LAS VEGAS, Feb 3 – The International Day of Zero Tolerance to Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) is observed each year on February 6 to raise public awareness about this barbaric practice. (FGM refers to any procedure causing partial or total removal of female genitalia for non-medical reasons. Although it has no known health benefits and carries both short and long-term physical and psychological health risks, it was forcibly imposed during childhood on at least 140 million women living today worldwide.)

“Female genital mutilation of any type is a harmful practice and a huge violation of human rights,” said Nadine Gary, director of communications for Clitoraid. “It has wrought excruciating pain and psychological suffering upon 140 living victims worldwide and caused the needless deaths of millions more. That’s why our organization is committed to assisting the Women’s Health Organization (WHO) in eliminating this horrific custom within a generation.”

As a step toward that goal, Clitoraid is dedicated to providing clitoral and genital repair surgery to all FGM victims who want it, according to Gary.

“In October, we’re opening a special hospital in Burkina Faso, West Africa, that will offer this surgery free of charge to FGM victims,” she said. “And thanks to our dedicated volunteer surgeons, we’re also offering it on other continents, including North America.”

In addition, Clitoraid is engaged in an active education campaign to inform the public about the grave dangers of FGM, Gary said.

“Fifteen percent of all FGM victims perish during or soon after the mutilation,” Gary said. “Three million girls are at risk of suffering that fate each year, and even if they survive, they’re sure to suffer from the aftereffects of this awful mutilation for the rest of their lives.”

Gary said Clitoraid was founded from an idea voiced by spiritual leader Maitreya Rael, who is also a fervent women’s rights and human rights advocate.

“He wants to educate the public about the importance of having women enjoying sexual pleasure without the guilt that often comes from the distorted teachings of primitive religions,” Gary said. “Eliminating guilt from sexual pleasure is essential to female balance and self-esteem.”

She said her organization is also monitoring a new and troubling trend.

“It’s appalling that health-care providers are increasingly being used in some countries to perform FGM,” Gary said. “That means some of those who could be fighting this practice are instead helping to legitimize and perpetuate it. One example is Indonesia. The World Health Organization is currently focused on this issue there, and our organization has voiced deep concern to the Indonesian Health Ministry. We have also trained a surgeon in the Philippines who is ready to perform clitoral repair surgery on Indonesian victims.”

On Jan. 30, Clitoraid sponsored a gender-free orgasm workshop at the Erotic Heritage Museum in Las Vegas where the 25 male and female participants embarked in an evening of pleasurable and harmonizing experiences, even spiritual ones for some.

Barbara Carrellas, author of the book Urban Tantra had come from NYC and volunteered to teach a tantra workshop to benefit Clitoraid's FGM patients. The workshop is meant for every human being but in the case of women who have suffered clitoral excision, this "full body orgasm" class may allow them to broaden their sexual energy beyond their genital area.



The group gathered in the museum's Erotic Chapel where 2 large beds covered with a plush, red, velvety bedspread welcomed a few of the participants. Others found a seat on the cushions displayed in a circle on the wooden floor. Phallic, Roman-like columns were propped up here and there against the ivory-colored walls. In this warm, sensual atmosphere, single women and men as well as couples were ready to experience the pleasures of "gender free orgasm".

On Jan. 29, while at Las Vegas's Del Sol High School to give a speech on immigration, President Obama was approached by Nadine Gary, Director of Communications for Clitoraid. She handed him a formal letter asking his administration to fund the last $100,000 necessary for Clitoraid's Clitoral Repair Hospital to be inaugurated in Burkina Faso, West Africa, in October.

Gary said she gave the letter to the president at this time because February 6 has been designated by the United Nations as Zero Tolerance Day for Female Gential Mutilation (FGM).

"Clitoraid has previously reached out to Hillary Clinton, who has always been very vocal against FGM," Gary said in a statement released by Clitoraid today. "Now we're hoping that Jim Carey will adopt the same strong stance toward eradicating this barbaric tradition that involves extreme violence against children."

