Population Matters-USA – Page 17 – working for a sustainable world

Different types of Female Genital Mutilation

I have often heard that the need to reduce population growth in African countries is less important than in rich countries because consumption is so much lower in Africa. It is true that the impact of a person in Africa is much less than someone in a rich country, however there are important but different reasons for Africans to reduce their fertility.

Although the average footprint of a person in Africa is small, there are already more feet than the land can bear in some places. Slowing population growth there will help people be healthier, happier and more productive. Traditions exist that are harmful to women and also lead to high fertility. These injurious traditions may have had their function in the past, but they have no place in the 21^st century.

In the past I was a cultural relativist. I believed that the practices in other cultures shouldn’t be evaluated by our standards. When I learned about Female Genital Mutilation, I changed my mind. If one believes that girls and women deserve the same respect as boys and men, one cannot be a cultural relativist.

FMG is practiced by many cultures in Africa. It consists of removing part or most of the external genitalia of girls. It is usually done without anesthesia and often with a dirty blade.When the margins of the vulva are separated by the (brutal) slicing, acacia needles are used to hold them together. Think of the agony FMG survivors suffer! Some victims die from blood loss or infection. The pain returns during intercourse and childbirth if the vaginal opening has been sewn nearly shut. Fortunately, there are many organizations in Africa that are working to get rid of FMG. Often they substitute another, more benign, coming-of-age ritual for girls.

Child marriage is another damaging custom of some African cultures. Typically, the girl’s arranged marriage is shortly after she starts to menstruate, and she is forced to wed a man many years older than she. A girlchild is considered a burden in many societies, so the best way to get unburdened is to marry her off. Worse, rape of a young girl is not uncommon. Since virginity is a requirement for marriage in many societies, the girl’s parents force their daughter to marry her rapist. The pitiable girl is thus dominated by her husband for the rest of her life.

The psychological effects on a girl who is married as a young teen must be terrible, however the physical effects can be fatal. Her pelvis may be too small to give birth if she conceives before her bones have finished growing. Obstructed labor may kill the fetus—resulting in a stillbirth. Sometimes pressure of the fetal head against the girl’s pelvis blocks blood flow to the girl’s tissues. The dead flesh dissolves, forming a hole through which pee and/or poop can pour.

You might think that child marriage and FGM don’t exist in the USA, but that is wrong. Some immigrants practice both. In addition, some non-immigrant groups have allowed early marriage, often in response to early teen pregnancies. Delaware was our first state to ban marriage before age 18, only 4 years ago. Women who marry young tend to have more children and seldom advance far in education.

Both child marriage and FGM are means of subjugating women; so is cutting short their education. Another way power is taken away from women is the absence of something we take for granted—clean and safe toilet facilities at schools. Many girls quit school after their period starts because their school lacks adequate, private toilet facilities.

Where girls and women are treated as inferior, they have little control over their lives. They don’t have power over what happens to the most personal parts of their bodies, nor when or whom they marry. They may not say when they have sex, nor limit the number of children they bear, nor use contraception if they want to.

Many organizations work to empower African women by putting an end to child marriage and FGM. One favorite is the Population Media Center, which has made great advances in education about these evils.

Although I am not an anthropologist and have spent only a little time in Africa, these seem to be some reasons that the population is growing so rapidly there. In the future I’ll write about religions which encourage large families, and about overpopulation causing famine—one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.

The map above, from Wikipedia, shows the extent of the Russian invasion as of 3/15/22

“We believe that widespread, effective and voluntary use of medically sound and individually acceptable birth control is an essential factor in any humane design to raise world living standards and achieve international peace.”

I read these words in Scientific American in 1960. It was close enough to World War II that I knew about the quest for the Germans for “lebensraum”, so it made intuitive sense.

Hitler was envious of the people who left Europe and settled the Americas. Immigrants were treated to unspoiled forests and fertile land, unlike what they had left behind in Europe. Those settlers used murder, disease and starvation to rid the land of the indigenous people who were already there. We descendants benefitted hugely from the Americas’ resources.

As part of the “Masterplan for the East”, Hitler and the Nazis invaded what is now Poland, Ukraine and other countries. This genocidal plot was to get rid the of the inhabitants of the rich land to the east and replace them with Germans. Fortunately, however, the Nazis were fighting on other fronts and the masterplan was only partially accomplished. Starvation, outright murder and disease were the Nazi tools of extermination.

The Russians took over after WW II, using similar techniques of annihilation. Stalin was just as cruel as the Nazis, and perhaps even more successful in killing. Although millions died, it was more than just luck that some survived. Survivors used whatever means they could to eke out a living. In 2008 my wife and I visited western Ukraine and met a distant family member who had been an OB-GYN in a town similar in size to Durango. (I have changed the family’s names.) Dimitri Kovalenko’s mother and grandmother planted plum trees during Stalin’s reign of terror, and sold prunes to pay Dimitri’s medical school tuition. After graduation, Dimitri was able to build two homes, one for his mother and the other where he raised his family.

When we visited, Dimitri’s wife, Iryna, was still working parttime as a pediatrician. Their two daughters, Kira and Natasha, were both in the same town. Kira, also a physician, lived in the house that Dimitri had built for his mother, a short walk away. Natasha had recently moved from Kherson, a large city to the south, to be with her elderly parents.

Kira’s husband, also a gynecologist, gave me a tour of the local hospital. The hospital was similar in many ways to what I was used to, but with some major differences. I remember a patient’s room as being drab, with no TV, and the equipment was similar to what we had in the USA 30 years earlier.

I have stayed in touch with this family. Dimitri’s health continued to deteriorate; he died 3 years ago. Iryna retired to help take care of him—she is now in her 80s. When the Russian invasion started, Kira and Natasha decided to leave Ukraine any way they could. Sasha wanted to stay in her home, understanding well the horrors she that might face. Fortunately, she has neighbors who will help take care of her.

The two younger women left Ukraine with only a small bag each, not knowing what the future held for them. They made their way to Moldova, then to Rumania and are now in Germany. They are safe there, living in the home of some kind strangers. Fortunately, they have had our help and the help of a friend who speaks German. I imagine that most of the Ukrainian refugees have no one who can translate for them, nor much money, nor friends in the USA to assist them.

US media talk about the millions of refugees from Ukraine. For me it is much more personal, knowing Dimitri’s family.

Many wars are over resources. Putin may want to take over the Ukraine’s rich agriculture and natural resources, including uranium, or it is possible that he is trying to reconstitute the Russian empire. What is clear is that Putin is a megalomaniac, and cannot be trusted. I don’t know if overpopulation is playing a part in the invasion of Ukraine, but in general, more people lead to more conflict.