Guardian newspaper tries to silence victims of genital mutilation, because they are men

December 17, 2014 by Inside MAN 41 Comments

The Guardian newspaper has publicly confirmed its policy of banning discussions about genital mutilation in the comment section under articles about genital mutilation.

To be more precise it is trying to ban commentators from sharing views about male genital mutilation that contradict its left-wing, pro-feminist, editorial views on female genital mutilation (FGM).

Many of the people impacted by the ban are committed campaigners against all forms of genital mutilation and men who were victims of genital mutilation themselves.

Campaigners told insideMAN last night that the practice of “moderating” male victims of genital mutilation (and their supporters) who call for all forms on non-consensual, medically unnecessary genital cutting to be banned has been going on for several years at The Guardian.

This week, apparently for the first time, the media group decided to openly “pre-moderate” comments on an article about FGM warning readers that “to keep circumcision of boys out of this particular conversation… comments specifically about male circumcision will be removed by mods as ‘Off Topic’.”

Debating the ban is banned!

The reason The Guardian gave for banning discussion of male circumcision was that “the effects and cultural practices/significance are very, very different, and essentially they’re two separate debates”.

One campaigner accused the newspaper of issuing a “fiat” that censored fair and reasoned debate and banned commentators from even discussing whether the two practices are linked or not.

To prove the point, another campaigner from New Zealand posted a comment explaining the historical links between FGM and male circumcision in the US and the UK and his comment was removed.

Boys have human rights too!

The same campaigner, who claimed on a separate forum that The Guardian allows posts supporting male circumcision, told insideMAN:

“It is legitimate for a site like the Guardian to not want every thread on FGC (female genital cutting) to be dominated by MGC (male genital cutting). What is less legitimate is to suppress every mention of MGC, and what is completely disgustingly illegitimate is to allow praise of MGC but not refutation of that praise, which seems to be what they are doing.”

“You could argue that to discuss FGC in isolation from other GC allows you to conflate harm with human rights violation…all GC is a human rights violation regardless of the degree of physical damage.”

Marilyn Milos, a US campaigner who began advocating for genital autonomy after observing the circumcision of baby boys as a nurse, agreed that the focus should be on human rights for everyone. She said:

“I’ve said many times before, genital cutting is not an issue of competitive suffering. The screams of infants and children undergoing genital cutting are genderless and both genders die from these harmful traditional practices. Both are human rights violations and should be dealt with as such.”

Men Do Complain

One man who has been making the case to the UK government that both practices violate human rights, Richard Duncker of Men Do Complain, explained his thinking to us. He said:

“It is difficult to see how a child’s human rights are not breached by non-therapeutic genital modification. The European Court of Human Rights has set a very low threshold for a breach of article 3 – that no one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment – for example the application to the court No. 9078/06 Tarhan v Turkey (17/07/2012) found that the applicant’s Article 3 right had been breached by the forced shaving of his head and beard.”

“Children are equally entitled to the protection of their human rights. There is a misuse of Article 9 of the Human Rights Act 1998 when adults state that it is their right to manifest their beliefs by modifying their children’s genitals. Article 9 is a qualified right in that a person cannot infringe the rights of another, even if that other is his or her child.”

Sadly, such considered comments from committed campaigners like Richard Duncker are not welcome at The Guardian.

What debate is allowed?

To its credit, The Guardian probably generates more debate about male circumcision AND female circumcision than any other mainstream media operation. The coverage is heavily weighted towards FGM, which has been the subject of five articles this month alone, compared with male circumcision, which has generated 5 articles all year.

Furthermore, while The Guardian’s coverage of FGM is unequivocally opposed to the practice and strongly rooted in discussion about the UK’s role in ending the practice at home and abroad; The Guardian’s articles about male circumcision offer a mix of pro-circumcision; anti-circumcision and neutral viewpoints and are often presented as “world news” and not connected to the need for the UK to end the practice at home and abroad.

The Guardian claims that while “the two issues are superficially related, the … cultural practices/significance are very, very different, and essentially they’re two separate debates”.

What appears to be happening is that The Guardian has mistaken its editorial, gender political, worldview of genital with the absolute truth and is now insisting that any victims of genital mutilation (and their supporters) who think differently are quite simply wrong.

We can only solve this problem together

I’ll give the final word to Georganne Chapin of Intact America, who told insideMAN:

“I think it’s rather curious. The Guardian is preaching to the choir if it does a piece deploring the evils of FGM. I do not minimize the problem of FGM in the cultures where it is still practiced, and we cannot deny that western countries with large Muslim populations will have to address the practice from a legal standpoint.

“However, as journalism, the topic isn’t even all that interesting on its own; the party’s over. The Guardian’s readership is universally going to condemn FGM. What IS interesting is that The Guardian and the mainstream western press, in general, are not willing to even entertain the possibility that in order to solve the FGM problem, we might need to address MGM.”

—Photo Credit: flickr/erix

Article by Glen Poole author of the book Equality For Men

If you liked this article and want to read more, follow us on Twitter @insideMANmag and Facebook.

Also on insideMAN:

Nicholas Smithers

Well said, I more of less gave up on the Guardian fir this reason as i’ve been seemingly placed on permanent pre-moderation. I wrote to the CIF moderators to ask why and was told I was fo repeatedly going off topic and making ‘whatabout’ arguments. I was trying to make the point that he argument was made stronger by addressing all infant genital mutilation.
- Inside MAN
  
  Thanks Nick!
- Patrick Smyth
  
  I know the feeling Nick.
karen woodall

this is why you have to address feminism head on, I know I keep going on about it but it is a fact, you cannot argue for men’s health and wellbeing within a femnist agenda because is ends up like this, men’s issues are simply obliterated and everyone behaves as if they do not exist. Feminists do not want men’s issues involved in their campaigning, it’s not what they are about and the Guardian is the darling of the femnist chattering classes. What I don’t get, is why men believe that feminism is inclusive of their equalities and their issues, I really struggle with this idea that men actually believe that there is a place for them in feminism because there isn’t.
- Janet Wilkinson
  
  Exactly, I think people often forget the mindset you are dealing with when it comes to feminism and give the brainwashed drones that follow it far too much credit.
  
