“…sex was something to be endured not enjoyed… ”: A Feminist Interpretation of Saida Herzi’s “ Against the Pleasure Principle” Anonymous College

Saida Herzi offers an in-depth account of the suffering that women from Somalia go through due to circumcision in "Against the Pleasure Principle." Even though the women are conditioned to view circumcision as a religious practice to foster purity, it is a patriarchal ideology intent on pleasing their future husbands of the young girl. The fact that circumcision is practiced in Somali leaves the reader wondering: “ Aren’t there feminists in Somalia, who can fight on behalf of young girls who are led to the slaughterhouse oblivious of the sexual life that awaits them in the future?” Women in Somali are encultured to internalize circumcision as a way of life. Saida Herzi’s “ Against the Pleasure Principle” has a feminist objective; she condemns the role that patriarchy plays in the immortalization of female circumcision, by detailing the negative effects of the practice on a woman in her sexual life and child bearing.

Patriarchy in Somalia programs girls from a young age on the ideology of female circumcision. For example, Rahma recalls about her desire to be circumcised at the age of four years old; she says, “there was no room for fear in her mind: all she could think of was that she wanted to have done to her what they were...