Pros And Cons Of Female Genital Mutilation

Over the years Female Genital Mutilation has become a grotesque practice that has been all over the news and newspapers, generating debates about cultural norms and the worth of sexual functioning. Trying to explain this said controversy, there have been discussions about the tradition being extremely common in Africa and many other places as well, and remains a cultural tradition, which has nothing to do with religion. There have also been debates about the terms that are being used to describe Female Genital Mutilation; for example, “female circumcision” or “clitoris dectomy”. However, many medical practitioners have rejected the term “female circumcision” because that sounds like they’re comparing the term to the “male circumcision”,

However, if you were to actually compare them, then FGM would equal to the amputation of most of the penis. On the other hand, female genital mutilation is usually performed to prevent young girls from having sex. It involves the mutilation of the clitoris; and is commonly done to females between the ages of four to fifteen; it could also go up to twenty-five. Female Genital Mutilation should stay in the list of unacceptable practices that violate human rights

Pros:

A woman choosing to get circumcised or mutilated has become a very common thing to do in Africa. Anthropologists have discussed the idea of men forcing women to undergo with such a procedure, but if you read a little more about it, most of the time older women are the ones who are inclined to want them, hence, forcing younger generations who do not want to undergo with such procedure to do it. It has been said that Female Genital Mutilation or less commonly known as Female Genital Cutting, is an African and Middle Eastern tradition; religion has nothing to do with what they choose to do with their genitals. Most of the traditional ceremonies start with an older women or any other

There are so many things wrong with this procedure, starting with oppression and discrimination against women. On the article we read in class about Genital Mutilation, there was a nineteen-year-old girl from Togo, who had to leave her home country in order to scape her reality. Her name is Fauziya Kassindja; she was the daughter of a small businessman named Muhammed. When Muhammed was still alive, he expressed his opposing beliefs towards said tradition. However, her father passed away and because of hostile relatives, her mother had to leave her house. In spite of this, her aunt took control of the household and tried to force Fauziya to follow their traditions. Kassindja’s aunt arranged a wedding for her niece to become the fourth wife of an electrician; her future husband wanted her to have the genital operation before they got married, however, Fauziya disagreed and decided to leave the country before the marriage and mutilation happened. When she got to the United States, she asked for political asylum. At first she was denied but she never gave up and successfully appealed the denial. The appellate concluded that if she ever went back to her country, she might face threats to her freedom or even physical violence for refusing their harmful traditions. She went through a lot but at the end of the day, she felt secured with her human rights untouched.