We talk to Halaleh Taheri, Founder & Executive Director of MEWSo, who is campaigning to ban Virginity testing and Hymenoplasty (hymen repair) and to expose it as the misogynistic practice that it is, which has no place in society today.

In this episode, Halaleh talks about her life as an activist, the brilliant work of MEWSo and explains more about the campaign and how you can help to end this abuse of young women and girls.

Listen Here (transcript below):

Halaleh is the Founder and Executive Director of the Middle Eastern Women & Society Organisation (MEWSo). She began the charity after realising the huge numbers of displaced women in London who need help integrating and navigating their way around the society of their new homeland. It follows her own extraordinary story of fighting the Shah of Iran during the 1979 Revolution and fighting the Islamic extremists who subsequently took over.

After moving to Iraq, she had to flee again 11 years later during the first Gulf War in 1992. As an asylum seeker, she first moved to Sweden where she gained a degree in Pedagogy (the science of teaching), qualified as a social worker, and began campaigning for the rights of women and children.

In 2005 she moved to London and found her particular skills were needed here more than ever. She continues to campaign for the rights of women and for a more just society for everyone.\

Follow Halaleh on Twitter: @HalalehTaheri

Transcript:

S – Can we start with a little bit about your background and what was it in your life that brought you to activism?

H – I am originally from Iran, the 1979 revolution in Iran when the Shah fell and my family was involved in politics because my two big brothers and my father. For years they had been in prison and from childhood I knew about injustice and working undercover. I knew about forbidden things. I grew up with undercover groups because of visiting them because my brothers were involved heavily in politics and then SAVAK, the intelligence group of the Shah were always following or checking on us. So I grew up in a climate that affected me for the rest of my life and I think I will have it until the end because it’s part of my genes I would say.

Gradually after the revolution, unfortunately, Khomeini came and life was harder even for Kurdish people, for my family as well because I lost people in my family, my brothers both and I lost my first fiancé and nine beloved members of my family in the fight with Khomeini and the Islamic republic and I blamed the left wing party and for the rest of life I was out of my town, my background, my family and travelled from place to place and different countries and between two continents, five countries until in 2005 I came to England and during these years I saw many injustices.

I saw many wars. I saw two revolutions, first the Iranian revolution and then the Kurdistan/Iraqi revolution and I was involved as well again. It reminded of the rebellion time in my late 20s, early 30s when the revolution in Iraq started. I was just a freedom fighter.

After that I travelled to Syria, Turkey and then to Sweden. In Sweden I settled properly and I educated myself and started building new women’s organisations for Kurdish people.

Then in 2005 I decided that, as I had travelled so much in my life, in my middle 30s or middle 40s I felt that I needed another go to travel around the world and see other parts of the world.

I came to England and I liked it so I stayed. I was a social worker at first and then I realised I must go back to my … and I set up the Middle Eastern Women & Society organisation in 2010 and until now I am still struggling, fighting, hoping to change the attitude of the community to help women and girls especially the most vulnerable in my community, which is women and girls and to be part of the change and process. They deserve better lives. They should live better than what we face every day.

So, that is part of my background.

S – Aren’t we lucky that you have come to London and to spend some time with us. We always welcome more women activists. You have set up the Middle Eastern Women & Society organisation. Can you tell us a bit more about the organisation?

H – Almost all of our women and girls and even men, vulnerable men, are very displaced, they are like a forgotten people when you go deep down in their relationship in the community. My passion as a woman activist, I have the women and girls to look after.

I had the experience for years as a displaced person, even as a fighter, I couldn’t find my place. Sometimes I wasn’t welcome but I was a fighter, but that’s not happening for everybody in the community. They can’t fight. They can back off and they can give up very soon if you don’t help them.

So I decided I won’t allow any other women and girls in my power to have this experience that I have. I was a fighter and still I was affected. If they are not fighters, they get ill and then it will be worse for the rest of their life.

So I decided to create MEWSo as a space for them so they can trust each other and trust us and gradually they can speak up about their problems and gradually they will be empowered and gradually when they are empowered they can be connected and be integrated. We know the integration issue is a huge issue and is not always a positive issue. We can see how much we fail in this integration process. But, in my part, that’s why I call it Women’s Society. I really want to connect women with society, whether it’s their own community or their neighbourhood or the wider society.

For this integration process we need women to be empowered and other people from the society will be interested to help those women and to be connected to those women.

Those women can’t get help so much if they just live with the rules and regulations and cultures in their community and family so therefore the rules and regulations and culture perspective of looking at women and girls in the community must change.

Therefore, gradually I decided that I must be involved with politicians, I must be involved with decision makers and tell them that things must change in our community by my help, by those pioneering women who now are speaking about their lives and by your power as a decision maker by law, by regulation, by services, by resources that you provide and I will be guaranteed that I have back up from you and I can go to the community and communicate with them because I already have bridges and they trust me.

