Mild Female Genital Mutilation

Patriciageegee. It is outlawed in Kenya now but these things are embedded in very ancient cultural tradition. Several posters have made the point that it is more likely to be stopped by education campaigns than anything else. The WHO needs to start a campaign. This practice is not confined to ISLAM .

Patriciageegee. Your anger comes across loud and clear. It mirrors mine.
What angers me even more, if that's possible, is that we have women in power who could do something, but don't.

Maggieanne. "I am truly concerned that the Muslim religion has got quiet a foothold in this country and we are closing our eyes to it"
I have been saying this for years and everyone thinks I'm crazy.

I wasn't singling out Islam. The whole point was to illustrate that it's a cultural practice that has become confused with a semi religious rite in order to give it validation and allow it to continue. It's a vile physical assault, it's child abuse of the highest order and just because it's been going on for a long time doesn't make it right. Why should these women who carry out the cuttings..urgh!!!..have to be "educated" in order to realise that they are inflicting horrendous pain and deep psychological trauma? Do they not know right from wrong at this most basic level?

Ah yes ethnic sensibilities. Was it Voltaire who said you know who your rulers are. They are the people you can't criticise.

FGM is performed by a local woman. It is not just a male inflicted custom. Women believe their daughters are not marriagable or clean with out cutting. It takes place across a swathe of Africa and does not depend on one religion.

Foot binding was driven out eventually so hopefully this will be too. It will take the strength of women with the support of men.

I am yet to hear anyone here speaking in favour of fgm. This emphasises the secret nature of the practice in UK.

I wholeheartedly agree with those who are angered by this practice and want it stopped - now.

I am at a loss as to how it can be stopped - it is a very difficult law to enforce. You cannot go around examining young girls en masse - and if it is only confined to those regarded as being at risk, how do we decide exactly who they are?

It is so exasperating that we seem to have an unenforceable law - if only there could be a prosecution that led to to a punitive sentence that might send out a message to the people involved in this barbaric practice.

Petra this is B* all to do with the Islamic religion. A lot of Muslims just happen to live in countries which practiced this centuries before Islam.

Islam started as a religious cult in (ca. 570–632 AD ) Mohammed was last in the line of Judeo-Christian prophets in about AD 610.

news.discovery.com/human/female-genital-mutilation-begin-121210.htm states that.

"This was not common practice in ancient Egypt. There is no physical evidence in mummies, neither there is anything in the art or literature. It probably originated in sub-saharan Africa, and was adopted here later on," Salima Ikram, professor of Egyptology at the American University in Cairo, told Discovery News.

Historically, the first mention of male and female circumcision appears in the writings by the Greek geographer Strabo, who visited Egypt around 25 B.C.

"One of the customs most zealously observed among the Egyptians is this, that they rear every child that is born, and circumcise the males, and excise the females," Strabo wrote in his 17-volume work Geographica.

A Greek papyrus dated 163 B.C. mentioned the operation being performed on girls in Memphis, Egypt, at the age when they received their dowries, supporting theories that FGM originated as a form of initiation of young women.

Why couldn't we bring in the examining of young girls en masse? Ok, to 'equal' things up, perhaps it would have to be the examining of both sexes en masse. Is that really impossible? An annual medical examination up to a certain age for all children, regardless of race or sex , of which the detection of any genital mutilation inflicted since the last examination could be just one element, would surely not be outside the realms of possibility, would it?

It would be a draconian law that denied parents the option to refuse to have their children examined. I can't see such a law ever being passed.

No to mass examinations. The mind boggles. I would have hated that as a child or a teenager.

Abhorrent as I find circumcision and FGM, I don't want to live in a society where all children are forcibly medically examined at some arbitrary age. And anyway, all that would do would be to drive up the age at which these practices were carried out by those determined to do so.

Whilst I agree that education is the answer, I don't think we can afford to just wait for ideas to change. I would like to see a far more proactive pursuance of prosecutions of parents who allow their children to be abused in this way, as well as those who carry out the procedures if they can be identified.

I have to say though, that we as a society really need to sort out our attitudes to male circumcision unless we want to be accused of double standards. It may be a slightly lesser mutilation but mutilation it still is.

