A little untraditional post, but wanted to share:
This whole process of talking about "those oppressed women" in other countries/cultures is counter-productive to any gender-empowerment, solidarity driven, transnational feminist cause. This process is known as "othering" in which an us and them is formed and our views and lifestyles are regarded as normal (and often superior). Women everywhere are oppressed and this may manifest in different ways; cultural differences of normativity must be taken into account, as well as this larger notion of empowerment and "human rights". Though it is a complex issue, I believe that there is truth to the notion that people in their situations are the experts of their own problems, with collective consciousness raising driven by interactions with others facing the same oppressions/marginalization, of the larger societal factors affecting the situations and experiences at hand, and taking collective action towards it if/when necessary. It's perhaps easier to judge from the outside but given the prevalence of the rates of eating disorders, breast augmentation and vaginoplasty(which I don't know too much about the rates), the portrayal of women in magazines/ads/fashion in our culture, it's inherent that there are messages given to women about appearance and they are indeed internalized, and many women alter their bodies and are unsatisfied with their body image due to an internalization of these messages. It manifests in our culture but perhaps in different ways, and perhaps it's more easy to point out the "faults" of another culture, but awareness of the universality of these societal inequities and effects of patriarchal culture on all women AND men and all human beings in general is important.
