The vagina dialogues

Says Catherine Blackledge, whose book The Story of V was published two decades ago because her fuddy-duddy – not to mention male – publishers had a heart attack when she wanted ‘vagina’ in the title: ‘I think there’s a moment that every person born with a vagina shares, and that is when you realise that you are treated differently to people who have a penis, that you are not treated with the same level of respect.’

Therein perhaps lies the crux, the nubbin, of all gender inequality issues. The male genitalia has the gravitas and microphone that female genitalia never came by easily.

In a new novel Hijab, translated into English by Pavan N Rao, author Guruprasad Kaginele takes into account female genital mutilation (FGM), also known as female circumcision, and the related complications, both gynecological and psychological. Two methods, sunnah and pharaon, are mentioned, that leave in their wake long medical struggles against any such cultural practices and established traditions.

Women themselves are slow to pick up arms. No one wants to rebel, especially when the battlefield is that unmentionable, that low down, that ‘disrespectable’. Who will fight its battles? It is left to a few good doctors who shadow box in the aftermath of such beliefs, their terrain uphill and often dangerous.

Originally a barbaric armament in reining a particular gender, FGM is also a war cry against vaginas and their capacity for pleasure, their latent inherent power. As Blackledge says, ‘We feel negative about our genitalia, because it seems to be the source of why we are treated differently.’

Oh yes, the V was getting a rather douche reputation. Someone had to intervene and who best but the V people.

Naomi Wolf, who describes female rape as a variant of male castration, says in her book Vagina: “The vulva, clitoris, and vagina are actually best understood as the surface of an ocean that is shot through with vibrant networks of underwater lightning — intricate and fragile, individually varied neural pathways.”

Despite their physical structure laid bare around 1672, there is a generic interest only in their emotional nature, which rarely puts them in the driver’s seat. Nicknamed Upright Wink, Verenda, Fairy, Red Wagon, Garage, Pussy, etc., it is obvious that women used to take their cue from male vocab to self-describe.

Be it pleasure or politics, time to snatch our manuals from enemy hands.