  For a large part the mentality of feminists being
  
  “oh no one cares about us poor poor victimised mistreated hard done by innocent women”.
  
  So when you then try and introduce a male issue into that mix
  
  in their warped and deluded mindset the male they are going to helping is a :
  
  “drunk,wife beating, drug addict, pedophile , rapist”
  
  they are so disgusted by mere concept that it might be helping these “bastards” that they apply no effort to sorting it.
Nick Langford

Thank you for highlighting this issue, Glen. I was reading another article this morning pointing out that suffrage for women only became possible once the groundwork had been laid allowing a majority of men to vote. Feminism sees these issues as distinct but it is an important point that the end of fgm may only be possible if it is considered alongside mgm.
- http://www.hilaryburrage.com Hilary Burrage
  
  Quick note just to remind people if I may that there is no single One True ‘feminism’ as perhaps implied here, any more than there is just one version of any other belief / perceptual system. I know the parallel is not exact – haven’t time right now for the epistemology , sorry – but, whilst I am a feminist opposed to patriarchy, but I don’t think every single man is a knowing, fully signed up patriarch!
  - Janet Wilkinson
    
    Hate to break this to you Hilary but there is no such thing as the patriarchy.
    
    Thats another one of your movements silly made up words that no one outside of your movement believes in.
    
    Just like the other fabricated terms like rape future and male privilege, isn’t it time your movement grew up and stopped making things up ?
Carter

It is unfortunate that this article reports the shocking censorship of the Guardian as pro-feminist. Some feminists might belittle men’s issues, but that’s not all of them, and I don’t think that defines their movement. A lot of feminists do not underestimate the problem of MGM, even if they focus their efforts on FGM. Nothing wrong with that.
- Inside MAN
  
  Thanks Carter
  
  Yes we are aware of pro-feminist campaigners in this field:
  
  Regards
  
  Glen
Informed in the U.S.

I think the Guardian’s stance may have more to do with religion than feminism. They seem to repeat every positive male circumcision story from the U.S. and fail to publicize the growing condemnation of male circumcision here.
Laura MacDonald

I’ve also been censored by the Guardian on an article about doctors doing FGM in Egypt – at least one of my comments was deleted as ‘off topic’ and ‘could lead to others being anti-semitic’. The offending line was, “You can see pro cutters learn from our hyperbole about FGM by trying to present what they do as minimal and rather like male circumcision, time and time again.’ But that was exactly what the Egyptian doctor was trying to do in the article! And it’s exactly what the Dentist caught in a sting in Birmingham did – he sought to justify his offer of FGM by saying she’d be numbed and it would be, ‘very very superficial because i’m not going to cut the clitoris”.
https://www.youtube.com/user/Bonobo3D James Loewen

Thank you Glen Poole, for illuminating this issue with the Guardian. It’s sad that we have to fight so hard for the most basic of human rights for children, (and the adults they become.) Religiosity and sexism are so tightly intertwined with political correctness, that exposing the obvious violation and harm to a child’s body (and psyche) are of little concern. Maintaining the status quo is the prime purpose of articles that revile FGM while willfully ignoring the shared motivations for routine violation of male and intersex bodies.
Pingback: The Guardian censors the discussion of circumcision | CircWatch()
http://www.hilaryburrage.com Hilary Burrage

Dale Spender reminds us that “Feminism has fought no wars” … http://www.feministpeacenetwork.org/2008/03/24/feminism-has-fought-no-wars/. It’s about equality, people….

I am a feminist and the Guardian is always my newspaper of choice. I have supported their NoFGM campaign 100%. I also oppose all genital mutilation, as do quite a lot of other feminists I know. I am however tired of the ‘what about the men?’ interventions and attacks on feminists which seem to come up so often in any discussion of FGM.

The human rights issues re FGM and MGM are the same, but ways to stop the practices have to be different because, amongst other things, the legal contexts are often different.

Also, FGM is expressly designed fundamentally to subjugate women (see http://statementonfgm.com/) to men: MGM may be intended to reduce male sexual pleasure – though more likely it first arose because of hot, dry desert conditions and lack of hygiene? – but it is not an attack on a person’s sexual identity as such, intended to make that person subject to the will (and whim, and disposal) of differently gendered others.

Here’s a Guardian article you obviously missed, by the way: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/aug/25/male-circumcision-ceremonies-death-deformity-africa

And thank you Carter (above). Here’s a Twitter account – @StopMGM – which tries to overcome the attacks on feminist analyses (as though there were only one) so often made by (some) ‘intactivists’. Let’s try to see all this as damage to children, and then seek ways to prevent it which fit different current perceptions and contexts.

Please take a look at this link if you want to see more about how and why some progressive feminists are also concerned about MGM: http://genitale-autonomie.de/videos-der-vortraege/levin/ (the talk is in English).

And finally, please note
1. that both FGM and MGM are essentially also ways to increase practitioners’ income; MGM is a good earner for USA medics, whilst the UK’s NHS doesn’t pay up in the same way; and
2. that names are important. ‘FGC’ is a trivialising euphemism for a practice which kills (either immediately or in the longer run) up to about 30% of those who undergo it, and may also cause the death of infants, regardless of gender, delivered to women who have been damaged.