Gary explained that Clitoraid is a Las Vegas-based, non-profit organization and that she and other Clitoraid representatives present yesterday for President Obama's speech were surprised that African immigrants were never mentioned in the president's comments.

"Among the African immigrants now living in the United States are an estimated 300,000 women who still suffer from the genital mutilation perpetrated against them in their youth," Gary said. "And although many of those victims would so much like to escape the effects of those wounds, they're still unaware that clitoral repair surgery exists and can help them be whole again. This is the reason Clitoraid exists, thanks to international spiritual leader Maitreya Rael, who founded Clitoraid to help such victims obtain the restorative surgery and help eradicate FGM once and for all."

Gary said Clitoraid's American volunteer surgeons will be traveling to Africa in October to operate on the 400 FGM victims already on Clitoraid's waiting list in Burkina Faso.

"That's why it would be most beneficial to have the U.S. government help fund our humanitarian action ASAP," Gary explained. "We need additional funds right now so our first Clitoraid hospital dedicated to providing clitoral repair surgery free of charge to FGM victims can open on time. The building construction is nearly completed, but we still need to purchase the needed medical equipment and supplies to outfit the clinic so our surgeons and other medical personnel can finally get started."

Gary said she met several Nevada political officials during the presidential visit.

"They asked me to contact their offices with Clitoraid's request for funds, since our non-profit organization is based in Nevada," Gary said, adding that that the aforementioned officials include Senator Ruben Kihuen, Congresswoman Dina Titus, Congressman Steven Horsford, and Regional Representative Christina Martinez.

Proceeds to benefit victims of Female Genital Mutilation

LAS VEGAS, Jan. 27 – Clitoraid, a Las Vegas-based humanitarian organization offering clitoral repair surgery to victims of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) in the United States and West Africa, will sponsor “How to Have a Gender-Free Orgasm,” a workshop to be presented by Barbara Carrellas at Las Vegas’s Erotic Heritage Museum on Wed., Jan. 30, from 6 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.

“Clitoraid’s first hospital for FGM repair surgery will open later this year in Burkina Faso, West Africa, and proceeds from this workshop will be used to purchase medical equipment for that facility,” said Nadine Gary, Clitoraid’s director of public relations.

Gary said that although the workshop techniques Carrella will teach have served as a sexually therapeutic tool for FGM patients, any man or woman can benefit from them.

“Workshop participants will experience the playful, powerful and transformative power of breath and pleasure,” Gary said, adding that there will be no nudity in the workshop. Nor will anyone be asked to work with a partner.

“Barbara Carrellas’s ‘Gender-Free Orgasm Class,’ sometimes called ‘The Art of Thinking Off,’ is famous for her use of Tantric and Taoist techniques,” Gary said. “Since they move sexual energy throughout the body, they will enhance your sex life, regardless of gender. What’s more, these techniques help people free themselves from the guilt of sexual pleasure, whether they’re FGM victims or victims of the kind of shame-based, rigid religious upbringing that’s all too common in the United States.”

Gary said Carrellas was featured on the Learning Channel’s television show “Strange Sex,” which included a segment in which scientists at Rutgers did MRI brain scans of Carrellas’s orgasmic state induced from breathing technique alone.

Gary explained that restoring a somewhat normal sexual life to FGM victims requires a multi-pronged approach that can make good use of Carrellas’s methods.

“First, there’s clitoral repair surgery, which Clitoraid’s head surgeon Dr. Marci Bowers now performs in San Francisco, and will soon also be offered free of charge to FGM victims at our new hospital in West Africa,” Gary said. “But sexual therapy and psychological therapy are also essential because they help patients let go of the emotional trauma that began the moment their genitals were mutilated.

Gary said Larry Ashley, a professor at UNLV, is currently Clitoraid’s sexual trauma counselor, and that workshop presenter Barbara Carrelas has expressed an interest in working with Clitoraid patients in the future.

Gary said the suggested donation for the Jan. 30 workshop at the Erotic Heritage Museum is $25.