Clitoris Awareness Month: Clitoraid invited to International Clitoris Summit

May 16 2023, category: Press Releases
San Francisco, May 15, 2023 – During the annual Clitoris Awareness Month in May (which coincides with Masturbation Month), the non-profit organization Clitoraid will participate in the International Clitoris Summit online organized by the women's organization, Clitoris.io, on May 20th. Indeed, Dr. Bowers, Clitoraid’s volunteer Head Surgeon who has operated on over 600 patients, victims FGM since 2009, was graciously invited to be one of the guest speakers during the Summit and Nadine Gary, Clitoraid’s director of Operations was also conveyed to co-host the event.

“We are delighted to be part of this clitoris empowering venue so vital to all women’s sexual health” says Nadine Gary. The full day Zoom event, 9 to 5 pm (pacific), will gather an impressive panel of 17 international guest speakers, be they OB GYN or urologist surgeons, doctors, sexologists, historians, artists who will share their vast professional knowledge and experiences to continue rehabilitating the clitoris in women’s minds and bodies and in humanity as a whole. During this 8 hour-conference, the mighty clitoris will take center stage in all its splendor, its remarkable mental, emotional and physical health properties linked to its endless pleasure possibilities will be featured - shame and guilt free - at last."

“Education is key, starting with learning about the clitoris’ true anatomy which wasn’t even discovered until the very end of the 20th century!” says Nadine Gary. She refers to Australian Urologist, Dr. O’Connell whose MRI breakthrough scientific research led to fully mapping the structure of the clitoris in 1998.

"To be clear, the clitoris is more than a nerve-rich button near the pubic bone. That’s just the visible part, called the glans” says Dr. Bowers, adding “the organ actually extends inches into the body in a winglike formation, its entire structure responsive to arousal cues.”

“The size of the penis and the clitoris are anatomically similar; one extends out of the body and the other stays mostly tucked in around the vulva.” informs Gary

This crucial anatomical information is what makes the clitoral restorative surgery possible since the surgeon has ample clitoral material to bring up to the surface once the scare tissue caused by the childhood genital mutilation endured by FGM victims has been cleared.

“However, the surgery is only half of the road to sexual pleasure recovery. Another fundamental aspect to our patients’sexual health is physical, mental and emotional therapy to help them overcome not only the trauma but also the sexual guilt and shame,” explains Gary. And in that regard, many non FGM afflicted women around the world share the same predicament because they’ve been “culturally and socially circumcised.”

That is why Clitoraid highly recommends venues such as the International Clitoris Summit because they are vital to all women’s sexual health around the globe.

"Our NGO reflects wholesome sexual values inspired by the Raelian philosophy where guilt and shame do not exist" says Gary.

The Summit is free, you just need to register in advance.

May is Masturbation Month thanks to Surgeon General, Dr. Elder

May 15 2023, category: Press Releases
In May 1994, former Surgeon General, Dr. Joycelyn Elders advocated teaching teenagers about masturbation as an alternative to sexual intercourse that may result in unwanted pregnancy. Dr. Elders was fired by the Clinton administration for voicing this innovative idea but, ever since, May has been referred to as “Masturbation Month”.

Clitoraid: 3rd humanitarian clitoral restorative surgical mission in Kenya

November 09 2022, category: Press Releases
San Francisco, CA - November 8, 2022 . Clitoraid—a US-based, humanitarian organization— is launching its 3rd clitoral restorative surgical mission in Nairobi, Kenya, Nov 14-19, 2022 to help victims of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) regain their sense of dignity and sexual pleasure—thanks to a technique developed by a French urologist.

“According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 25% of the Kenyan female population has had to endure the horrific tradition of genital cutting. And today, the practice is illegal in Kenya,” explained Nadine Gary, Clitoraid's Director of Operations.

The WHO estimates that 125 million women worldwide have had their genitals forcibly mutilated as babies or toddlers and possibly teenagers. This practice is a gross violation of the UNICEF Convention on the Right of the Child.

Clitoraid volunteer and head-surgeon, Dr. Marci Bowers of San Francisco, USA, will co-lead the clitoral restorative medical procedure in partnership with Kenya-based Dr. Adan Abdullahi at the Platinum Clinic in Nairobi.

