SAINT-DENIS, France — Chastity can exact a painful price from young Muslim women, forced into lies or surgery to go to the marriage bed as virgins.
Hymen repair, fake virginity certificates and other deceptions, said to be commonplace in some Muslim countries, are practiced in France and elsewhere in Europe, where Muslim girls are more emancipated but still live under rigid codes.
Such ploys have saved many a young woman from scorn and worse. But they also clash with the more liberal social mores of France and Europe, where some decry it as an attack on human rights.
The procedures are legal but shrouded in silence — "something that passes through nonofficial channels," via friends or the Internet, said Dr. Nathan Wrobel. "There are circuits that lead women to me."
Wrobel is one of an unknown number of gynecologists in France who are willing to repair hymens, the membrane usually broken by the first act of sexual intercourse. He was one of the few doctors willing to talk about it.
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Wrobel says women come to him having convinced themselves that the procedure will reverse the irreversible. "They tell me, 'I'll be a virgin again. You will make me a virgin,' which in reality is totally false. ... It's a secret we share."
Other doctors issue false virginity certificates or offer such tricks as spilling a vial of blood on the sheets to fool families into believing the bride has passed their purity bar.
Virginity has been prized across religions and cultures, and doctors note that only a few generations back European brides also had to furnish "proof" of chastity.
In today's France, with an estimated 5 million Muslims, it's part of the larger question of how to deal with cultural clashes ranging from head scarves in schools to sexual segregation in swimming pools.
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