I was not going to post today, but this left me speechless:
'Breast ironing' to stunt girls' growth widespread
1 in 4 girls in Cameroon suffer this abuse to protect against rape
Worried that her daughters' budding breasts would expose them to the risk of sexual harassment and even rape, their mother Philomene Moungang started 'ironing' the girls' bosoms with a heated stone.
"I did it to my two girls when they were eight years old. I would take the grinding stone, heat it in the fire and press it hard on the breasts," Moungang said.
"They cried and said it was painful. But I explained that it was for their own good."
A new survey has revealed it is shockingly widespread in Cameroon, where one in four teenagers are subjected to the traumatic process by relatives, often hoping to lessen their sexual attractiveness.
"Breast ironing is an age-old practice in Cameroon, as well as in many other countries in West and Central Africa, including Chad, Togo, Benin, Guinea-Conakry, just to name a few," said Flavien Ndonko, an anthropologist and local representative of German development agency GTZ, which sponsored the survey.
"If society has been silent about it up to now it is because, like other harmful practices done to women such as female genital mutilation, it was thought to be good for the girl," said Ndonko.
"Even the victims themselves thought it was good for them."
A presentation of the study can be found here (also for download in powerpoint format here). Renata, the NGO that ran this study, in cooperation with the German DTZ governmental organisation has a website, mostly in French, where they explain their efforts to help fight AIDS and other sexual diseases (and all health and social problems associated with it) by training young girls (12-18) who are already mothers to speak in schools about their situation, about sex, diseases, and to continue their own schooling.
I have not been able to find a direct link to contribute, but you can subscribe to their newsletter here or write to them here.
Because, as we all know, rapes happen because girls are too attractive, or too provocative, or because they lust after young men, and it's for their own good that this, like genital mutilation, has to be done to them.
These stories are never ending. Remember these, from not so long ago?
My husband does not give me food
Science Friday: Thank Heaven For Little Girls
I'm sure there are more such - wholly unnecessary - horror stories. The first thing we can do to help is spread the information, and make sure more people hear about these things. Then help the associations on the ground, and ask others to care about these things. Please pass this around.
Note: there was a previous diary on this topic two days ago, by pale cold: Torture of girls: Breast Ironing in Cameroon