Porn to blame for girls’ bad body image

British gynaecologists warned yesterday that increasing numbers of teenage girls and women are undergoing genital cosmetic surgery, driven in part by unrealistic images of how they should look based on pornography.

The state-funded National Health Service performed more than 2 000 labial reduction procedures – labiaplasties – in 2010, a five-fold increase in 10 years, according to the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG).

This is “probably the tip of the iceberg, compared to the number of procedures that are done in the private sector” where the data is not routinely collected, said Professor Sarah Creighton, a member of RCOG’s ethics committee.

She said there had been no similar increase in labial disease in the past decade to explain the trend, suggesting instead a confusion about what represents “normal” genitalia. “The misapprehension arises from the prominence of just one type of ‘neat’ genital appearance; the type to be found prominently depicted in pornography,” said Thomas Baldwin, a philosopher who sits on RCOG’s ethics committee.

In a new paper, the committee expresses particular concern that teenage girls are undergoing unnecessary surgery, which is similar to female genital mutilation – a crime in Britain. – raq’s security forces require “massive amounts of re-training” in human rights to better conduct operations and combat the country’s deadliest violence since 2008, the United Nations (UN)’s new envoy to Baghdad said.

Nickolay Mladenov, UN chief Ban Ki-moon’s special representative, also said he did not expect any long-term political problems to be addressed before elections, due on April 30, but voiced hope that authorities could make progress on key issues, such as the delivery of basic services.

“There is a culture within the security forces and the way they do things, which needs to change,” Mladenov told a group of foreign journalists in Baghdad.

Asked what he meant by a change in culture, he replied: “One that is more respectful of human rights.

“If you want to talk about the immediate security response to the crisis, the police, the army, etc, need massive amounts of retraining... in relation to human rights and how they respect international standards of human rights; how they undertake operations.”

Mladenov, a former Bulgarian foreign and defence minister, added: “A very big investment needs to be made in rule-of-law and human rights, both across the judiciary and also in the police and the security forces.”

Iraq’s security forces have been criticised, particularly by the Sunni Arab community, over allegations that soldiers and police unfairly target the minority.

The claims range from accusations of warrantless and mass arrests to extended periods of unlawful detention, as well as physical abuse in detainee facilities, often in a bid to extract confessions.

Human Rights Watch, for example, said in a statement published yesterday that Iraq’s security forces had been “surrounding and closing off majority Sunni neighbourhoods, effectively shutting residents inside, raiding homes and carrying out mass arrests” ahead of recent religious celebrations.

While officials admit that some individuals are wrongly arrested, they insist security operations are making progress in curtailing a protracted spike in violence that has sparked fears the country is on the brink of slipping back into all-out sectarian war.

The UN envoy did not blame any particular group in his critique of the security forces, noting that since now-executed dictator Saddam Hussein was ousted in the US-led invasion of 2003, Iraq has “been embroiled in confl icts; it’s been fighting a terrorist threat”.

“I come from a transition country myself,” he said. “I know how difficult this is to change without the context in which Iraq is.”

Mladenov said Baghdad would need to focus on a handful of key issues in order to reduce the bloodshed.

“You need to find ways to reintegrate the Sunni community; you need to find ways to deliver services; you need to find ways of doing your security operations in a way that effectively counter the threat.”

He said that although some issues could be resolved before Iraq’s elections, longer-term issues would have to wait. –