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I'm sure most of you have read about the AAP and the ritual nick rather than actual female genital mutilation. And I've seen a lot of arguments against it.
Some of them are from people I respect, whose arguments I respect, even if I disagree. Some, I respect less, while still disagreeing.
Here's my take on it.
This ritual nick means antiseptics, it means medical supervision, it means less girls taken to other countries to be treated worse than the cattle. If it saves ONE baby girl from being mutilated, it's justified its purpose. If it saves ONE girl from sepsis and death, it's worth it. If it saves a lot more girls? Then it's even more justified. Some things are non-negotiable in our culture. But by the same token, some things are non-negotiable in other cultures, and if this opens a point of negotiation, isn't that a good thing?
Because, until we find the lever that will force the other countries to stop brutalizing their women, shouldn't we, as thinking people, be doing what we can to find ways to protect them? Even if it means giving a little on things we find horrible, isn't a single drop of blood better than mutilation and possibly death? And please don't give me the 'slippery slope' argument. I don't buy it. There /is/ a line. The line is where you actually start mutilating people. THAT'S the line, for me.
(And if you want to bring circumcision into it, yes, I have a son. Yes, he is circumcised. Yes, it was done in the hospital, by a doctor, and not by a mohel. Yes, I do consider it to be a form of mutilation, as it is, in fact, the changing of the body with outside tools. And yes, I've been wondering ever since, if I would have it done again if I had to choose now. I'm up in the air about it.)
I welcome thoughts, but if you want to flame me, be aware, I flame back.
Edited to add: Thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
eevieivy , I can offer this article on female genital mutilation, it's not pleasant, and it's what the ritual nick is supposed to be preventing. It's text, and it's...unreal. I could only scroll down so far, and now I need to go throw up and cry for a while. Yeah. I'll take the nick over this.
Some of them are from people I respect, whose arguments I respect, even if I disagree. Some, I respect less, while still disagreeing.
Here's my take on it.
This ritual nick means antiseptics, it means medical supervision, it means less girls taken to other countries to be treated worse than the cattle. If it saves ONE baby girl from being mutilated, it's justified its purpose. If it saves ONE girl from sepsis and death, it's worth it. If it saves a lot more girls? Then it's even more justified. Some things are non-negotiable in our culture. But by the same token, some things are non-negotiable in other cultures, and if this opens a point of negotiation, isn't that a good thing?
Because, until we find the lever that will force the other countries to stop brutalizing their women, shouldn't we, as thinking people, be doing what we can to find ways to protect them? Even if it means giving a little on things we find horrible, isn't a single drop of blood better than mutilation and possibly death? And please don't give me the 'slippery slope' argument. I don't buy it. There /is/ a line. The line is where you actually start mutilating people. THAT'S the line, for me.
(And if you want to bring circumcision into it, yes, I have a son. Yes, he is circumcised. Yes, it was done in the hospital, by a doctor, and not by a mohel. Yes, I do consider it to be a form of mutilation, as it is, in fact, the changing of the body with outside tools. And yes, I've been wondering ever since, if I would have it done again if I had to choose now. I'm up in the air about it.)
I welcome thoughts, but if you want to flame me, be aware, I flame back.
Edited to add: Thanks to
eevieivy , I can offer this article on female genital mutilation, it's not pleasant, and it's what the ritual nick is supposed to be preventing. It's text, and it's...unreal. I could only scroll down so far, and now I need to go throw up and cry for a while. Yeah. I'll take the nick over this.
From: (Anonymous)
no subject
If we take 100 families and say that upon being told no, 80 of them just don't have it done, while 10 fly overseas but when offered the ritual nick instead 80 of them go for it while 10 still fly overseas, then there is no real net benefit to offering that as an option. The diehards on the subject will still still have run off to mutilation camp, and 80 girls will have had sharp things poked at their genitals for less than compelling reasons.
If it turns out that the distribution is different than that, well, that's more information to. I'm not really making any claims about what the numbers are, only that it seems like information that should be collected, yeah? I'm not sure how it could be accurately done, though.