Rapper T.I. — whose real name is Clifford Joseph Harris Jr. stated during a podcast this week that he takes his daughter to the gynecologist every year to make sure that she is still a virgin by having the doctor check to see if her hymen is “still intact.”
“Right after her birthday, we celebrate, then usually like the day after the party, she’s enjoying the gifts, I put a sticky note on the door: ‘Tomorrow. 9:30,’” Harris said during an interview on a podcast called “Ladies Like Us.” podcast
“So we’ll go and sit down and the doctor will come and talk, and the doctor’s maintaining a high level of professionalism,” Harris continued. “He’s like, ‘Well you know, sir, I have to, to share information’ — I’m like, ‘Deyjah, they want you to sign this so we can share information. Is there anything you would not want me to know? See, Doc? Ain’t no problem.’”
“I say, ‘Look doc — she don’t ride no horses, she don’t ride no bikes, she don’t play no sports, man — just check the hymen, please, and give me back my results expeditiously,” Harris concluded, adding, “I will say, as of her 18th birthday, her hymen is still intact.”
Checking a woman’s hymen to make sure that it is still intact is known as “virginity testing,” a practice that medical ethics experts say that doctors should not participate in for a variety of reasons.
“Virginity testing does not protect and promote the health of female patients; virginity testing is therefore completely incompatible with each of these three principles of professional ethics in obstetrics and gynecology,” said Laurence McCullough, an ethics and health policy researcher at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, according to Reuters. “There is no net clinical benefit and (a) preventable risk of biopsychosocial harm.”
Reuters noted that “some women, however, may be born without a hymen, and the membrane can also rupture or stretch from activities like sports or using a tampon.”
Late last month, Harris said to his wife while on his podcast “ExpediTIously” that he was owed sex and that it was part of the marriage “contract.”
“What’s yours is mine and what’s mine is yours. That means that little thing you got, that little sex box you got is half mine,” Harris said, according to The Grio.
“So you pick which side you want, and that’s yours. The rest of it is mine. We can split it right down the middle of the… What do they call it? Is it the, ‘Uvula”?'” Harris continued. “What I’m saying is, it’s half mine. And my half is on the inside.”
The comments immediately sparked shock online from journalists, celebrities, and doctors.
Attorney Jill Filipovic wrote: “T.I. is an abusive misogynist. He demands his daughter’s gynecologist disclose the results of an annual ‘hymen check’ to him so he can ensure she’s still a virgin. When it comes to his wife, ‘that little sex box you got is half mine.’ This isn’t over-protective. It’s abusive.”
T.I. is an abusive misogynist. He demands his daughter’s gynecologist disclose the results of an annual “hymen check” to him so he can ensure she’s still a virgin. When it comes to his wife, “that little sex box you got is half mine.” This isn’t over-protective. It’s abusive. https://t.co/Muv8mLCrp8
— Jill Filipovic (@JillFilipovic) November 6, 2019
Dr. Yasmin, Director of the Stanford Health Communication Initiative, wrote: “1. This is child abuse 2. This man understands very little, if anything, about the piece of tissue called the hymen 3. That he is bragging about this to the press says a lot about rape culture.”
“And to the doctors allowing this man to look through the speculum at his child’s vagina: what tf are you doing?” Yasmin added.
And to the doctors allowing this man to look through the speculum at his child’s vagina: what tf are you doing?
— Dr. Yasmin (@DoctorYasmin) November 6, 2019
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