By all means refer to both FGM and MGM as ‘mutilation’ to make the point, but please don’t call FGM ‘circumcision’ or ‘cutting’ in formal discussion.
- Inside MAN
  
  Thanks for you comments Hillary
  
  I’ll post a detailed response later but to pick up on some side points straight away:
  
  “Feminism has fought no wars”
  
  It’s a nice idea in theory, however the practice shows us that when feminists have political power they send (mostly) men to fight wars.
  
  As the anti-war MP, George Galloway, observed on BBC Question Time this year:
  
  “[We were told]…for years in the Labour Party, if only we could get more women into parliament there’d be fewer wars, less aggression and all of that. There was 101 ‘Blair babes’ elected in 1997 and all but three of them voted for every war that Tony Blair took us into.”
  
  http://www.inside-man.co.uk/2014/08/07/do-men-start-wars/
  
  “MGM…. more likely it first arose because of hot, dry desert conditions and lack of hygiene”
  
  The same could be true of FGM, sand can cause irritation and redness of the vulva (vulvitis) and lack of hygiene can lead to infections.
  
  http://www.drugs.com/health-guide/dysuria.html
  
  The idea that FGM is alway about control and power is incorrect. Like male circumcision there are many reasons for FGM. Today, the most common reason evoked for supporting FGM is the belief that the practice is a “good tradition”. Other reasons include religious requirement(s); rite of passage to womanhood; cleanliness; prevention of promiscuity among girls; preservation of virginity; better marriage prospects; enhancement of male sexuality; prevention of excessive clitoral growth; and facilitation of childbirth by widening the birth canal.
  
  http://www.path.org/files/FGM-The-Facts.htm
  
  Many of these reasons (tradition, right of passage, cleanliness, better marriage prospects, enhancement of female sexuality) also apply to male circumcision.
  
  http://www.inside-man.co.uk/2014/09/08/why-its-rational-to-say-circumcision-is-worse-than-fgm/
  
  Finally—-on language. Female circumcision was renamed FGM to separate it in people’s minds from male circumcision—to make it sound worse than MGM—when the reality is there are so many different forms that it is only accurate to say that is “different and sometimes worse”—-the name FGM doesn’t communicate that—it communicates that FGM is always worse than circumcision—-which is incorrect.
  
  In response to this, male victims of genital mutilation have struggled and continue to struggle to find the right language to put the genital autonomy of males, females and intersex people on an equal footing.
  
  They all have good intentions and they are all reacting to the problem caused by renaming female circumcision as FGM.
  
  With respect, you do not have the right or authority to tell male victims how they can and can’t refer to the two practices—on this forum male victims can use whatever reasonable words they need to use to try and communicate the issue.
  
  Male victims do not need more censorship Hillary they need more freedom and support to help them get their voices heard—and while The Guardian does not provide that facility—-insideMAN does.
  
  Thanks again for your comments (and for the work you do promoting genital autonomy as a human rights issues for men and boys)
  
  Best Wishes
  
  Glen Poole
  - http://www.hilaryburrage.com Hilary Burrage
    
    Thx for response, Glen. Big rush just now, but a note to say please actually read (or report, if you’ve read) the quote from Dale Spender in full, not just the title. I don’t think quoting Galloway (oh dear?) on ‘Blair babes’ (oh dear, even more) helps us to understand anything in this context. See what you think when you’ve considered the whole quote.
    
    Also, please note I haven’t said what men should call MGM: just what it’s proper for anyone (formally) to call FGM… please see the Bamako Declaration (not me, but African women leaders) http://nofgm.org/2014/11/12/the-bamako-declaration-female-genital-mutilation-terminology-mali-2005/
    
    PS I realise that some people (not you I like to think) don’t want to believe ‘feminists’ seek to protect all children from human rights abuse and harm. That’s probably one of the reasons the so-called WotAboutMenz (NB not my choice of phrase) came to be so regarded as off-topic re FGM.
    
    I wish the NoMGM lobbyists would start lots of petitions – WITH THEIR NAMES ON, not anonymous and shy – and ask me to sign them, just as the NoFGM people do, sometimes very bravely. I would sign; and I’d distribute the petitions too. (But I wouldn’t tell every man who has been circumcised that I am automatically concerned about him; many say it’s not an issue for them since it’s done…. and yes, of course, they don’t recall the original trauma; we could continue that one; but not now. So rushed…)
    
    But people need to understand that those of us, feminists who do care – thanks for your kind comments – find that blanket condemnation upsetting and very insulting. We’re mums and grandmas, concerned for all children, just as some ‘intactivists’ are.
    
    Best, Hilary
    - Inside MAN
      
      Thanks Hilary
      
      The Dale Spender quote seems to represent the tendencies in modern feminisms towards fundamentalism and moral superiority.
      
      “If someone says: “Oh, I’m not a feminist,” I ask, “Why, what’s your problem?””
      
      Imagine if a Conservative or a Christian or a heterosexual said that:
      
      “Oh, you’re not a Conservative, why, what’s your problem?”
      “Oh, you’re not a Christian, why, what’s your problem?”
      “Oh, you’re not a heterosexual, why, what’s your problem?”
      
      If feminists view being non-feminist as a “problem” what does that say about feminism?
      
      That they think being a feminist is a morally superior way to think about the world (and other ways of thinking are inferior)?
      That they think being a feminist is the “right” way to think about the world (and other ways of thinking are the “wrong” way)?
      
      How is the censorious Guardian behaving in its commenting policy on genital mutilation?
      
