So Carol,

FGM is a horrible practice that I can only hope will end, the sooner the better. But what have you really done about stopping it?

Did you report on any of the groups in the US trying to stop it? Mention which of our congressman are interested in this issue? Provide motivated readers with a call to action?

Are you a neutral reporter whose job it is just to push the copy out and get ad traffic? Or are you an activist taking action to move culture? Are you a pundit analyzing an issue, recommending actions, analyzing effects and likelihood of success?

You posted about it! Congratulations. Happy Hour in an hour?

Back at my Ivy League school, just 2 years ago, I was verbally abused in section for my stance on female genital mutilation. Everyone knew I was a conservative, so they would attack anything I said.

We were discussing it. I raised my hand. "I just don't think it's right. I understand that it is a part of certain cultures and that there is a legacy - I just don't think it is right. We need to wipe this out. No one should have the right to mutilate another person's body. No one. It isn't right."

Go figure, I was attacked for my stance, by a young lady, with this argument.

"Well, President Bush didn't think Saddam was right, or that middle eastern countries are 'right' so he just invades them, tries to wipe them out, which is wrong. If a certain culture wants to be governed a certain way (I'm assuming she was implying Sharia) we have NO RIGHT to mandate our way of thinking. So, just because we, as Americans, don't think female circumcision is right, doesn't give us the authority to prevent others from practicing this ceremony. A ceremony which goes back hundreds of years."

I threw my hands up. This was a young woman's argument. That was pretty much the moment that I decided I was done voicing my opinions in section, even though I was spending over $43,000 a year to attend school.

I asked her, how would you feel about having your genitals mutilated - she formally accused me of a sex crime to the administration. I showed up, I told a panel my story, they threw it out.

This is happening at our 'finest' universities.

So, Broadsheeters, who is right?

(i really wish I could post this with my username, but I would just be attacked by other people more 'enlightened' than conservative white me.)

http://www.thefire.org/

FIRE is an organization of liberals, feminists, conservatives, etc. that share a common interest in demanding free speech in the universities. They fight against implicit and explicit speech codes. They often fight against Broadsheet Feminist(TM) approved speech codes and punishments.

You'll never read about FIRE at Broadsheet, so I thought I would give you the link.

The practice has no integral relationship with the tenets of Islam.

Why does this matter either way? Must we see everything through the veil of idiocy that is religion? I hope I live to see the day when we can evaluate everything rationally.

I guess I can understand how in this particular instance it might be a shortcut to ending the practice. It just rubs me the wrong way that it's always part of the conversation.

Social Relativism is so obviously bullshit!

"In this guy's culture, it's okay to do X."

"Well, in my culture, it's okay to invade other countries and forceably eliminate their culture." Obviously, my culture can be wrong and so can this guy's. It's ridiculous to claim that there's no universal morality EXCEPT you have to respect other people's culture AS LONG AS it doesn't conflict with this rule about respecting people's culture.

I'm not sure if there's Right and Wrong. I like to think there is Right and Wrong, but I know that I'm just guessing. If there's no Right and Wrong, then why condemn me for wanting to end female genital mutilation -- or, for that matter, promoting female circumcision, or any other crazy policy I care about. If there is Right and Wrong, then I can't believe it doesn't prohibit genital mutilation!

Now, the caveat is that this doesn't mean every issue has to be resolved at gun-point. Invading Egypt to end female genital mutilation would be a ridiculously bad idea. Democracy is good, period, but if you can ever spread democracy with a bomb then those times are very, very rare.

Many, maybe most female circumcisions in Egypt do far less damage than a male circumcision in the US. Some of them are only a symbolic incision. Doing that to a girl in the US though would result in jail time for the surgeon, yet 56% of US male babies still have the most sensitive part of their penis cut off, and that's not only legal, but subsidised in some states.

How can we expect to stop female genital cutting whilst at the same time promoting male genital cutting? I don't see much difference, and neither do the people in the countries that cut women. People from the US seem to fly into a rage when the comparison is made, but the more you learn, the less difference there is.

Canada, the UK and Australia have pretty much stopped male circumcision, so why is it taking so long in the US, and why are millions spent trying to find reasons to justify it? People have a fundamental right not to have part of their genitals cut off without their consent.

Female genital cutting will be stamped out a lot sooner if we stop male genital cutting too.

I wish people wouldn't call it 'female circumcision.' It's seldom circumcision; it's usually much more severe.

Better to call it 'female genital mutilation', or, if you want a more neutral word, 'female genital cutting.'

First, ml66uk, the extensive mutilation that is usually called "female circumcision" in no way resembles "male circumcision." Whether male circumcision is wrong or not, it does not utterly destroy male sexual function and sensation and carry the lifelong risks to fertility, sexual ability, health and life that female clitoridectomy (and often removal of labia and obstruction of the urethra and vagina) does.

I am not arguing for snipping off the most sensitive part of a little boy's genitalia. I'm just saying it's NOT a comparable procedure.

And yes, I believe it's wrong--just wrong--to back up our white conservative anonymous. And we should try to stop it. But what we don't have a right to do is swoop in imperialist-style and say "it's just wrong so you have to stop," without a real grasp of what it means and the purposes it serves (or appears to) in those cultures, without giving fair rebuttal to the real misinformation that underlies it, without understanding why sometimes even the women of that culture support it, without giving them (men and women) real chances to see other possibilities and stand up for themselves and their daughters.