Well, that certainly is your right to feel that way

Being concerned is where it starts. Education spreads the word. Some education just happened here. Action is up to the individual. I am going to do a little research and find out what is being done. Sometimes it is just a matter of combining resources.

i would think that a direct product of "concern" would be that you do something about it. i'm not the one making a claim to be concerned about this issue, you are.

turning the issue back at me, shutting down your computer and going sleep tonight after talking up a storm about how concerned you are does nothing. if you are truly concerned then join one of those organizations which are seeking to educate.

jmo

I addressed you because you talking about one thing that we could do - treating women here well.

I was letting you know something that was occurring already.

Well said Jasmine

and you know what i do to help others???? first i don't have the money to donate or the time to go to those countries to educate. i'm a single mom. and i do PLENTY to help out others here with what i can....so yes all i can do is be concerned at this point

Sadly on one point Mirror is right, there is little we can do. But I do care and if some means to help stop it was available or becomes available to me, I certainly would.

Uh but you don't care why would join?

jasmine...i didn't "turn it back to you" or talk up a storm. i responded to your post in a debate thread like everyone else does

Jasmine made a good point

there isn't a whole lot I can do....plain and simple...but that doesn't mean i can't care...it keeps me human!!!!!!!!!!

exactly rose. its concerning. women being treated this way. Thers isn t a whole lot I as a person can probably do.

and im certinly not BRAVE enough to go over there and try to help these women personally. especially not after seeing what they do to women.

But I do have sympathy.
and am entitled to feel outraged and disgusted.

True to my word:

Female Genital Mutilation
Culture

* Sami Aldeeb Abu-Sahlieh. To Mutilate in the Name of Jehovah or Allah: Legitimization of Male and Female Circumcision. (Translation by Frederick M. Hodges, D. Phil. (Oxon)) Medicine and Law, vol. 13, no. 7-8 ( July 1994): pp. 575-622.

Medical Society Statements

* World Medical Association. Statement on Condemnation of Female Genital Mutilation, Adopted by the 45th World Medical Assembly, Budapest, Hungary, October 1993.
* American Medical Association, Council on Scientific Affairs, Report 5 (I-94): Female Genital Mutilation, Chicago, 1994.
* Commitee on Medical Ethics. Guidance for doctors approached by victims of female genital mutilation. London: British Medical Association, 1996.
* Committee on Bioethics, American Academy of Pediatrics. Female Genital Mutilation (RE9749). Pediatrics 1998; 102(1):153-156.
* American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists Female Circumcision/Female Genital Mutilation (FC/FGM) Fact Sheet.

Links to Organizations

* Amnesty International: Female Genital Mutilation Information Pack
* Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) in Africa (Link to new Web site by noted author Hanny Lightfoot-Klein)
* Prisoners of Ritual: An Odyssey Into Female Genital Circumcision in Africa by Hanny Lightfoot-Klein
* Female Genital Mutilation Research Home Page (Marianne Sarkis)
* The Tahara Project. From filmmaker Sara Rashad
* Research, Action, and Information Network for the Bodily Integrity of Women (RAINBO)
* Deutsch-Afrikanische Frauen Initiative
* Rising Daughters Aware.
* PATH Female Genital Mutilation page
* FGM Network
* Women's International Network

Some Scholarly Journal Articles On The Internet

* Pieters G, Lowenfels AB. Infibulation in the horn of Africa. N Y State Med J 1977;77(5):729-731.
* Hrdy DB. Cultural practices contributing to the transmission of human immunodeficiency virus in Africa. Rev Infect Dis 1987;9(6):1109-19.
* Mohamed Badawi. Epidemiology of female sexual castration in Cairo, Egypt. Presented at The First International Symposium on Circumcision, Anaheim, California, March 1-2, 1989.
* Fran P. Hosken. Female genital mutilation: strategies for eradication. Presented at The First International Symposium on Circumcision, Anaheim, California, March 1-2, 1989.
* Lightfoot-Klein, H. The sexual adjustment of genitally circumcised and infibulated females in the Sudan. J Sex Res 1989;26(3):375-392.
* Lightfoot-Klein H, Shaw E. Special needs of ritually circumcised women patients. JOGNN 1991;20(2):102-107.
* Dirie MA, Lindmark G. The risk of medical complications after female circumcision. East Afr Med J 1992;69(9):479-482.
* Menage J. Post-traumatic stress disorder in women who have undergone obstetric and/or gynaecological procedures. Journal of Reproductive and Infant Psychology 1993; 11:221-228.
* Hanny Lightfoot-Klein. Erroneous Belief Systems Underlying Female Genital Mutilation in Sub-Saharan Africa and Male Neonatal Circumcision in the United States: a Brief Report Updated. Presented at The Third International Symposium on Circumcision, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland May 22-25, 1994.
* Black JA, DeBelle GD. Female genital mutilation in Britain. BMJ 1995;310:1590-1592.
* Gallard C. Female genital mutlation in France. BMJ 1995;310:1592-1593.
* Meniru GI, Meniru MO, Ezeh UO. Female genital mutilation. BMJ 1995;311:1088.
* Menage J. Professionals should not collude with abusive systems. BMJ 1995;311:1088-1089.
* Hamilton J. UN condemns female circumcision. BMJ 1997;314:1145.
* Brady M. Female genital mutilation: complications and risk of HIV transmission. Aids Patient Care STDS 1999;13(12):709-16.
* Ciment J. Senegal outlaws female genital mutilation. BMJ 1999;318:348.
* Abboud P, Christian Quereux C, et al. Stronger campaign needed to end female genital mutilation. BMJ 2000;320:1153.
* Welch J. Caring for Women with Circumcision: A Technical Manual for Health Care Providers. BMJ 2000;320:1481.
* News. Concern mounts over female genital mutilation. BMJ 2000;321:2.
* Scherf C. Women in Africa have many other problems besides genital mutilation. BMJ 2000;321:570.
* Avshalom Zoossmann-Diskin. Male genital mutilation in any society is surely abhorrent too. BMJ 2000;321:570.

