Letters to the Editor
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What Somali Women's Groups Recommend
Check out this post summarizing the findings and recommendations of Somali women's groups for ending FGM:
http://happyfeminist.typepad.com/happyfeminist/2006/07/i_have_long_fel.html
FIRST, the post notes that FGM has been effectively eradicated in the west African countries of Senegal and Guinea, so this isn't an impossible battle.
SECOND, the reports found that most of the Somalis in Somalia are well aware of the dreadful side effects of FGM and continue to support it anyway. Nonetheless, those Somalis who did not support it cited the side effects as a major reason for their decision. So these groups recommend continuing to hammer away at the fact that women who undergo FGM suffer.
THIRD, the area of most confusion among Somalis is a false belief that FGM is mandated by Islam. However, the vast majority of Somali religious leaders understand that it is not a religiously mandated or sanctioned practice. One strategy is to get Islamic religious leaders to speak out on this issue.
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Why Somali Women Subject Daughters to FGM
One comment upthread stated that it's really the women carrying on this tradition, not the men.
But, as the post I linked to in my prior comment notes, surveys of Somali women establish that they subject their daughters to FGM out of a fear that their daughters will not be marriagable otherwise. This fear is well-founded. The surveys found that the majority of men required FMG in their brides -- the majority being 65% - 97% of men depending on the region in Somalia. Being an unmarriagable in Somalia could mean a life of destitution and/or lack of any social status.
Again, the solution is to educate men and women that this is not an Islamic practice. Also educating men and women about female sexuality is important to as these practice tend to be grounded in fears of women running amok sexually.
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A Man Has Little to Say About It
Just to reiterate, potential grooms get like no vote at all in these societies.
Marriages are arranged, often by Uncles and Aunts (not even parents get much of a vote).
What a potential bridegroom thinks about FGM matters very little indeed.
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FGM? Not on my wife!
This is wonderful work this woman is doing. Men should be talked to as well, at every opportunity. If the tack that works is men's desire to have mutually enjoyable sex with women, so be it, as "selfish" as some may see it as being when compared to other possible concerns relating to this practice.
Because having mutually enjoyable sex IS about women's rights, and if men see it that way (or even if they don't), it's some kind of progress, especially where this horrible practice is concerned.
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Whew! I read all the letters posted here on FGM!
I hardly know where to start. I've been following this practice (even speaking out against it) for a long time.
Here's what comes to mind:
Cultural relativism and multiculturalism: We're big on this up in Canada. In my opinion, FGM (which is, of course, going on here--for one thing, we have the largest Somali population outside Somalia)is the "elephant in the room" nobody talks about. Because if it were actually publically addressed, we'd be in a big dilemma now, wouldn't we? As it is, with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms we have (thank God), we're having enough controversy over issues relating to religious rights (rites?) v.s. gender equality rights (Sharia Law, anyone?)
Darfur--what I don't see talked about in the media, when they talk about rape--the fact that these women are genitally mutilated, and one of the consequences of the rapes is that they are even more severely damaged because of it. Again, people are silent on the subject.
I could go on--and on--but this is enough for now. In my case, I find this subject extremely painful (to say the least) psychologically--even traumatic.
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Twisted, warped....
Oh, and as for the revolting suggestion that most men find female pain sexually enjoyable, please crawl back under the rock you came out from. That idea is simply despicable and reprehensible. And twisted, warped, and insulting.
Canuckistan, in case this is referring to me, I by no means suggested that most men in the world find female pain sexually enjoyable. But I will own up that I think the men from cultures where FGM is practiced and insist that hteir wives and daughters and women are FGM do find the pain exciting.
My reasoning is as such - the men in these cultures call the shots. Yes, the FGM is performed by the women, but as shown, if no man will marry a nonFGM woman, then the women have no recourse other than to FGM (unless you're luck enough to be from a bery enlightened and/or wealthy family). The men insist upon FGM.
The next step in reasoing comes from my assumption that penetrative sex for FGM women is much more painful/uncomfortable than nonFGM women. Here I admit I can be wrong - maybe sex is the same and just as enjoyable for FGM women - in which case my whole argument is wrong, and I apologize. But I don't think that's the case.
Now if sex for FGM women is painful/uncomfortable but the men insist on FGM, then that means the guys don't care that the women are in pain/uncomfortable during sex.
After hundreds/thousands(?) of years of this practice is it so unlikely that these men would come to incorporate a woman's discomfort or outright agony as a normal part of the sexual experience?
In the West, stereotypically speaking, my prowess as a lover is shown by the woman being "really into it", scratching my back, screaming, being really wet, she came a 1000x. etc.
In a FGM culture your prowess as lover is shown how? Or am I to believe that the men in these cultures are very attuned to how unpleasant sex may be for their wives and as a result are exceedingly gentle and quick lovers - who only wish to penetrate just enough to inseminate their wives and have children? They derive the majority of their sexual enjoyment by mutually satisfying masturbation or stimulus of other erogenous zones?
Again I don't believe it. But I could be wrong.