This process is a part of MEWSo work, while we are looking after them in domestic violence and isolation process and learning new skills and knowing about this new country is a part of that. They are not connected with the country where they live.

The other side is communicating with the politicians, other women’s organisations and other networks and telling them – this is what’s happening in our community, come and help us – They are citizens of our country, they deserve a better life.

S – You said the word trust several times, that is so huge. If women can’t speak with someone who understands their culture, their background and context, that doesn’t give them the opportunity to share their reality. You can then say to the decision makers and politicians, this is what’s going on and this is what we need to do about it. Building trust is hugely important to move these issues forward.

H – That’s true, when a person is coming to new place and they don’t know anything, in the first place they are panicking and trying to forget about the horror that they had in the past, especially refugee and migrant women and sometimes they are facing oppression in their own family but they don’t know how to get help. When they were at home they had connections, now here they don’t have connections.

Then they are looking for support and they can’t speak English, the language of the country and they don’t know how it functions. So when they come to us we speak the language, we tell them in a simple way what are the services. We make them come down and to trust and tell them we are looking after them step by step and not worry. We tell them the important support the government will provide for them. Most of them don’t know there are services for women, there are refuges for example if they run from their house and the horror of their relationship.

For example – migrant women are always scared of deportation. First of all we say – take out the image that you will be deported, you won’t be deported. This message can’t come from outsiders; you can’t trust them but when I tell as a Kurdish speaker, trust me, you won’t be deported and we will help you – then she will start telling about her situation.

So trust is really important in any relationship especially in very distressed situations, in traumatic situations and then gradually they will speak up.

S – It’s another one of many reasons why it’s so important that we protect and expand working with different communities so that you can get the information in your own language with someone who understands what you’re going through.

The campaign you’re involved with at the moment about banning virginity testing.

Can we start at the beginning and how do we define virginity?

H – A very deep question, a good question and confusing as well because there are many ways to interpret this word. In my opinion the virginity test is a tool in the hands of men, in a men dominated society where women are part of the property of men. Women and children are the property like the rest of the property, it must be used in the way that they choose for them and virginity is part of a very sensitive issue for women because it’s related to a sexual life and production and this must be under the control of men, totally.

When men control the sexual life of women, the worst situation is in Somali where they do it in the very worst way with FGM then they are banished from their childhood until the night they are married. It is so painful and so misogynistic I don’t know how to describe it.

There isn’t another way that you can’t make it so that any sexuality won’t happen, so later on those cultures or customs and even some religions are very strict like Islam. They say that any sexual relationship before marriage or before permission from Father or family, is forbidden, is Haram and is punishable so this is the situation when a virginity test is required as a tool to guarantee that this property is pure, is untouched is ready to be delivered to another man who is the fiancé. You can see the process.

S – When you’re defining women as property, virginity speaks to their worth, to the worth the family would put to a woman who was deemed to be a virgin as opposed to the lack of worth the family would put to a woman they felt wasn’t a virgin.

H – When the virginity test is being done, it doesn’t show, it’s a fraud. It’s totally a fraud because it doesn’t show that this young girl had a sexual relationship because almost 50% of young girls, for many reasons, riding a bicycle or a horse, using tampons, falling from trees, doing exercises, they lose their virginity or their natural body, they don’t have this elastic hymen that starts bleeding. This bleeding is a fraud again, it doesn’t show a virginity or the real sexual life of this girl.

So many times, girls have been killed, punished, abused, beaten, humiliated for nothing because of the 3 drops of bleeding on the first night of a wedding. This is so misogynistic and a violation of women’s rights because unnecessarily you judge women and girls as an untrusted person by the custom of the family, for nothing.

For those girls who had a relationship, it’s a very hard time and very dangerous because for some reason those young girls - imagine in UK schools and society, those young girls learn from school that they have rights to know about their sexual life from aged 16 they can experience in a very healthy way, a relationship, they get boyfriends, they look at their neighbours and their friends and then they start a relationship – When it’s time for a wedding they are panicking and so scared because of the tick boxes of the whole culture and religion that they are asking for and one of the boxes that is so strong is the virginity. It must be clear. Therefore, they are panicking and rushing to Hymen repair surgery.

Then all the family start asking the girls – we are going for the test, I don’t trust you because you were with the girls many times and you have been away many hours, I don’t trust you, I will take you to the doctor, I must be sure before I give you to your fiancé, otherwise I lose my honour and I can’t be with my community, my family.

All those attitudes that they have been brainwashed, indoctrinated they believe in that and their own children are like that.