      Like it believes it’s way of thinking and talking about genital mutilation is the “right” way to think about the subject and other ways of thinking about it are “morally superior”.
      
      I’m a non-feminist committed to fighting for gender equality. Feminists as you have demonstrated, have a tendency to believe that feminism has a monopoly on thinking about gender equality. So much so that they work to exclude non-feminists from the gender equality debate—for example by censoring non-feminist thought from discussions about genital mutilation.
      
      Why do feminists do that? Maybe it’s because of a tendency towards fundamentalism and moral superiority—as expressed by Dale Spender—that believes that there is hierarchy of thought—and that when it comes to gender equality, simply being a feminist places you at the top of the hierarchy of thinking and everyone else is not only lower down in this hierarchy of thinking, but has a “problem”.
      
      I’m not an anti-feminist. I used to identify as feminist until I discovered that my belief in gender equality for men and boys was not welcome by most feminists and that feminist thinking did not help me to understand or resolve problems facing men and boys—but other ways of thinking did.
      
      At that point I became a “problem” to feminists—because many feminists think like Dale Spender, they think people like me who aren’t feminists, have a problem.
      
      Regards
      
      Glen
- Nick Langford
  
  Hilary says that ‘FGM is expressly designed fundamentally to subjugate women to men’. That may be partially true, though Glen points out that there are other justifications for the practice.
  
  To claim that MGM is somehow the lesser evil because it is not ‘an attack on a person’s sexual identity as such, intended to make that person subject to the will (and whim, and disposal) of differently gendered others’ does not necessarily follow, and I don’t see the connection.
  
  There is an extraordinary range of mutilations and modifications which people perform, sometimes on others, sometimes on themselves, from relatively modest piercings and insertions to full gender reassignment. There is a whole gallery of the wonderful Pitt Rivers museum in Oxford dedicated to this. My favourite is the Japanese art of Kokigami.
  
  One motivation for these behaviours is submission, not to what Hilary awkwardly calls the differently gendered, but to a deity. Some gods – perhaps through acute insecurity – make alarming demands on their followers to prove their devotion. One such was Cybele, who called on her avatars to sever their testicles, as recorded in the terrifying Latin poem by Catullus,
  
  stimulatus ibi furenti rabie uagus animis
  deuellit ili acuto sibi pondera silice.
http://redpilluk.co.uk William Collins

I also have had a perfectly polite comment on MGM deleted by the Guardian moderator on the grounds that it violated their commenting rules. I checked against their rules very carefully and it did not. It was just censorship – so I was interested to read that this is indeed their policy. As for Hilary Burrage being “tired of the ‘what about the men?’ ” – no you’re not, Hilary. After half a century of hearing only about men’s issues, and nothing about women’s, on every subject – education, health, family, jobs, not just MGM – in every news outlet and all the media – after half a century of having laws tweaked to advantage men with no regard at all for women – after half a century of hearing women vilified as violent, emotionally stunted thugs with no defence being permitted – THEN you’ll know what being tired is.
- http://www.hilaryburrage.com Hilary Burrage
  
  William: My fatigue about ‘TheMenz’ refers to the fact that in the past men have frequently tried to change the topic (FGM) to MGM on my own personal website or if I write about the topic elsewhere – despite the discourtesy, given that I make it patently clear I oppose any genital mutilation anyway. I now ask that people who wish to discuss MGM do so on the specific post/s on my own website which are allocated to that topic, even though my particular expertise lies in FGM rather than MGM. But I do try to support lobbyists against the latter as well – I never try to prise the debate on other websites back to FGM…
  And as for these violent thugs, fortunately I don’t know them. Like most of my feminist friends, I’m married to a nice man.
  PS Yes, I agree that women still have a long way to go before they have genuine equality with men. But that doesn’t stop us from willingly working with men on important issues.
  - Janet Wilkinson
    
    “even though my particular expertise lies in FGM rather than MGM.”
    
    So you admit you are ignorant of MGM issues yet you still then attack men for wanting to be part of the discussion regarding genital mutilation ?
    
    Have you considered Hillary, that the reason men and women are trying to raise the issue of MGM is because its one that needs raising and hasn’t been taken up by feminists at all so far.
    
    Considering we have feminists claiming to stand for equality we live in a country which finds FGM illegal and punishable by prison sentences and MGM completely legal.
    
    Perhaps the next rally of feminists gather, they need to re-examine what the true meaning of equality means because from where I am standing it looks like women are much better off than men or should I say defenceless little new born baby boys who have no protection at all from the law.
    - http://www.hilaryburrage.com Hilary Burrage
      
      Janet, unfortunately you clearly didn’t see the previous comments I offered – where I state unequivocally that I oppose MGM and have even set up a twitter account etc to demonstrate that. I also explain above what is meant by patriarchy, if you’d care to look.
      
      So, for once more only: I am against all unnecessary genital mutilation, and I have no inclination to ‘attack’ anyon.
      
      As you will see if you read previous comments, it makes me sad that apparently some ‘intactivists’ would rather dismiss NoFGM activists than align with them.
      
      I and quite a few NoFGM lobbyists I know would like to work with others to protect ALL children, if that fact could be accepted. What’s the problem?
      
      The NoMGM lobby could be so much stronger, if it didn’t seek so vigorously to deny the integrity of NoFGM activists out of hand. Strength in unity….?
      Hilary
      - Janet Wilkinson
        
        The point is Hilary is it should never have been a FGM or MGM issue in the first place it should of been a GM issue. But as always with feminists they have to take everything down the divisive route and turn every problem into just a “female” problem and subsequently ignore the other male half.
        
        I notice you ignored my point about equality, but really that is a huge part of why no one ever works with feminists because they take every thing and twist its meaning to mean something completely unrecognisable from the truth.
        
