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Bodies Like Ours is organizing an "educational protest" against intersex genital mutilation this Friday, September 26th. The timing coincides with a scheduled surgery on a child that will be viewed by hordes of medical professionals for CME credits. According to the Connecticut Children's Medical Center, which hosts the event, Dr. Richard Rink of Indiana University School of Medicine will give a grand rounds on September 25th about "feminizing genitoplasty and total urogenital mobilization," followed by the live demonstration of the actual procedure the next day. Below is the press release from Bodies Like Ours:
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Friday's Child: Intersex Activists And Their Allies To Protest Intersex
Genital Mutilation At Connecticut Children's Medical Center
A visible, educational challenge to Concealment-Centered medical protocols that believe early cosmetic surgeries on genitals is more important than honest discussion of the facts will take place outside the Connecticut Children's Medical Center in downtown Hartford, Friday, September 26, 2003 from 7am-9am. A wrap-up news conference will be held immediately following by representatives from Bodies Like Ours, an international peer support organization for intersexed people, their families, and friends.
According to the announcement sent out by CCMC to their staff and residents, the Myron P. Walzak Visiting Professorship, features a well-known pediatric urologic surgeon, Dr. Richard Rink, whose practice includes doing intersex genital mutilations. On Thursday, Grand Rounds will be given by Rink to pediatric urology residents called, "Feminizing Genitoplasty and Total Urogenital Mobilization" On Friday, a surgical procedure is scheduled to be performed by this same surgeon with a viewing area set aside in CCMC.
One in 2,000 people are born with medical conditions that result in congenital anomalies of the reproductive and sexual system. A person with an intersex condition is born with sex chromosomes, external genitalia, or an internal reproductive system that is not considered "standard" for either male or female. Surgical 'correction' has been the standard of medical care for over 50 years, but the protocol has come under intense scrutiny as many adult survivors voice their outrage of what was done to them as children. The vast majority of these surgeries are done on infants and children for purely cosmetic reasons. Often, parents of these children are not offered full information concerning the lifelong ramifications of such surgeries.
According to Janet Green, cofounder and board member of Bodies Like Ours, "The reason the public needs to understand this issue is that it has purposely been kept from view, and there are thousands and thousands of us who are shamed, isolated, and tired of a big bad secret."
The Friday's Child action will bring attention to these horrific surgeries being performed at Connecticut Children's Medical Center and elsewhere. In hospitals throughout the United States, 5 children each day are subjected to nonconsensual cosmetic genital surgeries. CCMC is representative of every hospital that facilitates genital mutilation of infants and children whose lives will forever be physically and emotionally scarred with shame, secrecy and isolation.
Where:
Connecticut Children's Medical Center
282 Washington St, Hartford, CT
We will gather in front of the main entrance (the "glass ball")
When:
Friday, 9/26/2003 7am-9am with a press conference at 9am.
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For more information, please visit Action Alert.
Posted by Emi on Sep 24, 2003