Female Genital Mutilation/Circumcision

[cybercoma]

http://news.scotsman.com/latest_internatio...fm?id=988492007

Egypt's state-appointed Grand Mufti said on Sunday that female genital cutting was forbidden by Islam after an 11-year-old girl died while undergoing the procedure at a private medical clinic in southern Egypt.

Genital cutting of girls, often referred to as female genital mutilation or circumcision, is banned in Egypt although the practice remains widespread as a rite of passage for girls and is often viewed as a way to protect their chastity.

It's good to see someone on the inside speaking out against this horrific and inhumane act. At the same time, it's disgusting that it is 2007 and there is a need for someone to speak out against it. Would girls be mutilated like this if not for religion? For what reason would good people do such horrible things, but in the name of God?

[ScottSA]

http://news.scotsman.com/latest_internatio...fm?id=988492007

Egypt's state-appointed Grand Mufti said on Sunday that female genital cutting was forbidden by Islam after an 11-year-old girl died while undergoing the procedure at a private medical clinic in southern Egypt.

Genital cutting of girls, often referred to as female genital mutilation or circumcision, is banned in Egypt although the practice remains widespread as a rite of passage for girls and is often viewed as a way to protect their chastity.

It's good to see someone on the inside speaking out against this horrific and inhumane act. At the same time, it's disgusting that it is 2007 and there is a need for someone to speak out against it. Would girls be mutilated like this if not for religion? For what reason would good people do such horrible things, but in the name of God?

Ayup...blame God...right. Maybe because they are friggin' 6th century savages? I have news for you...slavery was outlawed and the global trade smashed, directly because of religion. You can run around making sophomoric arguments that religion is the root of all ewvil, but let me save you a bit of future embarrassment and tell you that it ain't so.

[FascistLibertarian]

It has more to do with patriarchy and controlling womens reproduction than religion.

It is sick.

[cybercoma]

I'm sure the majority of people who are having this procedure done to their daughters believe they are doing the "right" thing because of religion. A rational mind would not butcher a child, such as this. It is religion that has poisoned the minds of these peoplec(who, for all we know, are otherwise good people, trying to do the right thing), making them think that it is "right" to control womens sexuality/reproduction and perpetuate a patriarchal society.

[M.Dancer]

They are doing it because their culture demands it.

Culture is evil

....and if anyone has had to endure a 2 hour modern jazz dance demonstration can testify that culture is also prentiously boring.

[BC_chick]

It has more to do with patriarchy and controlling womens reproduction than religion.

It is sick.

FGM is an old African tribal ritual which is practiced mostly in sub-saharan African countries. It has spread to some northern Muslim countries and occassionally in the Middle-East. Given that the common denominator is therefore not religion, I agree with you 100%. Sadly though, the women are the ones doing it out of brainwashed notions of "customs."

[kimmy]

Indeed. The common thread isn't religion, it's stupidity.

African tribalism with it's history of massacres and widespread belief in sorcerers who can steal a man's boy-parts by shaking hands with him, has to be one of the world's foremost hotbeds of stupidity.

So it is hardly surprising that the Muslim world, itself having no shortage of idiots and idiot-worshipers, would look to African tribal practices and say "hey, we can learn from these people!"

-k

[cybercoma]

Indeed. The common thread isn't religion, it's stupidity.

African tribalism with it's history of massacres and widespread belief in sorcerers who can steal a man's boy-parts by shaking hands with him, has to be one of the world's foremost hotbeds of stupidity.

So it is hardly surprising that the Muslim world, itself having no shortage of idiots and idiot-worshipers, would look to African tribal practices and say "hey, we can learn from these people!"

-k

Belief in a deity and knowing its will is not a far cry from belief in sorcerers and witchcraft.

[ScottSA]

Indeed. The common thread isn't religion, it's stupidity.

African tribalism with it's history of massacres and widespread belief in sorcerers who can steal a man's boy-parts by shaking hands with him, has to be one of the world's foremost hotbeds of stupidity.

So it is hardly surprising that the Muslim world, itself having no shortage of idiots and idiot-worshipers, would look to African tribal practices and say "hey, we can learn from these people!"

-k

Belief in a deity and knowing its will is not a far cry from belief in sorcerers and witchcraft.

That's like saying Mother Theresa is not a far cry from the Mad Mullah.

[cybercoma]

Mother Theresa believed you could only find God through suffering, yet she was charged with providing care for those who suffered.

Conflict of interest? That's not the topic, but you may not be far off. Mother Theresa was hardly a "saint".

[ScottSA]

Mother Theresa believed you could only find God through suffering, yet she was charged with providing care for those who suffered.

Conflict of interest? That's not the topic, but you may not be far off. Mother Theresa was hardly a "saint".

But that's not the point. You made a claim that effectively removes the moral distance between her a Beelzebub or the Old Man on the Mountain.

[FascistLibertarian]

Sadly though, the women are the ones doing it out of brainwashed notions of "customs."

Just like the house slaves in the US or the Jews who helped during the holocaust.

You need to co-opts a part of the population you are holding down.

FGM could not exist without women actively supporting it.

I still hold it is in the end due to patriarchy.

[Moxie]

Sadly though, the women are the ones doing it out of brainwashed notions of "customs."

Just like the house slaves in the US or the Jews who helped during the holocaust.

You need to co-opts a part of the population you are holding down.

FGM could not exist without women actively supporting it.

I still hold it is in the end due to patriarchy.

