I'm watching a documentary called The Perfect Vagina, about the rising trend of women having cosmetic surgery on their vaginas.
It is the fastest growing area of cosmetic surgery, and seems to be predominantly due to women's concerns about the size of their labia minora. In a medical research paper referenced in the programme, we learn that labia minora range in size from 20mm to 100mm, so naturally there is a lot of variation, but it seems that the vaginas we see, especially in porn, are 'perfect' and contained and neat, with small labia minoras, and this is making many women insecure. To the point of wanting surgery to reduce theirs.
Girls of 14, 15 and 16 are enquiring about the surgery, and the numbers seeking it are unprecedented.
The operation is called a labiaplasty and it is done under local anaesthetic, the woman being awake while her labia are sliced off. It can take three months for the vagina to recover after surgery.
The presenter, Lisa Rogers was clearly moved and alarmed by the attitudes she came across, from women, from men and from medical professionals. We also saw her own changes throughout the film.
She continually wanted women to love their bodies, and their vaginas, and could see clearly that cutting bits off and stitching bits up was not any kind of answer to the problem of us feeling so pressurised by our pornified society that even intimate parts of our bodies do not look 'right' and must be brutally modified.
The whole programme made me incredibly sad. It strikes me that hating our vaginas is yet another way that our patriarchal society infiltrates our minds and destroys women. Piece by piece.
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