The mass examination of all girls? There are so many objections to that, but I'll just look at who, when and how much. It would have to be done by a female medical professional. Do we have the staff to do this for every girl in the country? When would it be done - in terms of age of child and position in the school year. Even in a one-form entry school, that could mean 15-20 girls, taking 5 minutes each - say roughly an hour and a half. When in the school day would this happen? Would the checks need to be repeated every year so that parents didn't just wait until the one-off check had happened? And how much would it cost to do this for all girls, and whose budget would it come out of - education, the health service, the CPS? and that's before you even begin to consider the effect on young girls of having this kind of examination

Indeed so - I have commented upthread how vehemently I object to male circumcision - and it is legal! The mind boggles as to how this barbaric practice is not outlawed. There is nothing racist about objecting to babies being mutilated, be they male or female.

I am always puzzled by circumcision - these are people who believe in god - how can they go against their god and suggest that he/she did not know what they were doing in making humans as they are? Good effort, but let's just trim a few bits off! - quite quite barmy and utterly barbaric. It makes me despair.

Margrete , Richard Dawkins is not saying that feminists agree with FGM just that they are very quiet about it . One would have thought it would be a very big issue with feminists but it doesn`t seem to be .

There should be a high price to pay for those that do this, we can talk about this but when you actually think about what it really is, it just makes your body react to the pain that you imagine that these girls suffer. Years ago, at school, we always saw a nurse that gave a brief examination of every child, basic things like tests for colour blindness and a quick look to see how advanced you were towards puberty, do they still have the nurse/doctor visit? Do mothers take their child to "the welfare" to check on their progress. I must admit, I'm a bit out of touch with schools and young children.
It horrifies me to think of Daniel Pelko, I think that was the boys name, literally starving to death and the teachers doing nothing! Is that what life is now, people too scared to speak.

Maggieanne , no there are no school nurses any more , no nit nurse or welfare checks either . My GC get nits constantly from school , they get treated all the time but if another child is not treated then they just catch them again . All the schools seem to be worried about now is league tables and perpetual testing , the children`s welfare seems to come quite low on the list . Hence children starving to death while still attending school !

And quite frankly, the old practice of checking children's heads for nits, and eyesight and hearing tests bear no comparison to looking at their genitals.

I'd think they'd have to have a responsible adult in attendance (i.e. a parent, guardian or similar), and where would these examinations take place? Certainly not in a spare classroom...

I think we need someone to come on here who has had it done and is campaigning against it. I don't see that circumcision is comparable . It can be done for medical reasons can it not whereas there is no justification for FGM other than to deprive a woman of sexual pleasure . Perhaps Gnhq might oblige. We have a lot of foreign wives in this university city and they have tales to tell.

Male circumcision for medical reasons is fine - but not for any other reason. Wholly unacceptable.

The ancient practice usually involves the partial or total removal of a girl’s external genitalia. In some cases the vaginal opening is also sewn up.

But some communities practice less invasive rituals such as pricking or nicking the clitoris.

The U.S. gynecologists, writing in the Journal of Medical Ethics, argued that permitting more minimal procedures could allow families to uphold cultural and religious traditions while protecting girls from more dangerous forms of cutting.

It seems that what these particular gynaecologists are suggesting should be legal is almost directly comparable to male circumcision. How can we condemn them if we continue to permit male circumcision?

I don't think male circumcision is comparable to fgm which is why we have changed the name from female circumcision.

The former involves a nick at a very young age ( horrible.as that must be.) The later involves horrific cutting and sewing up of female genitalia which damages the woman/ girl for life. Men don't have permanent disfigurement. Jews and Muslims and many Americans have been circumcising boys for centuries.

I remember meetings some American woman who believed it was more hygienic. They were surprised I didn't consider it for my boys.

We must not confuse the two.

I have to say I understand the debate to be had re cultural mutilation whether it be circumcision or female genital mutilation.

But ye gods the practice/ actual physical degree of physical abuse of Female Genital Mutilation is so abhorrent, repugnant, dangerous, vile I can make a distinction. I may well be wrong and. I appreciate and totally take on board other posters comments and I do not want to get into yet another spat with anyone . I have just aired an opinion.

Galen I was in tears listening to the radio 4 play. It was horrifying and heartrending especially as I was listening in the car waiting to pick up my 4 year old DGD from nursery. How can any religion condone mutilating young children, boys or girls? I have listened to both sides of the arguments on various programmes previously and although I am generally a tolerant and open minded person I cannot see that this can ever be right in any culture or religion. Child abuse of any sort is wrong and should be prosecuted.

LullyDully I remember as a child being horrified when I heard about foot binding. I agree if this could be banned then so could FGM with a combination of education and punitive measures.