tagged w/ Mutilation
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Discover Magazine...
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Israel Bans Cat Declawing. Punishment: One Year In Prison, $20K
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On November 28th Israel’s legislature unanimously passed a bill that outlaws the declawing of cats, except for certain medical reasons, making it a crime punishable by up to one year in prison and a fine of about $20,000 (or 75,000 shekels).
Declawing is a somewhat misleading term; in the procedure, called an onychectomy, the veterinarian typically removes all or most of the cat’s outer toe joint, bone and all. As declawing opponents have often pointed out, the human equivalent would be the amputation of your fingertips at or just above your third knuckle. Cats also use their toes/nails to walk upon; the Israel bill says the ban will help cats move around more normally, avoid certain medical complications, and defend themselves.
Declawing is not very common outside North America, and is banned in much of Europe, Australia, Turkey, Brazil, and elsewhere. It’s estimated that about 25 percent of American cats are declawed, typically done to protect the owner’s furniture. While the procedure is legal in most places in the U.S., it’s been banned in several cities in California, a state where it’s also illegal to declaw wild or exotic cats.
Scratching is done in part to mark a cat’s territory, and the animal can often be taught to use a scratching post instead of, say, your favorite armchair. Regular nail-clipping can also keep cats’ claws from doing excessive damage. Some studies have shown declawed cats to be more likely to exhibit problematic behaviors, like jumping onto tables or more frequent biting.
One study found that 20 percent of cats underwent complications, like infections, after declawing.
.Discover Magazine...
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Israel Bans Cat Declawing. Punishment: One Year In... more
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CNN...
http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/africa/07/27/cameroon.breast.ironing/index.html?hpt=hp_c1
Breast ironing tradition targeted in Cameroon
From Nkepile Mabuse, CNN
July 27, 2011 8:53 p.m. EDT
Click on photo to play video
Activists fight breast ironing tradition
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(CNN) --
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Every morning before school, nine-year-old Terisia Techu would undergo a painful procedure. Her mother would take a burning hot pestle straight out of a fire and use it to press her breasts.
With tears in her eyes as she recalls what it was like, Terisia tells CNN that one day the pestle was so hot, it burned her, leaving a mark. Now 18, she is still traumatized.
Her mother, Grace, denies the incident. But she proudly demonstrates the method she used on her daughter for several weeks, saying the goal was to make her less desirable to boys -- and stave off pregnancy.
A study found that one in four girls in Cameroon have been affected by the practice.
The U.S. State Department, in its 2010 human rights report on Cameroon, cited news reports and said breast ironing "victimized numerous girls in the country" and in some cases "resulted in burns, deformities, and psychological problems."
There are more than 200 ethnic groups in Cameroon with different norms and customs. Breast ironing is practiced by all of them.
Some mothers use hot stones or coconut shells to flatten their daughters' breasts.
Doctors believe improved diets have resulted in young Cameroonian girls going through puberty early. Many of them are also becoming pregnant early.
Terisia became pregnant at 15. Her child died at birth.
She told CNN that breast ironing doesn't work. She hates the practice and wishes her mother had instead talked to her about sex and preventing pregnancy.
Grace Techu argues that if it weren't for the breast ironing, Terisia would have become pregnant at an even younger age.
Techu has four daughters, and she used the procedure on the first two. The third avoided it because her breasts are growing at an acceptable rate, Techu says, and the fourth girl is still too young.
Mothers who want their children to finish school before becoming parents have resorted to this drastic measure, and many see nothing wrong with it.
In 2006, a German nongovernmental organization exposed the practice, which at the time was done mainly in secret.
Now, charities have embarked on campaigns to educate mothers in Cameroon that sex education -- not breast ironing -- is the solution to ending teenage pregnancy.
Dr Sinou Tchana, a gynecologist in Cameroon, has seen breast glands that were destroyed. She also saw one case of cancer, though she says it couldn't be established whether the ironing caused or only exacerbated the cancer.