        Regardless I have tried on numerous occasions to approach feminists and work with them on small projects I have been working on for example I have mentioned adverts that were being sexist towards men or to talked about shows that contained sexism towards men and asked them to help engage in stopping it by emailing people etc. Simple small things.
        
        The only response I got back was abuse, feminists telling me I was a traitor to my sex for trying to stop sexism against men, and lots and lots of hate mail. I tried on several forums, Facebook groups, and I even spoke to a lot of feminists in real life and they all ignored and dismissed all the issues I raised regarding men, or just laughed when I told them.
        
        Just for curiosity I asked various MRM groups I knew about helping to engage on areas where there was sexism against women, again small areas such as adverts and TV programmes etc. Their response was like a breathe of fresh air they agreed to help and we worked together on several projects.
        
        So you when I see a feminist come forward with a little sign entitled “I care about men too” I know very well, that means “I might listen to some of your mens issues but I will either try and discredit, dismiss, or ignore them entirely stating “but but teh womenz haz itz worse !!1”
        
        So going back to your book, if you really cared about helping everyone, and considering that in western countries women are already leaps and bounds better off than boys as you know its actually ILLEGAL for it to happen to women and girls and legal for it to happen to boys.
        
        Why didn’t you call your book “Tackling the dangers of GM ” instead of FGM ? Why didn’t you spend your time researching and producing a book that would help stop baby boys from being sliced up as soon as they are born, who have no where near the levels of protection that girls have ? Why when you know all of that, have you still put all of the emphasis on FGM ?
        
        Btw the way, as you claim you are not ignorant on the subject I am sure you already know this, but to make sure.
        
        Type 1a of FGM is the removal of the clitoral hood. This is by far the most common type of FGM in the UK and US.
        
        This process is effectively the same as removing the foreskin from a man, however men suffer significantly more side affects after having the procedure done either immediately or later on in life.
        
        Such as
        
        Erectile dysfunction
        Psychological issues
        Massive loss of sensitivity resulting in significant loss of pleasure.
        Bleeding
        Infection
        Soreness
        Death during or shortly after the procedure
        
        Through all the material I have read about type 1a FGM, it does not include anywhere near the same levels of risks and problems later on in life, as those presented to men from MGM. Which only stands to reason considering the differences in the way the genitalia works and is used for intercourse etc.
    - http://www.hilaryburrage.com Hilary Burrage
      
      PS Just for clarity Janet; I did and do not claim ‘ignorance’ of MGM (far from it, actually); I just wanted to make the polite comment that I came to MGM via my research on FGM, and I respect the view of others who may be travelling from knowledge of MGM to – I hope – also include FGM. My forthcoming book will include both, but with an emphasis on FGM, especially in modern usually non-practising countries.
    - http://www.hilaryburrage.com Hilary Burrage
      
      Janet, I am not personally responsible for the current legal situation! My choice would be for all GM to be illegal, but since, as you say, MGM is mostly not (one region of Germany recently tried) I think you’ll have to accept that different strategies are required at this point, to get equality re FGM and MGM before the law.
      
      And, whilst I’d rather we sought common ground than promotion of the very obviously mistaken claims that ‘no feminists’ care about MGM I do, and Prof Levin, also quoted here, does, for a start), it is I think important to recognise that , whatever the intent of the ‘operator’, Type 1a FGM is very rarely the outcome. 1a would require far more anatomical knowledge and skill, and a very acquiescent, still victim, to achieve. There are plenty of cases of women who were told they had 1a, but on examination the damage was greater and this proved not to be the case. (Parallels here with MGM, which is almost always claimed to be ‘just a nick’, but may be far more than that.)
      
      But, whatever, all unnecessary ‘surgery’, to children of any gender,is a risk too far, and should not occur.
      - Janet Wilkinson
        
        Well I guess there are a couple of points.
        
        1. I Agree that all surgery is dangerous and should not be carried out in these cases. No matter if its someone using a Stanley knife / razor blade or a fully equipped hospital ER room it shouldn’t happen if the operation is not required which it definitely is not in either genders case.
        
        2. Sadly your view on your feminist movement is out of date. The feminism that exists today has become a sexist, misandry ridden, hate filled, anti-male, irrational, rhetoric spewing one that spends its time attacking people or producing sexist pictures on tumblr or attacking people on twitter. I think #Gamersgate and #Shirtgate were the most recent demonstrations of that. I have always called myself an egalitarian because I believe in true equality for everyone and not prioritising one gender over the other. So we are not going to agree on feminism, you stick with your dictionary definition and I will stick with judging it on its actions.
        
        3. My point about type 1a FGM is that in the US and UK (places where we can more realistically make changes, as opposed to war torn Yemen or Somalia), Type 1a is still the most popular. However the numbers of these occurrences are massively dwarfed by the number of MGM cases.
        
        Outside of western countries where the more severe types of FGM are present it swings in the other direction and its clear FGM should be focused on.
        
        But in western countries MGM is happening more, has worse side affects and is still legal. In my mind that presents a bigger problem than the odd case where someone dares to break the law and have a type 1a done and risks imprisonment for 2 years and hefty fines.
        
        The legal issues are something we can do something about and should be doing something about. If Germany has managed to do it :
        
        http://www.inquisitr.com/287672/circumcision-ban-in-germany-heralded-by-intactivists-an-interview-with-eric-op-ed/
        
        Then it should be possible for other countries too.
PF

Holy sanctimony alert Batman. Sorry Hilary I don’t mean you as you may have mistakenly got this impression being the last poster before I wrote this, I mean the Guardian in laying down the law on how an issue can be debated in a democratic society. Comment Is Free but only for those with a certain point of view that is.
- http://www.hilaryburrage.com Hilary Burrage
  
  Thanks, PF ?
Peter London

Hilary:

“But I wouldn’t tell every man who has been circumcised [MGM] that I am automatically concerned about him”

Would you tell the same to every women who has been subject to FGM?

