Clearing my throat.

I've never been one to ease into anything. So today's rant topic is... (drumroll please...)

Female circumcision! (Yes, you should read the damn link).

Here's my thing: the Taliban committed outrageous violations of human rights, largely upon women, for years before we invaded. Now, our reason for invading Afghanistan was valid, and all I mean to say is WTF took us so long??!!

Meanwhile, tacit and awknowledged allies allow this practice to go on: Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Egypt... It's been going on for ages in Sudan, but no one starts paying attention until whole communities are affected, not just the women.

I once was ranting at school about the Taliban's treatment of women (yes, this was pre-9/11), and actually had a friend tell me that I wasn't respecting their religion.

Seriously.

I support freedom of religion. You show me proof that ANY of those 7-13 year old girls say "Mommy, could I please have my clitoris cut off so I can be a better and purer Muslim?" mis-informed or not, and we'll revisit the issue.

But I think we all know that there is no element of choice in this.

And the reaction is so blase! Rape carries shorter prison terms than weed possesion. Women still make barely 75 cents for every dollar a man in the same position makes.

None of this gets discussed. Not even by the first, major-party woman candidate for president. The first woman with a real shot of getting elected. No one talks about it. Women's issues don't have any political cache anymore. Women suffer every day, all over the world, including here in this country, and it causes barely a ripple. Rape victims are victimized a second time by the system. God help you if you're sexually assaulted or harassed by a public figure! We always try to villianize the woman. Even other women do it!

I don't know which is worse: the persistent inequality, the fact that there's still this belief that men must take care of women, or the fact that, if that's men's job, they're doing a massively crappy job of it.

Sex is wrong and bad and dirty, so women must cover themselves up and mutilate their bodies and surrender their liberty. A woman's purpose is to marry so you must avoid anything that will make you less appealing to a potential husband. Women are overly emotional and make lousy leaders, or, if they're excellent leaders, they're completely unemotional and lousy people.

Double standard much? Why don't more people talk about this? Why isn't this in the news every day, because it happens every day.

Or perhaps I should punctuate that differently. "Why isn't this in the news every day? Because it happens every day."