"One mother came with secondary burns because the stone she was using to do this breast ironing burned her," Tchana says.
One of Tchana's patients is a 23-year-old whose scars are still painful 14 years after her breasts were ironed. She has joined the effort to confront mothers about the effects of their actions.
The challenge for all those trying to stop the practice is reaching parents like Techu in villages before a ritual that they say is motivated by love shatters more lives.
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CNN's Josh Levs contributed to this report.CNN...... more
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suzane
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1 year ago
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When most of us think of female genital mutilation, we probably think of faraway places. Well, peel off those blinders. In 1997, our very own Department of Health and Human Services estimated that 168,000 girls and women living in the United States had been or were at risk of being subjected to some form of the abhorrent practice known as female genital mutilation (FGM).
Not only is FGM being practiced relatively widely in the United States, it's happening in the most hallowed halls of American medical science. In fact, the head of the pediatric urology department at Cornell University's New York Presbyterian Hospital -- which is often ranked among the top 10 hospitals in the country -- has been operating on young girls who suffer from what he (and likely the girls' guardians) have decided is "clitorimegaly," or oversized clitorises.
In order to relieve these girls from what seems like little more than a cosmestic issue, Dr. Dix P. Poppas cuts out parts of the clitoris' shaft, saving the glans, or tip, for reattachment. Poppas triumphantly calls the procedure -- rebranded a clitoroplasty -- a "nerve sparing" one unlike the FGMs practiced in other countries.
How does the good doctor know that nerves have been spared? Well, Poppas and his nurse practitioner developed a series of sensory followup tests involving Q-tips, their fingernails and vibrators. But don't worry, a family member was always present in the room. As the resulting journal article notes, management of such situations requires a "compassionate and multidisciplinary approach."
Activists Alice Dreger and Ellen K. Feder, a professor of medical humanities and bioethics and a professor of philosophy, respectively, have been railing against the practice of FGM -- of any kind -- for a decade. They are part of the majority medical view that questions the very basis of clitoroplasties. (The American Academy of Pediatrics disturbingly stated in May that it only had an issue with "all types of female genital cutting that pose risks of physical or psychological harm" -- as if any kind of clitoral mutilation did not necessarily entail such harm. The AAP recanted the shocking affront to women's physical and mental health only a few weeks later.)
"We still know of no evidence that a large clitoris increases psychological risk (so is the surgery even necessary?), and we do know of substantial anecdotal evidence that it does not increase risk. Importantly, there also seems to be evidence that clitoroplasties performed in infancy do increase risk – of harm to physical and sexual functioning, as well as psychosocial harm," Dreger and Feder wrote in an article lambasting Poppas' study.
These procedures seem motivated mostly by an obsession with having "normal" genitalia -- and normal kids. The fact that cosmetic genital surgery is on the rise is one sign of this. And given that only one of every 2,000 infants is born with genital ambiguity, parents faced with an "abnormal" clitoris are not likely to have ever seen one before and may react with trepidation. Will my kid be a lesbian? Will my little girl want to become a boy? We know children are all unique, like snowflakes, but when it comes to vaginas, sexual orientation and gender identity, it seems we'd prefer cookie-cutter, please.
So parents go to Dr. Poppas who mirrors their fears and offers a medical procedure that Cornell's Web site recommends "because female patients are able to undergo a more natural psychological and sexual development." What parent would withhold such treatment, recommended by a top-notch pediatrician and hospital?
(more @ link)When most of us think of female genital mutilation, we probably think of faraway... more
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Farmers in the Shrewsbury area have been finding some of their sheep dead and strangely mutilated. Farmers claim to have witnessed sheep being “lasered” by unidentified light from UFOs. They claim to have even WITNESSED unsuspecting sheep being zapped by two of the spheres.
http://www.ufo-blogger.com/2010/04/uk-ufo-sheep-mutilations.htmlFarmers in the Shrewsbury area have been finding some of their sheep dead and... more
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Hundreds of members of the LGBT community and the ACLU have taken to the streets, and lobbied the state in Puerto Rico to treat the brutal murder of 19 year old Jorge Steven López Mercado as a hate crime. They say that they want the confessed murderer, Juan A. Martínez, made an example of and that the state has a history of not following its own hate crime statutes.
