mass sterilisation of women in Uzbekistan

[WillieWaggledagger]

I heard a piece on the R4 Today programme (just before 7am I think) - it was an extract from crossing continents at 11am today

Utterly horrifying stories of population control by removing women's uteruses without their knowledge after two children. They also mentioned that Western govts are removing sanctions against the country for human rights abuses so that they can use routes to Afghanistan

Read about this earlier. Quite terrifying how easily these women's rights have been taken away.

What the fuck! This is outrageous.

In the feature I read from the BBC it also mentioned that 80% of women have c-sections when giving birth. Yet this sterilization programme is, in part, to reduce maternal and infant deaths. Over medicalisation couldn't be the issue. Handing birth back to women couldn't be considered.

The fact that doctors think that and sterilizing women without their knowledge is OK demonstrates how entrenched male privilege is. No mention if sterilizing men. No mention of stopping men sticking their dicks into women. No the obvious solution is to take away women's rights.

God this is horrific. And the complete dismissal of any contravention of human rights issue to improve routes into Afghanistan is just awful. Human rights are only an issue when they affect men it seems. Women are not human. Just like the talks to create an agreement with the Taliban that completely failed to take into account the way they treat women because peace for the 'population' (women obviously not part of it then) was more 'important'.

and on so many levels.

Bloody hell.

Abigail in the piece I heard this morning (haven't listened to crossing continents as am at work) it was during the c-sections that the uteruses were removed.

An (anonymous) Uzbekistan doctor said that they are given monthly (I think, possibly annual) quotas of how many women they must sterilise.

Also they said that lots of men subsequently leave their wives because they believe the woman secretly asked for the sterilisation

Yes Willie. I was really trying to describe the juxtaposition of sterilizing women through c-sections in order to help reduce maternal mortality without apparently looking at the high rate of c-sections as a cause of higher mortality rates. It is all a bit screwed up!

The quotas thing is terrifying. And it doesn't surprise me that men blame the women. When women's rights are taken away from us it is generally our fault.

Can't they castrate the men after they've impregnated a woman twice?

Note to peanut gallery - that's a joke (with a serious point in it)

Well exactly Nyac. That would be so outrageous you have to point out it as a joke.

Probably more difficult Nyac as it's a more difficult to keep track of a father than a mother. The man can get someone pregnant fuck off somewhere and no one will know he has a child or how many.

Well then they should try a bit harder. If they can make the effort to remove women's wombs, surely they can track down men and get them with a pair of bricks. Castration is a much safer procedure than hysterectomy.

Anyway quite a lot of these women will be accompanied to the delivery room by their husbands. So whilst she's in labour, the surgeons can get on with the bollock removal.

Of course they could just give them vasectomies, but it sounds like the Uzbekis are going the medieval route.

I doubt they care that much, and laziness is involved why go to all the trouble of tracking down some elusive man who may or may not be the father as you will firstly have to confirm paternity. When the woman is going to come to the hospitals anyway and you know she is the mother since she is the one giving birth.

Obviously this is not right.

Sorry but it has fuck all to do with laziness and everything to do with misogyny.

It's horrifying and similar happens in more places than you might think. In Mexico lots of public hospitals, for example, have a policy of inserting the coil into women right after they have given birth, with or without their consent. Sometimes even without their knowledge. Now this isn't as outrageous as forced sterilisation I in the sense that inserting a coil and a hysterectomy are two very different procedures with different risks and one is reversible. However, it is not good medical practise to insert a coil postpartum because it can impede the processes the uterus goes through in the weeks following birth. It is also not an overwhelming reliable contraceptive method. It is well documented that women who don't know they have the coil have gone on to get pregnant: putting their lives in risk and inducing miscarriages. Also I know of various cases where the woman has died from complications derived from the too early insertion of a coil.
The whole subject of medical "professionals" deciding about a woman's fertility and presuming to know what is best for them makes my blood boil.