Jeez, it's been a long time since anybody's called me an optimist. I
fully expect enormous environmental calamities (leaving out the more
dramatic events, simply the destruction of the seas and the lack of
drinking water) to kill off huge numbers and alter human societies in
unpleasant ways well before genital mutilation becomes a thing of the
past. I do think that what hope there is comes from social
change--laws that a people don't support are simply ignored.
As to "I don't believe it is seen as analogous to the circumcision of
boys. I really don't. The mutilation of women is, I believe, bound
up in fear of women's sexuality," belief has nothing to do with it.
In many of these societies female genital mutilation happens at the
same age as circumcision of boys, and the members of those societies
consider the practices analagous. One could argue, as Freud did, that
circumcision is symbolic castration by the father. Pretty much
nonsense. Which doesn't make it a good thing. I don't just believe, I
know, from the literature, what many of these peoples think, and I
also know from physiology that they're wrong. To change behavior one
had better address not what one believes oneself but what those whose
behavior one wishes to change believe. It certainly doesn't help to
assume that a behavior if practiced by a demented Christian or Jew in
New York or London would have the same meaning in another culture.
Maybe I am an optimist. If the problem is "fear of women's
sexuality," and if that fear is widespread, I don't see any way to intervene.
That said, if environmental degradation doesn't do us all in before
then, the practice will probably end as village economies succumb to
globalization. I'm not proposing that we all sit on our hands--that
kind of change will take a couple of generations, and it will also
require a lot of education. But education, about this as about
anything else, doesn't work if it ignores the cultural context.
Mark
At 11:01 AM 3/30/2006, you wrote:
>Hello Mark,
>
>
> > the acceptance of male circumcision, which is also a form of
> > mutilation,
>
>I totally agree. I think there have to be very compelling reasons for any
>form of surgical intervention. As you imply the word 'circumcision' is one
>that everyone understands or thinks they understand as removal of an
>inconsequential piece of skin. Hardly worth worrying about.
>
>135 million girls/women alive today are estimated (by Amnesty) to have been
>subjected to some form of genital mutilation (the majority in receipt of a
>full clitoris removal). About 7,000 women in the UK are considered at risk
>but no-one has any real stats for 'developed' countries.
>
>
> > the same league as to consequences. Problem is, the societies that
> > practice it do see it as analogous to the circumcision of boys, and a
> > perfectly normal thing to do.
>
>I agree that it is seen as normal. I don't believe it is seen as analogous
>to the circumcision of boys. I really don't. The mutilation of women is, I
>believe, bound up in fear of women's sexuality. It is, for instance, normal
>for Sudanese husbands to cut open their wives labia prior to penetration
>(stitched sometime in babyhood or childhood) on their wedding night (sorry,
>you have already mentioned this).
>
> > Some cultures
> > limit themselves to removing the hood of the clitoris, which is
> > closer to what happens in male circumcision.
>
>This is a tiny minority. And I cannot see it as even coming close to male
>circumcision.
>
> > Why the press in Britain and the US refer to these things as
> > circumcision is beyond me. Maybe as you suggest, Joanna, it's
> > cultural relativism pushed to an extreme, though the British tabloid
> > press isn't usually that sensitive. Mutilation would be more accurate.
>
>I suspect 'circumcision' is used because the idea then becomes more
>palatable. It becomes easier to ignore the violence towards females that
>goes on every day as a matter of routine. Ritualised rape of babies/young
>girls as a cure for AIDS or to reverse a run of bad luck are other forms of
>violence that don't often get discussed in the press. They are commonplace
>in parts of Africa/Asia and therefore must also be happening in my own/your
>countries too.
>
>
> > I'm not suggesting an answer: I'd probably rescue the girls and devil
> > take the consequences.
>
>135 million already mutilated. That probably makes for about 20 million
>pending...
>
>
> > The Australian anthropologist Kenneth Read describes in The High
> > Valley (one of the essential anthropology texts, and a great book by
> > any standards. Is Read read in Australia? A national treasure) a
> > signal moment of cultural change in a village in the mountains of
> > Papua. It had been the custom forever for girls to be married at
> > eight or nine to adult men. The practice had fallen very recently
> > into abeyance as a result of changes in the economy of the village
> > with the intrusion of foreign influence. Read witnessed what was
> > probably the last such marriage. The women were furious, and tried to
> > stop it, but the girl's father pushed it through. This is a famously
> > macho society. At the end of the wedding there was the usual male
> > procession (I may be mixing up the details--I've read the book
> > several times, but not for over a decade) from the girl's native
> > hamlet to her husband's. As it passed through a narrow gorge the
> > women attacked the men, throwing at them anything they could get
> > their hands on. No one had ever heard of such a thing happening before.
>
>
>You're an optimist aren't you?
>
>Tina
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