“They will be assisted by local Kenyan doctors as well as two MD’s from the US, Dr. Jasmine Pedroso and Dr. Ben Hu, and Dr. Angela Deane of Canada. Both Dr. Hu and Deane are returning for a second time,” explained Gary, who went on to say, "the mission will also be an educational opportunity for a group of post-grad residency medical students from the University of Nairobi Medical School who have been invited to witness the actual surgical procedure."

Sixty FGM survivors, including women from Tanzania and Nigeria, are scheduled for surgery during the one-week, humanitarian endeavor that will take place at Dr. Abdullahi’s clinic in Nairobi,” informed Gary.

Since 2009, Clitoraid has provided clitoral restorative surgery (CRS) to over 550 genitally-mutilated women (mostly in the US) at the clinic of Dr Marci Bowers in San Francisco," said Gary. "Very few people realize that more than half a million FGM victims currently reside in the US as a result of immigration. We have also previously operated in Burkina Faso, West Africa, where our hospital dedicated to FGM victims still awaits its Grand Opening,” explained Gary."

The creation of Clitoraid was inspired by International spiritual leader, Raël, a relentless defender of human rights and women’s rights. The innate right to sexual health and fulfillment has been a core value of the Raelian philosophy for nearly half a century and is now advocated by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a basic human right.

“Society must rid itself of sexual shame and guilt disseminated by archaic patriarchal religions both tribal and mainstream that are especially abusive and demeaning to women,” stated Gary. “Repressing their sexuality has been a powerful ploy to control and subdue them for centuries.”

“Today, thanks to access to education, women are realizing that traditions and cultures that violate their sexual integrity and their sexual freedom also violate their dignity as women,” Gary concluded.

Clitoraid launches its 2022 'Adopt a Clitoris' fundraising campaign to help FGM victims in Kenya.

March 03 2022, category: Press Releases
LAS VEGAS, March 3, 2022 - The U.S. based NGO, Clitoraid is launching its 2022 ‘Adopt a Clitoris’ fundraising campaign that will sponsor the clitoral restorative surgery (CRS) of FGM survivors during its 3rd Humanitarian Mission in Kenya, from November 14 to November 19, 2022.

"We call on the public to 'Adopt A clitoris', that is, to sponsor the 150 FGM Kenyan patients who will be scheduled for surgery during our upcoming mission this fall." explains Nadine Gary, Clitoraid International Director of Operations.

"Any donated amount will make a difference!" says Gary, "These women are desperate to turn the page on the unspeakable trauma they’ve endured in their childhood and to finally recover their clitoris, this precious organ, solely dedicated to their sexual pleasure."

“The 'female circumcision' ritual, of unimaginable violence, consists in forcefully slicing off a portion of a child’s clitoris and sometimes her labia, without anesthesia”, Gary bemoans, “by denying women of their sexual pleasure, the hope is to turn them into chaste, subdued and faithful wives.”

“And the Covid pandemic has made things worse!” Gary says.

It has been reported that the Covid related stringent measures have produced an increase in Sub-Saharan FGM cases.

“The reason is economical”, explains the spokeswoman, “circumcisers were striving to make ends meet while little girls were locked down in their homes and accessible.”

The Covid pandemic has also caused medical supplies to triple in cost in Kenya and today, the price of a CRS procedure is estimated at $600.

“That’s in spite of doctors such as Dr. Marci Bowers, Clitoraid's head surgeon and Dr. Adan Abdulahi, the host of the mission in Nairobi, and others, volunteering their services” adds Gary.

Clitoraid’s 'Adopt a clitoris' campaign unequivocally raises the issue of women's sexual pleasure as an inherent human right, a stance supported by both the United Nations and Rael Maitreya, the international spiritual leader whose humanitarian vision sparked the creation of Clitoraid in 2006.

Beyond Kenya, ‘Adopt a clitoris’ is a global call to denounce and erase centuries of shame and guilt around women’s sexual pleasure perpetrated by patriarchal Abrahamic religions for too long”, concluded Gary.
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