Some Law Resources on the Internet

* Prohibition of Female Circumcision Act 1985, United Kingdom
* Female Genital Mutilation: A Report to the Attorney-General, prepared by the Family Law Council June 1994 (Australia).
* Criminalization of Female Genital Mutilation Act. Pub. L. No. 104-208, § 645, 110 Stat. 3009, 3009-708 (1996) 18 U.S.C. 116. (United States)
* Prohibition of female genital mutilation act, New South Wales, Australia
* Section 268, Criminal Code of Canada, 1997.
* Abbie J. Chessler. Justifying the Unjustifable: Rite v. Wrong, 45 Buffalo L. Rev. 555 (1997).
* Doriane Lambelet Coleman, The Seattle Compromise: Multicultural Sensitivity and Americanization, 47 DUKE L.J. 717, 739 (1998).
* Dena S. Davis. Male and Female Genital Alteration: A Collision Course with the Law? 11 Health Matrix: Journal of Law-Medicine 487 (2001).
* Christine Mason. Exorcising excision: medico-legal issues arising from male and female genital surgery in Australia, 9 J Law Med 58 (2001).

International Human Rights Instruments

* Universal Declaration of Human Rights, G.A. res. 217A (III), U.N. Doc A/810 at 71 (1948)
* Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), (U.N.T.S. No. 20378, vol. 1249 (1981).
* African [Banjul] Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights, OAU Doc. CAB/LEG/67/ (1981).
* Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), A/RES/44/25 (1989).
* Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women G.A. res. 48/104, 48 U.N. GAOR Supp. (No. 49) at 217, U.N. Doc. A/48/49 (1993).

Bibliographies

* National Child Protection Clearing House Bibliography
* World Health Organization Bibliographic Data Base
* Amnesty International Female Genital Mutilation Bibliography

Female Circumcision in the United States

* Dawson BE. Circumcision in the female: Its necessity and how to perform it. American J Clin Med 1915;22(6):520-523.
* McDonald CF. Circumcision in the female. GP 1958;XVIII(3):98-99.
* Rathman WG. Female circumcision: Indications and a new technique. GP 1959;XX(3):115-120.
* Duffy J. Clitoridectomy: A nineteeth century answer to masturbation. Presented at The First International Symposium on Circumcision, Anaheim, California, March 1-2, 1989.
* Linda Burstyn. Female circumcision comes to America. The Atlantic Monthly 1996;276(4):28-35.
* Celia Dugger. Congress bans genital rite. New York Times, October 12, 1996: A1.
* Christopher Baughman. Doctors Testifies Surgeon Secretly Circumcised Woman. The Advocate, Baton Rouge, October 30, 1996.
* Barbara Crossette. Mutilation Seen as Risk for the Girls of Immigrants. The New York Times, March 23, 1998.
* Michelle Milholland. Woman circumcised by ex-husband awarded $35,000. The Advocate, Baton Rouge, 10 April 2001: 1B-2B.


(File revised 1 October 2003)

Thanks for the information Metalwing

The OP called this an Islamic practice clearly to vilify the religion.

Female circumcision is not an Islamic practice but a cultural one.

I am going to caution you all now...I hate to do it but...beware of throwing the first stone.

There are some pretty disgusting things done in this country in the name of religion. Fostering ignorance, marrying young girls to older men...

We all know...

How many times have I posted things about the evangelical right here only to be berated about generalizing?

Still...you seem not just willing but hungry to generalize about others.

Female circumcision is an obscene practice from my stand point.

But...while we are throwing stones...maybe we ought to take a minute or two to think.

Women...

In this country...the good ole U.S.A. we have people from all political spectrum's who think women shouldn't be able to vote, who requite women to wear long dresses and sleeves (how different from veils is this) and who think it is perfectly fine to marry multiple wives some of them teens.

Let's be clear I am not endorsing or excusing this horrendous practice of female circumcision still...how would you feel if Warren Jeffs aged 49 marriage to a child aged 15 was put up on tv as an example of the Christian United States?

Let's stop this shocking videos bull and start actually learning about one another.

The really awful truth is Christian and Islamic fundamentalist have more in common with each other than I do with either group

Nah. You can go topless. I am all for it. Until you're 40.