when Mary came back from her visit with Elizabeth visibly six months pregnant, Joseph may even have saved her life by allowing the community to think that Jesus was his own. So–did this make him a liar?
[blockquote] Shall I remark that for countless centuries women have been using every available means to make themselves out to be something that they are not? And look, #10 tells us this is all men’s fault![/blockquote]
Larry Morse, are you intentionally misreading what I wrote? I said no such thing. Just because I refuse to put all the blame on women doesn’t mean I therefore put it all on men.
[blockquote] #!0 cites the Bible at the end. Is it possible the Bible has a more penetrating, a sounder view of fundamental human nature than #10? L[/blockquote]
I believe that the Bible [i]does[/i] have a “more penetrating, a sounder view of fundamental human nature” than I do, yes. That’s why I take it as authoritative. But what’s your point? My point in that last line is related to my point in the first line (I refer to my #10 post): women’s bodies are repeatedly conformed to men’s desires. The Bible, in Genesis, describes this as one of the outcomes of our sin. Whose fault is it? All of ours. Who takes the blame? We all try to put it off on someone else: the woman you put here with me, the serpent, and so on. Maybe we should begin to recognize that all cultures suffer from this malady and try to do something about it. The NT tells us that a woman’s beauty should not come from outward things but inward things; but our culture is just as guilty as this Franco-muslim culture of demanding that women pay more attention to outward beauty.
Now, before you go off on a rant, let me point out that in that last sentence, you can only read me as blaming only men if you think that only men constitute culture. In which case, you are a case in point.
If when men first had sex, one of their ears fell off, they too would be looking for plastic surgery, before they met the in-laws.
Two books on the subject are:
Princess by Jean Sasson
Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali
#1 Ralph,
No, men are not held to the same standard. In some of the Arabian Gulf countries, sons are doted on to the point of semi-divinity. It is not uncommon for females to be ‘procured’ for Saudi boys from foreign countries and turned into virtual sex slaves. Unfortunately, in most of the Muslim world, women and girls (particularly foreigners) are still little more than property – sons are everything.
rehtorical question:
Where is the feminist outrage at such a societal standard?
My daughter had a friend whose parents were from Syria (or was it THEIR parents from Syria) who upon graduation from high school was forced into an arranged marriage with a man 20 years her senior, and forced to move to Arizona after the marriage, leaving all of her friends and family behind.
When my daughter asked her how she, as an American, could agree to something like this, her friend replied “I’m not American, I’m Syrian”.
Again, where is the feminist outrage? There should be protesting in the streets!
Jim Elliott