The state has agreed to investigate this crime with added hate crimes enhancement.
Martinez has confessed to killing Lopez Mercado, who he picked up on the road for sex and beat and killed after discovering that the prostitute he had picked up, was actually a man in drag. Using the "gay panic" defense, Martinez says he hates homosexuals because he was sexually abused in prison on a prior conviction, for which he had just been released.
Jorge Steven López Mercado's body was found 2 weeks ago partially burned, decapitated and dismembered in a ditch. He was popular in the gay scene, and had aspirations of becoming a designer.
On Current:
http://current.com/items/91468444_gay-teen-found-dismembered-burned-and-decapitated-in-puerto-rico.htm
http://current.com/items/91468160_horrific-hate-crime-terrorizes-the-gay-community-in-puerto-rico.htm
More on Nuevo Dia (in Spanish):
http://www.elnuevodia.com/XStatic/endi/template/content.aspx?se=nota&id=641128
More on Primea Hora (in Spanish):
http://current.com/http://www.primerahora.com/diario/noticia/policia/noticias/confiesa_crimen_de_odio_asesino_del_joven_homosexual/344856
More on Towleroad:
http://current.com/http://www.towleroad.com/2009/11/man-arrested-in-horrific-murder-of-puerto-rican-gay-teen.html
More on Boy in Bushwick:
http://boyinbushwick.blogspot.com/2009/11/puerto-rican-authorities-agree-to.html
Photo Credit: Primera HoraHundreds of members of the LGBT community and the ACLU have taken to the streets, and... more
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We've all heard the stories about witch trials: A man or woman is accused of being a witch, goes through a "trial", and ends up hanged or burned at the steak.
Sounds like your 10th grade history class all over again, right?
WRONG.
In Nigera (among other places), children are being denounced as witches. They are being torturched, humiliated, abandoned, and killed.
Why? Churches.
Read the story, leave comments. We need to do something about this, be it re-education, missions, whatever. This HAS to stop.
EKET, Nigeria - The 9-year-old boy lay on a bloodstained hospital sheet crawling with ants, staring blindly at the wall.
His family pastor had accused him of being a witch, and his father then tried to force acid down his throat as an exorcism. It spilled as he struggled, burning away his face and eyes. The emaciated boy barely had strength left to whisper the name of the church that had denounced him — Mount Zion Lighthouse.
A month later, he died.
Nwanaokwo Edet was one of an increasing number of children in Africa accused of witchcraft by pastors and then tortured or killed, often by family members. Pastors were involved in half of 200 cases of "witch children" reviewed by the AP, and 13 churches were named in the case files.
Some of the churches involved are renegade local branches of international franchises. Their parishioners take literally the Biblical exhortation, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live."
"It is an outrage what they are allowing to take place in the name of Christianity," said Gary Foxcroft, head of nonprofit Stepping Stones Nigeria.
‘Children are defenseless’
For their part, the families are often extremely poor, and sometimes even relieved to have one less mouth to feed. Poverty, conflict and poor education lay the foundation for accusations, which are then triggered by the death of a relative, the loss of a job or the denunciation of a pastor on the make, said Martin Dawes, a spokesman for the United Nations Children's Fund.
"When communities come under pressure, they look for scapegoats," he said. "It plays into traditional beliefs that someone is responsible for a negative change ... and children are defenseless."
The idea of witchcraft is hardly new, but it has taken on new life recently partly because of a rapid growth in evangelical Christianity. Campaigners against the practice say around 15,000 children have been accused in two of Nigeria's 36 states over the past decade and around 1,000 have been murdered. In the past month alone, three Nigerian children accused of witchcraft were killed and another three were set on fire.