“many say it’s not an issue for them since it’s done…. ”

Go into any African village where FGM is rife and ask the same of the women.

“and yes, of course, they don’t recall the original trauma”

So FGM is OK if the women does not recall the original trauma?
- http://www.hilaryburrage.com Hilary Burrage
  
  No, Peter, FGM is never OK; and nor in truth is MGM, though the relative risks are different in different contexts I suppose. And having spent the past several years researching FGM – my book is very close to completion – and, increasingly also MGM, I can assure you I have actually managed to grasp that many of those, men and women, who have experienced genital mutilation do not regard it as damaging.
  
  BUT….
  1. women in ‘African villages’ often have absolutely no notion that FGM is not essential to becoming adult, nor in some instances do they know anyone who has not had it, or have any idea at all that many of the medical problems they tolerate on a daily basis are related to the condition (the same applies of course to men some ‘African village’ who are circumcised). Fistula, increased infant mortality at delivery, a lifetime of kidney and other infections, pain and many other afflictions are the frequent lot of many women with FGM.
  
  2. MGM continues to be common amongst men in the USA – not now so much in some other places, where medicine is less commercial – and American etc men have every opportunity to research and understand the risks of the practice. So my puzzle is, why these men don’t catch on? What prevents them understanding the (potential / real) risk that was inflicted ontheir own bodies? Where are the education programmes led by male intactivists?
  
  I do have some answers to these questions in my head, but I just hesitate a little to step in, as I said, to tell men who are as well able to read and write and access information as I am, what they ‘should’ do, when surely their confrères are better placed to make the case for protecting future children? I currently judge it better to campaign at one remove, making the NoMGM case in more general terms, as most men really resent a woman ‘telling them what to do’, at least unless she’s their mother or wife…?
  
  Also, WHY are so many NoMGM activists reluctant to go public with their names and position? I’ve had men from the USA write to tell me they would lose their jobs if they spoke up by name. In the land of the free….????????
  
  [PS Yes, I know about the medicalization of FGM e.g. in Egypt, before anyone mentions it; the questions about how this has come about relate closely I’d suggest to those about MGM and men in the USA – conformity is more important than real knowledge???]
Nick Langford

I remember when I was at school – boys’ boarding school where we slept in dormitories, showered together, etc – some boys were ‘cavaliers’ and some were ’roundheads’. There was no particular stigma or shame attached to being either; it’s just the way it was. No one considered themselves either mutilated or intact; abused or fortunate.

Forty years later, however, I find myself a keen supporter of a campaign to end the non-medical, ritualistic mutilation of infant boys; a campaign which teaches the circumcised that they have been abused and disfigured, violated against their will. Many of these men now feel traumatised where before they were quite unaware that they were the victims of any violation. Is that trauma the responsibility of the circumciser or of the campaigners?

I have no doubt that it is right to end this trade in prepuces, but the unavoidable step is to awaken a generation of men to the reality of what has been done to them, and we should at least take note of that, and of our responsibility.

This is one of the perils of many campaigns: that in the gap between raising public awareness and eventual success there is a treacherous no-man’s land where the situation actually becomes worse for a while. When success is deferred or becomes unobtainable – as in the campaign for shared parenting, for example – the campaign for awareness actually makes the situation on the ground much worse for many people. This is why the campaign to end MGM must achieve its aim as swiftly as possible.
- http://www.hilaryburrage.com Hilary Burrage
  
  Thanks for this, Nick. And yes!
  My only question would be, do we generically need to approach the issues differently in modern western societies than in traditional practising ones? That’s the tricky bit, I think???
  - Inside MAN
    
    Yes we do need different approaches but that does require us to challenge the notion that fgm is always worse. We have to go beyond a binary approach.
    
    Language is very important here—-we have the widely accepted phrase fgm and the concept of violence against women
    
    We don’t have concept called violence against men, so we are hindered straight away, and we don’t have a widely accepted phrase……we have circumcision, ric, mtm, mgc, ntc, mc, SMC, umc…..
    
    That preponderance of phrases for the male side of the problem highlights how different the challenge that faces us is…..there is a consensus that fgm is a problem that needs addressing…. With mgm we are a long way off consensus
    
    The male fight is different and a long way behind the female struggle—- but we shouldn’t blame individual male advocates for wanting their issue to be given equal footing—that’s exactly what they should be fighting for at this stage—-and whether we like it or not Hilary it is right and inevitable that challenging fgm campaigns and campaigners and challenging feminism is part of that male struggle
    
    How feminists and fgm campaigners respond to that male challenge is a measure of how well equipped they are right now to be role models of empowerment and equality for all…as things stand the answer is not very well equipped—as the guardian,s actions reveal.
    
    If The Guardian had a perfectly good campaign for men and boys going on that would be admirable. Right now they don’t so male campaigners are an annoyance that the guardian deals with through censorship
    
    If the guardian was treating the two issues differently but equally, there would be no need to censor people they could simply direct us to the correct campaign…..the problem is not mgm campaigners saying “wot about men” the problem is that mmgm campaigners have to say “wot about men” in the first place.
Peter London

Hilary. It’s great reading your comments. Thank you for the opportunity to discuss this with you.

1. “the relative risks”: FGM and MGM do not have “risks”; they are 100% harm.