They start with the panicking, going to the doctor, searching for the test, going underground searching for the surgery. You don’t know what’s happening underground. It’s like an iceberg. Under the iceberg it’s chaotic, especially with the Mother who is in charge of looking after the virginity of the girls, and the poor girl herself, looking for support to get rid of this issue.

 The wedding is the most beautiful desirable moment for a girl who is going, but for the girls in our community it’s the most traumatic process.

S – So within this culture where virginity is a hymen that is intact. So the test is test whether the hymen is intact even though we know it is not a good measure as to whether someone is a virgin in the first place. How would that actually be tested? What happens to a young woman if she goes for virginity testing?

H – One of our clients was interviewed last week on Good Morning Britain and they all talk about the trauma, about the humiliation, about feeling so unhappy that people think they are dirty and that they have been checked and the process they have gone through with the doctors. Imagine that, we trust them with our health, those doctors who put our girls in such a risk. Therefore, it should be banned, therefore they should be fined, go to prison because they are putting our girls at such a risk, such a traumatic process. That checking on their dignity and their personality, their value by saying yes or no, just one word.

A girl described to me, she said – we are fighting with our Mother, we are not going – or sometimes we decided to go but before we go we feel dirty and panicky and that punishment is coming and we’re really worried when we go to the doctor and what he will say to us, whether we are or we are not. Especially those girls who were sure that they hadn’t had any relationship and still they were okay to go and even then had a traumatic process. Some girls who hadn’t a relationship were still being pushed to go and already knew what the doctor will say but they hoped maybe the doctor will lie.

Imagine that this process gives a lot of hard times to these girls. They lose their self-esteem, they feel bad about themselves, they start punishing themselves, some of them think of suicide before they are going for the virginity test and are so scared of the punishment, that’s why they are going for suicide.

Some of them decide not to marry if they have to show that they are virgins

For those girls that show that they are doing hymenoplasty, we had a case, the girls hadn’t had any relationship, but she heard that some girls might not bleed therefore she searched for a doctor, so desperate and worried about her fiancé. She went to doctor and said – I’m not sure if I will bleed or not or give me something – there is a packet that you can use on the first night you can use for some bleeding; they use it even if they haven’t had a sexual relationship because they are so worried about these few drops and they must be shown in the bed in front of the fiancé and sometimes the rest of the family.

S – So the groom’s family will expect to see blood on the sheets on the wedding night as proof.

H – In Asian families, Arabic, middle east definitely, the fiancé must see that and some families require that the fiancé comes out and shows the sheet to the rest of the family.

S – This is all around shame and honour.

H – For them it’s about shame and honour and purity of the girl and they got a pure perfect woman in the family. For me it was a description of the property that the girl must be pure, perfect and untouched, like brand new –

S – Like a product. There’s no medical reason why this procedure should be done, so who are the doctors who are assaulting young women in this way for no reason that’s anything to do with their physical health? Other than cultural reasons there isn’t any reason for these tests to be done.

H – That’s true, there isn’t, if you look at society, many people are surprised and say – really? Is this happening? – It’s happening because it’s part of business as well. It’s from £300 - £1000 just for the test for a family that are desperate to get it.

So imagine those doctors, those untrusted doctors, those who we believe are looking after our health, they gain such a lot of money. For hymenoplasty it is up to £4000.

Many clinics say, more than 20, you can book it on-line ‘for the attraction and beauty of the hymen’ – but underground, orally, they make big business, they get the cash and it’s for hymen repair. They are doing that in the UK especially in Edgeware Road.

Therefore, the law is really important because all of them must be closed and if they are detected they must be fined and go to prison. Both doctors and clinics, they have to learn their lesson.

S – I can imagine of I went to the well-qualified nice doctor, that would give some legitimacy to the procedure. It’s only by changing the law that we can be really clear that this is a form of abuse and that there’s nothing legitimate at all about it.

H – That’s totally true. Some of them find excuses that the girls are coming and begging us and worried they might be in a dangerous situation, that’s why they have done it, which is an excuse, both for virginity test and for hymen repair.

They must be taught, we wanted to teach our doctors, that’s one of the roles and duties we have as an organisation, we wanted to teach our doctors and clinics and tell them - you can give our brochures and tell her there is a service that can help you, the police can help you, social services can help you, you will be protected, you don’t need to go through such a hard time. You don’t deserve such procedures.

The doctors must be part of the support rather than pushing for the surgery or procedures. Therefore, it’s part of the education we must give to doctors and all those people who are involved.

S – It’s a bit similar to a woman going to a doctor with an injury because her partner has hit her and the doctor telling her she shouldn’t do those things that make her partner hit her rather than supporting her to get away from an abusive partner.

H – And for domestic violence the doctors have learned that immediately they give them brochures in the situation, they call the organisation. We have many cases where the GP calls us and in a situation they call the police. That must be exactly the same with the virginity test and the hymen repair issue as well.