Nigeria is one of the heartlands of abuse, but hardly the only one: the United Nations Children's Fund says tens of thousands of children have been targeted throughout Africa.We've all heard the stories about witch trials: A man or woman is accused of... more
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AMY GOODMAN: A British court heard evidence last week that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton tried to prevent the disclosure of details regarding the CIA’s role in the alleged torture of former Guantanamo prisoner Binyam Mohamed. Newly revealed British government documents show Clinton warned British officials the Obama administration would end intelligence sharing if it revealed evidence in Mohamed’s case. Mohamed was released from Guantanamo in late February after seven years in US custody. He says he was repeatedly tortured at a secret CIA prison and at Guantanamo.
Well, earlier this year, the leading conservative British parliamentarian, David Davis, came here to the United States to speak with US lawmakers about Mohamed’s case. Davis, a former shadow home secretary and a former member of the British special forces, has been critical of torture and “extraordinary rendition.”
I spoke with Davis about the attempts by the Obama administration to suppress evidence in this case.
DAVID DAVIS: We have in Britain at the moment a court case underway about torture. It’s one of, we think, fifteen cases of really serious torture. We’re not talking waterboarding here. We’re talking scalpels and beatings and cutting people in unpleasant places. That case is beginning to show complicity in that torture on the part of British intelligence agencies.
The judges want to release some information to the public, very carefully selected information, not detailed security information, and they have not been able to, because the US administration has written to the court, written to the foreign office and then to the court, saying if they release this sort of information, they’ll cut off intelligence cooperation or reduce intelligence cooperation with the United Kingdom. Now, that’s a serious threat. The judges referred to it as a “threat” eight times in their judgment, and they clearly thought we ought to know what’s been going on, what’s been happening with British intelligence agencies’ involvement in torture. We can’t do it, because the Americans are stopping us.
CLICK FOR VIDEO/FULL ARTICLEAMY GOODMAN: A British court heard evidence last week that Secretary of State Hillary... more
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Her work has brought her death threats. Rugiatu Turay, 32, helps girls avoid the cruel and internationally condemned ritual of female genital mutilation (FGM).
Speaking about the millennia-old practice, which affects 8,000 girls worldwide daily, is taboo in Turay's homeland Sierra Leone, as it is in many other African countries.
But she refused to remain silent. In 2003, Turay founded the Amazonian Initiative Movement (AIM), a women's rights group that fights FGM.
'It's my heart's desire to spare girls the brutal genital mutilation that I myself experienced,' she said.
Turay was 12 years old when she fell victim to female circumcision, a procedure in which the clitoris and labia are removed with knives and razor blades. It happened 10 days after the death of her mother, when Turay was taken to a secluded place along with her sisters and female cousins.
'We were glad. We didn't know what awaited us. We thought it was an outing,' she emotionally recalled in the Hamburg office of the children's rights organization Plan International, which backs AIM.
'It was horrible,' she said. 'My sister lay screaming on the ground. I was blindfolded. I resisted with all my strength because my mother had told me that no one should touch me there.'
Turay lost so much blood that she was unable to walk for seven days. She was not taken to hospital and nearly died.
'I fled to my father and showed him my wounds,' she said. Her father could not help her, however.
'It's almost impossible to talk about it. They want you to be afraid. But I have no fear,' Turay said. By 'they' she meant the men of Poro, a powerful secret society in Sierra Leone. The Poro men tried to intimidate Turay by laying supposedly magic objects in front of her house.
But she went to the police and asked the Poro chief, 'What would you do if someone wants to kill your child?'
According to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), there are 150 million girls and women worldwide whose genitals have been mutilated. Most of them are in African and Arab countries such as Egypt, Ethiopia, Guinea, Mali, Sudan, Somalia and Sierra Leone.
Meant to prepare girls for marriage and motherhood, female circumcision is often associated with Islam. Neither the Koran nor the Bible mention it, however. But girls who have not been circumcised are considered 'unclean.'