2. Damage to women from FGM. Any and all genital mutilation of any un-concenting person is terrible & evil; especially a helpless infant; and regardless of any “facts” about whether it’s “good” or “bad”.

But the truth about the medical and scientific research should be known:

Seven Things to Know about female Genital Surgeries in Africa

— By the public policy advisory network on female genital surgeries in Africa.

“Western media coverage of female genital modifications in Africa has been hyperbolic and one- sided, presenting them uniformly as mutilation and ignoring the cultural complexities that underlie these practices. Even if we ultimately decide that female genital modifications should be abandoned, the debate around them should be grounded in a better account of the facts.”

http://www.taskforcefgm.de/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/hast81.pdf

Female Circumcision Does Not Always Reduce Sexual Experiences:

“International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology” — a peer reviewed journal of international renown:

Female genital cutting in this group of women did not attenuate sexual feelings:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1471-0528.2002.01550.x/abstract

“The Journal of Sexual Medicine” — a peer reviewed journal of international renown:

Pleasure and orgasm in women with Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting (FGM/C):

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17970975

“The New Scientist”* (references a medical journal)

Female Circumcision Does Not Reduce Sexual Activity:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn2837-female-circumcision-does-not-reduce-sexual-activity.html#.Uml2H2RDtOQ

“Journal of General Internal Medicine” — a peer reviewed journal of international renown:

Female “Circumcision” – African Women Confront American Medicine

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1497147/

“Pediatrics (AAP)” — a peer reviewed journal of international renown:

Genital Cutting Advocated By American Academy Of Pediatrics

http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/102/1/153.short

Medical benefits of female circumcision: Dr. Haamid al-Ghawaabi [no medical references; but spouting of the same “reasons” that are given for MGM)

http://islamqa.info/en/ref/45528

3. “So my puzzle is…”: Genital mutilation is one of the very hardest things to eradicate from any society; and the success of that endeavour has little to do with the education level of the subjects. The are many reasons for that.

4. “Where are the education programmes led by male intactivists?” Hmmm… maybe I’ll try applying for a charitable grant to set up such a program; better still, I’ll email my government’s “Department for Men’s Rights & Health” and ask them for a donation. “LOL” as they say.

5. “most men really resent a woman ‘telling them what to do’, at least unless she’s their mother or wife…?” Well, I don’t know where to start with that one. But you’ve got it the wrong way round, that much I’m sure ?

6. “WHY are so many NoMGM activists reluctant to go public with their names and position? I’ve had men from the USA write to tell me they would lose their jobs if they spoke up by name. In the land of the free”: In the USA, being against MGM is often seen as anti-semitic. A lie that parts of the Jewish community work hard to propagate. I know a leading lawyer fighting against MGM; and he has been accused of being anti-semitic, even though his wife is Jewish! But of course, there is a HUGE Jewish movement against MGM. There are other reasons as well – no different to being an woman who speaks-up in an African village, you would be ostracised to say the least.

7. “conformity is more important than real knowledge?” Knowledge is over-rated I’m afraid! And it’s far more about normalisation rather than conformity. And of course the endless ability of the human mind to fool and deceive itself.

As an Intactivist, I have a mutilated penis. But to my eternal thanks, my mind is not mutilated; and I see clearly that genital mutilation of any child: female, male or intersex is wrong. Let’s throw FGM & MGM into the trash can, and instead replace it with CGM – child genital mutilation.
http://www.hilaryburrage.com Hilary Burrage

Peter, thanks, but I’d like to suggest people read reports by the World Health Organisation http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs241/en/ , rather than documents like the Hastings report, which reflect a very singular view of FGM and is to be honest widely regarded as lacking credence. ( http://www.statementinfgm.com )

I haven’t time to explain everything just now (there’s a holiday looming, as you may have noticed…!), but re ‘risks’… I agree absolutely that all unnecessary ‘surgeries’ are unacceptable, but, taking a more epidemiological perspective, we can learn a lot by examining relative likelihood of various outcomes. In both FGM and MGM some serious outcomes are more frequent than others, and often the contexts in which the procedure is undertaken are relevant here – eg in both cases, severe bleeding can cause death if medical intervention is not easily accessible. And of course maternal / infant mortality is another example of such risk, as is the nightmare of obstetric fistula, if obstruction can’t be dealt with rapidly.

Forgive me if I leave this debate now; so much to do in the next few days. I just wish that someone would do what you say is impossible – get going with the medics and lawyers who oppose MGM and start a really wide public information campaign (I know the US intactivists have something like this: http://www.intactamerica.org/- I receive their newsletters), such as many brave women are doing in equally (or even more) challenging, sometimes very personally dangerous, contexts around the world re FGM.

MGM and FGM lobbies are unlikely to converge immediately because the public information campaigns and the law are at different stages in most places; but we all had to start somewhere.

Some of our friends above in this debate might be pleasantly surprised by how much encouragement they received, if they started to invite support, rather than declaring strongly that they expect FGM activists automatically to oppose them; isn’t it time that people stopped claiming that activists like me want to protect only female babies and girls? Surely they realise that is a very insulting way to see us, often mothers ourselves?

My suggestion: instead of some folk apparently wanting more to attack ‘feminists’ than to gain their support, how about we accept that there are different stages / required strategies in the campaigns to abolish FGM and MGM, but we can offer mutual support? That’s why, eg, I set up the @StopMGM Twitter account https://twitter.com/stopmgm , and why I’ve tried to address some of the issues above.

For me and others the issue is stopping child cruelty and abuse, and we have to go about it in different ways to match different types of hurt and different circumstances. It’s not a competition, it’s a multi-faceted campaign!

Hope that helps, and thanks again for the discussion.

