When it comes to discussing FGM (female genital mutilation), American progressives generally fall into two camps: those who think Western criticism of this cultural practice is imperialistic, and those who think FGM is an abuse against little girls and designed to control women’s sexuality.
I can remember quite clearly how I learned about FGM: I was about eleven-years-old, waiting for a friend at the hair salons and reading Cosmopolitan (that bastion of radical feminism), when I came to an article about women who’d been victims of the practice. I felt like throwing up.
This feeling has never gone away when I read about the practice even years later. So I was particularly surprised by a headline in PR Newswire which read “American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) is Advocating for U.S. Pediatricians to Perform Certain Types of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).” In a move subsequently denounced by Equality Now, the AAP is calling for “federal and state laws (to) enable pediatricians to reach out to families by offering a ‘ritual nick,’ such as pricking or minor incisions of girls’ clitorises.”
Excuse me????
As Taina Bien-Aime, Equality Now’s Executive Director explains, “Encouraging pediatricians to perform FGM under the notion of ‘cultural sensitivity’ shows a shocking lack of understanding of a girl’s fundamental right to bodily integrity and equality.” Couldn’t have said it better myself, Ms. Bien-Aime.
Moreover, those who rely on the cultural relativism argument often fail to recognize opposition within cultures that practice FGM. For instance, there’s the inspiring story of Waris Dirie, a former model-turned-activist who fights against the practice, having herself endured it as a girl in Somalia.
More dramatic is the fact that the Ugandan parliament unanimously passed a bill banning FGM, with life imprisonment if the victim dies.
The new recommendation from the AAP mocks international progress on the FGM issue. The United States should be a safe haven for everyone who chooses to make their life here, and that includes young girls and women.
[...] write about issues plaguing women in those regions, including honor killings, maternal mortality, FGM and a whole host of other issues that don’t make for good dinner table [...]
[...] describes how an unbending religious orientation invited a host of catastrophes: financial ruin, FGM inflicted upon Ayaan and her sister at young ages and improperly treated mental illness. Ayaan says [...]
[...] that with Egypt, which has a much spottier human rights with regards to the womenfolk: FGM (female genital mutilation) was again made legal after its initial ban in 1997, then subsequently [...]
I think the real purpose of the AAP paper is less straightforward than you indicate. Their recommendation is to change laws to allow Doctors to perform this ‘ritual nick’. What they really want is to build trust with communities who don’t trust American Pediatricians.
We’ll see, but unless one of the following happens, their recommendation is merely lip service: (i) the AAP actively lobbies congress to change existing laws, or (ii) AAP goes to federal court, or files a friend of the court brief in support of performing a ritual nick. I don’t think they have any intention of doing either. Acting in that way is inconsistent with the dissonance you correctly note is evident in the paper. It would create an incredible controversy.
So, if the stated purpose is not credible, what’s a reasonable alternative motivation? My guess is that pediatricians aren’t seeing children from cultures in which FGM is performed. They want to indicate to families that they understand, but there’s nothing they can do. Oh, and by the way, remember to bring your child in for a checkup.
I don’t mean to defend what the AAP is doing. In my view, they’re sacrificing girls’ autonomy for a narrow public health gain. [There are public health issues in the area that effect larger communities than the recent immigrant groups the AAP is looking to reassure. After all, if kids don't see the doctor, they don't get vaccinated. That effects everyone.] They may actually save some lives in the process. And they might, although this seems far less plausible to me, save some girls from being horribly mutilated.
You can see the incentives from their view. ‘Ritual nicks’ will never be a live possibility, anyway. So, no harm, no foul. In the meantime we improve relations with and access to a certain population.
There are two troubles. First, as you note, it could impede initiatives to stop more extensive forms of mutilation internationally. Second, even the symbolic sacrifice of girls’ autonomy is repugnant at a time when girls’ and women’s actual reproductive rights are being severely curtailed, and when it has become legal for Doctors to lie to their pregnant patients, thoroughly undermining their autonomy.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/OPINION/04/28/carr.abortion.oklahoma/index.html
Still, it’s not right to think that the U.S. is going to be a “safe haven” for FGM. That’s completely implausible, and this AAP paper does nothing to make that a legitimate possibility.