The circumcisers, who are female, are highly respected and well paid. AIM does not try to publicly shame them, but to persuade them that circumcisions are a bad idea.
'We educate them about the consequences of genital mutilation and suggest alternative sources of income,' Turay said, adding that she had converted the Poro chief by showing him a video of FGM.
Through Plan International, AIM also offers school seminars informing children of their human rights. Though an increasing number of girls are aware of the dreadful consequences of FGM, many are unable to overcome the power of the authorities and the circumcisers, as well as pressure from their families, and so have no choice but to flee.
'Since 2005, we've had a least three girls a year who ran away from genital mutilation,' Turay said. They found shelter at an AIM centre in the African nation of Guinea, and two of the girls live in Turay's house in Lunsar, her home village.
'With the help of donations, we want to establish a women's refuge there, too,' she said.Her work has brought her death threats. Rugiatu Turay, 32, helps girls avoid the cruel... more
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I could only look at the image for a small amount of time before getting very physically ill. :barf:I could only look at the image for a small amount of time before getting very... more
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Nettle
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2 years ago
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Why do Aliens always get the rap for these kinds of incidents, it could easily of been woodland trolls, lazer elfs or night sprights??Why do Aliens always get the rap for these kinds of incidents, it could easily of been... more
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At a recent medical conference in Chicago, a team of radiologists from Nationwide Children's Hospital presented intriguing X-ray evidence of a psychological phenomenon — what they believed was a new form of self-injury among teens and adolescents. Eleven out of 505 patients whom the team had treated in more than a decade had inserted objects — from chunks of crayon to unfolded paper clips — under their skin in a behavior the Nationwide team labeled "self-embedding."
OK I am all about self expression, but admittedly this kind of grosses me out....At a recent medical conference in Chicago, a team of radiologists from Nationwide... more
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Please read this and pass it on to your friends. Everyone should be aware of the horrors of female circumcision!! We must stop this practice!!
Kudos to the churches and Maendeleo Ya Wanawake for having the guts to stand up against FGM!!
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At least 300 girls in south-western Kenya have fled from home and sought refuge in churches in a bid to escape forced female genital mutilation (FGM).
The girls, some as young as nine, are at two rescue centres in rural Nyanza province, police told the BBC.
Female circumcision is banned in Kenya, but remains common in some areas where it is considered to be part of a girl's initiation into womanhood.
The traditional ceremonies take place between November and December.
The girls in Kuria District are now in the care of the two churches and Maendeleo Ya Wanawake, a women's organisation.
Police are providing security at the centres to ensure that the girls are not forcibly removed or harassed.
Beatrice Robi, Maendeleo Ya Wanawake's district chairperson and a gender activist, says that at least 200 girls are undergoing circumcision in the district a day.
She said she had found a seven-year-old girl who had just been circumcised.
"There are more girls who are still in their homes and they are undergoing it [circumcision], whether it is voluntarily or they are being forced," she told the BBC.
She says her organisation along with the local churches and authorities have been trying to convince the community to stop the practice and rescuing girls from forced circumcision.
Paul Wanjama, the commanding officer in Kuria District, says girls in the region usually flee to the rescue centres until the season ends.
He said that in some cases, parents encourage the girls to go to the rescue centres to avoid being circumcised.
"There are some parents who are against that [FGM practice] but they get pressure from these traditional people," he told the BBC.
Girls who undergo circumcision feel that they are ready for marriage and do not go back to school when the term begins in January leading to a high drop-out rate, Mrs Robi said.
She appealed to other girls to seek refuge in the centres until the end of the traditional ceremonies and praised the local police for their support.
Mr Wanjama says some cases of forced circumcision had been reported to the police and legal action has been taken.
The FGM operation involves the partial or total removal of the external genital organs.
The UN World Health Organization (WHO) says it leads to bleeding, shock, infections and a higher rate of death for new-born babies.