Best, and signing out,
Hilary
- Janet Wilkinson
  
  “isn’t it time that people stopped claiming that activists like me want to protect only female babies and girls?”. Whats amusing is you don’t realise, all these assumptions are based on the label you drag around with you “feminism”
  
  Well you show us examples of where feminists have tried to help on an issue that purely affects men and boys and you will go some way of demonstrating that. Currently all I see is one person (You) who has setup a twitter page, and retweeted a bunch of stuff claiming you want to help. I don’t see any of your feminist buddies helping, i don’t see any feminists standing up with you against MGM. I don’t see any of your feminist buddies telling the Guardian what they are doing is wrong…
  
  Actions speak louder than words, lets see some Hilary
  
  Then we can look at working together.
Frank

“To be more precise it is trying to ban commentators from sharing views about male genital mutilation that contradict its left-wing, pro-feminist, editorial views on female genital mutilation (FGM).” – Ugh. “Left-wing”? Really? I’m a leftwinger, a communist in fact, and I’d urge any intactivist to look into the fact that all circumcision (female *and* male) was strictly illegal in the Soviet Union. As a result of this, many Jews who still live in Russia or emigrated to other parts of the world from there are intact to this day!

In fact, MGM started happening (under the typical flimsy medical pretenses) in the countries of the former USSR as soon as they turned capitalist. Germany was a prime example: West Germany had an MGM rate of ~10% (and that’s in the non-Muslim population!), while East Germany had a rate of close to zero. All that changed as soon as capitalism was introduced there. Virtually over night, the MGM rate in the east was “adjusted” to West German levels.

And some of the highest MGM rates are in ultracapitalist nations like the US and South Korea. It wouldn’t be too far-fetched to argue that the advent of MGM in the Western world not incidentally coincides with the advent of industrial capitalism. John Harvey Kellogg started it to curb the “evils” of masturbation, but that was just one particularly vicious form of sex control that took place all over the Western world at that time in various ways.

To argue that the Guardian is stifling debate around MGM “because of its overall left-wing political stance” is outright ludicrous, and says more about the politics of the author of this otherwise interesting piece.
- Inside MAN
  
  Thanks for that comment Frank and particularly for the analysis of post-communist circumcision rates in Eastern Europe.
  
  There are many types of “left wing” and not all are pro or anti circumcision.
  
  There are also many different contexts which shape how a prson’s politics are applied.
  
  The context of anti-religious Eastern European communism in the 20th Century is very different from the context of multi-cultural Britain in 2014.
  
  There are two key elements of left-wing thinking that are at play here:
  
  In the West, FGM has been framed as “violence against women”—this is a left-wing, feminist construct that arises out of the belief that the bourgeoisie oppress the proles; whites oppress blacks and other ethnic groups; men oppress women etc……..
  
  Genital Mutilation is framed in the contemporary left-wing mindset as a form of oppression—-men oppressing women—-but male circumcision doesn’t have a natural place to fit in the existing left-wing narrative……and including it alongside FGM destroys the “men oppressing women” narrative.
  
  There’s also the added issue that the problem is predominantly found in some black and other ethnic minority groups (eg Jewish communities and Muslim communities) and modern left-wingers fear it is racist to criticise these groups. It’s now OK to criticise ethnic minorities who are seen to oppress women (the tackling sexism card trumps fear of being racist)—-the same isn’t true when the “victim” is a man.
  
  Of course this doesn’t mean that all left wingers are pro-male circumcision, but it’s an interesting fact that when polled by the Jewish Chronicle it turned out that supporters of the populist right wing anti-immmigration party UKIP were most likely to oppose circumcision.
  
  Interesting to note that sometimes political perspectives that are less tolerant and less socially progressive (eg UKIP and Communism) are more likely to be anti circumcision.
  
  On the left in Europe it tends to be the most socially progressed thinkers coming from a children’s rights perspective who push for a ban on male circumcision (we’ve seen this in places like Germany, Denmark, Holland and parts of Scandanavia).
  
  It seems more likely that sustainable political change in Europe will come from the left/socially liberal side of the political spectrum……eventually, but right now thinking on the left (eg at The Guardian) is a barrier to progress.
  
  Best Regards
  
  Glen
  
  PS: I am not anti-left-wing, I am apolitical.
http://honeybadgerbrigade.com/the-team/ Jim Doyle

“To argue that the Guardian is stifling debate around MGM “because of its overall left-wing political stance” is outright ludicrous, and says more about the politics of the author of this otherwise interesting piece”

I have agree. The Guardian is stifling debate because of its overall woman-pedestalizing, gynophile cultural biases, which are as much tradcon as they are anything. When it comes to left-wing, the only connection is to the identity politics which have parasitized and destroyed real left-wing activity for decades now.
Nigel

I have found this debate very informative. Jim, I think it is quite simple. The Guardian represents the comfortably off. Of course due to the passage of time these include many who once conceived of themselves as radical in some way. They have a fundamental problem now. Having become the “establishment” how can some of their self interested concerns be represented as important radical calls for action. The answer is to scour the world for issues that can be coopted. Thus it is that privileged women make fanciful links between genuinely shocking practices or events and their demands for higher pay, accelerated promotion, quotas in plum jobs and so on. It is for this reason that there is censorship, for it starts to expose the inconvenient truth that “identity politics” is often simply a vehicle for the already privileged to cement their position for themselves and their offspring. The point is not whether FGM and MGM are worse or comparable. It is simply that the latter is completely redundant in the argument for company director quotas for women, whereas the FGM is (bizarrely) in the list of “proofs” supporting such things.
In fact there seems every reason for those campaigning for FGM and MGM to combine and work together. Particularly as the latter is so much more widespread and accepted.

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