S – The government have said within its violence against women and girl’s strategy, that it will ban virginity testing. I didn’t see anything in the document about the hymanoplasty. I’m confused as to how you can ban one and not the other because they are so linked.

H – Very good question. When we started 3 years ago with this issue, we started with hymenoplasty ban. A lot of media showed interest and it was good and some messages went out in parliament, talking about a ban on hymenoplasty, then later on the discussion shifted to ban virginity tests and we found good people in parliament who were interested and we were connected and other women’s organisations showed interest as well and ten we started communicating with the government having round table with the Health Secretary of the government and some MP members who were interested and they were talking about the banning.

In one of the discussions, I raised it that definitely hymenoplasty must be banned with virginity testing otherwise we fail in our promise to our women in the community, plus, if you only ban virginity tests, then the girls will unnecessarily go for hymen repair surgery, so you are part of this misogynistic process. How dare you do that.

I told them directly that if you are not supporting the ban then you are part of this violence against women therefore it’s really important that both of them are banned.

The answer came back, congratulations, both of them are banned now.

What I’m hearing on the women and girl’s strategy is it’s just saying ban virginity tests.

We want to remind them that it’s ban virginity tests, ban hymenoplasty, you can’t divide them, you can’t separate them, both must be banned otherwise we can’t properly help women and girls in our community.

This is really important, we will repeat it all the time. We are going again. The process of a ban takes one year. Until one year, we are working in the community, we are educating, we are saying again and again – ban virginity testing, ban hymenoplasty. You can’t divide these two.

S – Both of them are buying into that misogynist concept that a woman’s worth is determined by her sexual and reproductive action and that she’s not a person in her own right.  She’s the property of the father, property of the husband rather than being an individual woman.

H – Totally true. Then ban virginity test yes but the big business is hymen repair and still is, they are going underground and they make it more expensive because they know that women need it more and then those girls will suffer.

S – How can we all help and get involved to make sure in this next year as the legislation comes into force that it’s legislation that’s worth its weight rather than these half measures?

H – We must continue with our campaign and don’t stop saying – ban virginity tests and hymenoplasty – we need a coalition and support from everywhere. We need people to invite us and we tell them because we know about this situation. It’s part of education. Everybody must hear about and talk about it as much as we can talk openly. We break the silence, break this taboo.

We talk openly about this to everyone, it’s really important. We need an audience to listen to us. We need the media to send out our messages to wider society. We need politicians to listen to us when they are going back to the panel and say – women’s organisations are out there shouting for ban this – we need a coalition among the women’s activists. If we are a coalition, we can change more and we can push it more for any changes.

For example, in law there is still other issues we must work on, we must take it to the next stage. For the moment it is really important to make it clear to the government that we wanted a ban for both of them:  make it clear that the fine and punishment for those doctors is clear including the families who push the girls, anybody who pushes the girls and make sure that behind this law there is enough resources and support to women’s organisations so we can go to the community and communicate with them and talk to them and educate them and support them to understand this new law and empower those women.

This education must go to secondary schools, for girls and boys. It must be part of sex education otherwise the next generation doesn’t get so much, they won’t be empowered, their self-esteem won’t be enough to protect themselves even in the community, in front of the family and say that – this is my right, you can’t decide it for me.

So sex education must cover virginity tests and hymen repair surgery, a misogynistic issue and girls and boys both must learn about that.

S – I’m really glad you said that as well as legislation, support for organisations to be able to work within communities around education because the end game is to get to a point where this is not even requested within families and that women are not valued by whether or not they are a virgin. As we’re seeing with FGM the communities themselves are turning their backs on it and that’s where we want to get to with this with the communities saying – that’s not how we want to treat our young women.

H – Resources for women’s organisations is really important because later on we will face challenges in the community because those customs and cultures who strongly believe in such procedures and women are the property men in their structure, they will fight us. They will challenge us and we need support from the government, from the wider society, from other women activists, resources, having a good back up because we are going to challenge them and say – you are wrong, we are right –

We need support from everywhere and from everyone who cares about this issue.

S – One of the things I’ve learned is it’s easy to divide women into different issues. We all need to come together. It’s the sisterhood and solidarity that is the most frightening to misogyny because when we work together, that’s when we do change practices and protect women and enable them to live their lives without constraints.

H – Every time I see these cases it breaks my heart and I just wonder, how could this happen? We live in one country. One side living with the customs and cultures and the other side enjoying themselves.

Why must our girls in the community suffer so much.

It’s a duty on everyone. We are equal citizens and we must be treated by the government with one law. Just one law for all of us.

This law should be the Domestic Violence Bill and all the laws in this country.

That’s my big wish and my big fight for the community.

I want my girls in my community to grow up with the same value like the rest of society.

S – If there’s one law it should be applicable to protecting every girl.