In Africa, about three million girls are at risk of FGM each year, according to the UN.Please read this and pass it on to your friends. Everyone should be aware of the... more
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Authorities say several feral cats have been found beaten, burned and mutilated in the Bronx.Authorities say several feral cats have been found beaten, burned and mutilated in the... more
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The leader of an Army special forces team "grinned" as he held the ear of an Afghan man he suspected of being an insurgent after he shot him and left his body in the desert, a Green Beret testified Tuesday.
The testimony by Sgt. 1st Class Ricky Derring came at a military hearing for his team leader, Master Sgt. Joseph D. Newell, who could face court martial on a murder charge in the March 5 killing of the Afghan civilian.
Derring said Newell returned to the spot where he left the man's body and "made a stabbing motion and I could see his arms cutting." Newell then walked back to the team's vehicle with the man's ear in his hand, Derring said.
"He shook the ear and grinned," Derring said.
Under cross examination by Newell's civilian attorney Todd Conormon, Derring said he didn't actually see Newell cut off the man's ear.
The Article 32 hearing that is expected to last two days is similar to a civilian grand jury. It is not used to decide guilt, only whether there's enough evidence to court martial Newell, who was assigned to the Fort Bragg-based 3rd Special Forces Group. The Army has not released details about Newell such as his age, hometown and how long he has served.
Derring said his team was escorting a convoy of supplies in Helmand province, when they spotted two civilian cars in the distance. The soldiers fired a warning shot and went to investigate.
Derring, a 50-caliber machine gunner on the team, said Newell asked the man through an interpreter whether he was an insurgent or had improvised explosive devices. He questioned him about a photo of a weapon on his cell phone.
"Joe was asking him questions: Where did he get the phone, was he placing IEDs, was he Taliban," Derring testified during a hearing at Fort Bragg, a sprawling Army base near Fayetteville.
Derring said the man answered no. But Derring said he, Newell and the interpreter believed the man was an insurgent because Taliban forces often use cell phones to communicate and call in their locations.
Newell drew his gun and shot him, left him in the desert, then returned and cut off his ear, Derring testified. Newell took the body to another place in the desert, "and kicked and over his face a little bit," Derring said.
Derring responded to Conormon's questions about hard feelings between Newell and other team members. Derring said they would argue about tactics and other matters, adding that Newell had to assert himself because he was a newer member of the team.
Derring said he was upset about the shooting and later told another sergeant what had happened.
"He basically said Master Sgt. Newell had a screw loose," Derring said.
Newell later talked to Derring about the killing, during which Derring told Newell he never wanted to be in that kind of situation, Derring said.
"He told me, 'Don't worry, nothing will come of it.' He said, 'if it does, I'll just say I was attacked,'" Derring testified.The leader of an Army special forces team "grinned" as he held the ear of an... more
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Terrible atrocities are committed against untold numbers of women around the world every day and for most of these women, justice will never be served. This is a list of the worst of the atrocities. In no particular order:
7:
Bridekidnapping
Bride kidnapping is a common practice in Kyrgyzstan and Turkmenistan. When it is time to get married in Kyrgyzstan, a man or his family will pick a woman and she will be kidnapped. The prospective groom and his male relatives or friends or both abduct the girl (in the old nomadic days, on horseback; now often by car) and take her to the family home, where the older women of the family try to get her to accept the marriage. Some families will keep the girl hostage for several days to break her will. Others will let her go if she remains defiant. The kidnapped woman’s family may also become involved in the process, either urging the woman to stay if the marriage is believed to be socially acceptable or advantageous for the prospective bride and her family, or opposing the marriage on various grounds and helping liberate the woman.
In Ethiopia and Rwanda it is quite brutal, where the man kidnaps the woman and rapes her. The family of the woman either then feels obliged to consent to the union, or is forced to when the kidnapper impregnates her, as no one else would marry a pregnant woman.Terrible atrocities are committed against untold numbers of women around the world... more
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