I'd agree with your assertion. We need to do more in educating immigrants that's it's criminal to mutilate females. There has already been one successful trial against a man who had it done against the mother's wishes. He's in jail, as he should be. Females are not property for men to do as they wish in Canada, religion is an excuse for this barbaric cultural practice. Another way to keep Muslim or African women subjugated and isolated from main stream society.

On side note, why do these men want women who don't enjoy sex? Really someone lying dead staring at the ceiling praying it will be over soon or a willing partner who enjoys sex. It seems like a no brainer to me.

[ScottSA]

Sadly though, the women are the ones doing it out of brainwashed notions of "customs."

Just like the house slaves in the US or the Jews who helped during the holocaust.

You need to co-opts a part of the population you are holding down.

FGM could not exist without women actively supporting it.

I still hold it is in the end due to patriarchy.

The question is not that something feminists label as patriarchy exists, but rather whether it is reflective of male domination, as feminists assert, or merely division of labor, as normal people and anthropologists point out. Consider, for instance, the tribes in which men sit about all day long, occasionally bestirring themselves to go out for a few days of hunting, while women rush about doing the mundane chores of daily life. Is that patriarchy? Because really, that's merely a flipside of 1950s western culture in which the men went out and did the work while the women, who were once tied down in the kitchen, suddenly found themselves benefitting from the kitchen revolution, with lots of time and nothing much to do except complain about it. And that was supposed to be reflective of "patriarchy" too.

Why would men care if labias and clitori get lopped off? Are you suggesting that these women are in some kind of thrall?

Talk of patriarchy is always good for a laugh. I'm surprised to find someone in 2007 who still takes it seriously. It's soooo 90s.

[FascistLibertarian]

Consider, for instance, the tribes in which men sit about all day long, occasionally bestirring themselves to go out for a few days of hunting, while women rush about doing the mundane chores of daily life.

If you’re going to talk about hunter-gathers you need some more information.

It would be hard to consider a societal type that was more sexually egalitarian than non-settled H-G's.

I would not consider their gender roles and relations to be at all related to 1950s western culture.

Patriarchy only came to be after the Neolithic revolution.

The status of men has always been higher than women.

Some women have always held power over men.

These are universals.

The degrees to which these are true are not universal!

Gender roles are very diverse over time and space.

Why would men care if labias and clitori get lopped off?

Are you really asking this?

Okay......

men would care because if this happens sex wont be nearly as good for the women.

Therefore she will be less likely to cheat, as sex for her will not be enjoyable.

pa·tri·ar·chy

A social system in which the father is the head of the family and men have authority over women and children.

A family, community, or society based on this system or governed by men.

I fail to see what is so funny.....

[M.Dancer]

Mother Theresa believed you could only find God through suffering......

No but why let facts get in the way of a perfectly good bigoted smear

[ScottSA]

Mother Theresa believed you could only find God through suffering......

No but why let facts get in the way of a perfectly good bigoted smear

I take it you're defending the mad mullah?

[M.Dancer]

Mother Theresa believed you could only find God through suffering......

No but why let facts get in the way of a perfectly good bigoted smear

I take it you're defending the mad mullah?

Mother Theresa or Cybercoma?

Mother Theresa did not believe you could on find God only through suffering......but she did believe you could find God in suffering......or more correctly, by ministering to the suffering.

[cybercoma]

According to Hitchens, your favourite author no doubt...

This returns us to the medieval corruption of the church, which sold indulgences to the rich while preaching hellfire and continence to the poor. MT was not a friend of the poor. She was a friend of poverty. She said that suffering was a gift from God. She spent her life opposing the only known cure for poverty, which is the empowerment of women and the emancipation of them from a livestock version of compulsory reproduction. And she was a friend to the worst of the rich, taking misappropriated money from the atrocious Duvalier family in Haiti (whose rule she praised in return) and from Charles Keating of the Lincoln Savings and Loan. Where did that money, and all the other donations, go? The primitive hospice in Calcutta was as run down when she died as it always had been—she preferred California clinics when she got sick herself—and her order always refused to publish any audit. But we have her own claim that she opened 500 convents in more than a hundred countries, all bearing the name of her own order. Excuse me, but this is modesty and humility?

http://www.slate.com/id/2090083/

Mother Theresa.... Blessed Theresa of Calcutta, the beatified. Yes sir.

[ScottSA]

According to Hitchens, your favourite author no doubt...

This returns us to the medieval corruption of the church, which sold indulgences to the rich while preaching hellfire and continence to the poor. MT was not a friend of the poor. She was a friend of poverty. She said that suffering was a gift from God. She spent her life opposing the only known cure for poverty, which is the empowerment of women and the emancipation of them from a livestock version of compulsory reproduction. And she was a friend to the worst of the rich, taking misappropriated money from the atrocious Duvalier family in Haiti (whose rule she praised in return) and from Charles Keating of the Lincoln Savings and Loan. Where did that money, and all the other donations, go? The primitive hospice in Calcutta was as run down when she died as it always had been—she preferred California clinics when she got sick herself—and her order always refused to publish any audit. But we have her own claim that she opened 500 convents in more than a hundred countries, all bearing the name of her own order. Excuse me, but this is modesty and humility?

http://www.slate.com/id/2090083/

Mother Theresa.... Blessed Theresa of Calcutta, the beatified. Yes sir.

Hutchins can be suuuuuch an idiot sometimes...

[M.Dancer]

She spent her life opposing the only known cure for poverty, which is the empowerment of women and the emancipation of them from a livestock version of compulsory reproduction.

Really? That's the only cure? What about micro loans?