Tactics needed to end ancient female rite

Press, 22 July 1980, Page 12

Tactics needed to end ancient female rite

U.N. .. jJ women s conference

The conservative estimate is 30 million and some researchers claim more than double that number: the women and girls in many African and Middle.' Eastern countries who are what is politely called “circumcised” and, more accurately, “genitally mutilated.”

That is to 'say, theyhave suffered all manner of injury — psychological, physical and sexual — because of customs that decree the alteration of the female body to suit male tradition and male sexual imperatives. / Marty people argued over the years that the practice did. riot exist. When enough evidence was produced to the contrary, they argued that it was rare.

When overwhelming evidence was produced to the contrary, they switched their argument and attacked on three fronts: that girls regard it as a rite of womanhood and tribeswomen carry it out; that legislation against it won’t help; that any interference from the outside world- is “cultural imperialism.”',' There- is- some truth in all these arguments. Some, but not a lot. Any deeplyingrained ritual comes to seem “natural” and virtuous, however basically evil — we in the West have .examples of our own. Witchburning was a positive good in its time.. Capital punishment still is, in . some American states.

The women who. carry’ out circumcision do so because they fear girls will be considered unclean and unmarriageable by the men upon whom they are forced to depend; besides, they have, a living to earn. It is true that ..circumcision is; widespread in, for ’ instance, the Sudan, despite legislation against it in.;1946. But, as most of us.know to our cost, legist lation without public awareness or education is a paper tiger, serving only to shelve problems in the /odour of sanctity.

an increasing number of Third World women who themselves abhor circumcision in whatever form and count on our solid-arity-only for the., initiatives they have already taken, without us.

They ensured that the abolition of genital'mutilation was recommended at the 1979 Sudan World Health Organisation conf e r e n c e , recommended again at Cairo in 1979, and yet again at the 1980 African regional conference, a preliminary to Cotaken without us. There are, of course, some women who actively support the status quo and many men — including meh in Western development agencies — who cite “ethnic integrity” as. a reason for doing nothing; But since the male political leaders of the countries concerned are often only too happy to discard their own ethnic integrity in' exchange for anything, from colour television and large cars to Western dress, one cannot take their worries too seriously- . - . ■

Fran Hosken, the major and indefatigable American campaigner against female circumcision, has already put in almost a. decade’s work bringing the practice to Western attention and supporting Third World women who want change. She has trekked across most of the coun?. tries in question. and tirelessly recorded case history after case history, fact after facat, and been mightily abused for her efforts.

She will be in Copenhagen to continue the campaign in July, infuriated at the continuing failure of many Westernfunded aid agencies to

tests and no pioneers expect popularity, which is just as well. -- Edna Adan Ismail, a member of the Health Ministry of Somalia, understands the value of tact. She took up the cause “because, as a midwife, I saw for myself, day after day, how damaging circumcision is to women and their children.” Nevertheless, she is — as are a number of Third World women — wary of certain aspects of Western feminist concern.

“Circumcision,” she says, “cannot be discussed in isolation. It must be treated as part of the general health of women and their daughters. When I talk about it at home, I always talk to couples, never, to men or women separately. If I did, the men would blame , the women and the - women the men. “And I never mention any of the more abstract feminist arguments about male oppression or female sexuality. The whole area is too remote from village people, too sensitive, pointless. I simply insist that, like some other habits, circumcision is bad for the health of little girls, bad for’ women and bad for the babies they bear. “In that way, men and women are not set against each other but brought together in mutual concern for their children.” Her tactics seem eminently sensible and practical. There are a growing -number of men, husbands and fathers in the Third World, who also dislike circumcision and yet fail to persuade their womenfolk against it. One Somalian woman told me she was circumcised while

women to a lifetime of debilitating infections, painful intercourse, difficult ' childbirth and even to their,death and the death of, their offspring. Since it is our money and our taxes that fund these agencies,, have we not a right to expect that their health education programmes ■ ' : include circumcision? instead of pretending it doesn’t exist and thus , failing women like Edna Adan? ■ ~ Tn order to help, we can press for the changes that Third Women women want - ;< themselves, by. supporting in writing, agencies like the World Health Organisation and t U.N.I.C.E.F. who have changed their policies and now need our encouragement to implement resolutions. We can also make sure that any charities we back who work 'in the Third World know bur views on female circumcision. . Then, after Copenhagen, we can ask for the implementation’of any decisions there by the women of Africa and the Arab countries who are, themselves, affected ‘by circumcision and fear for their daughters. —. Copyright — London Observice Service.-;!;

Female circumcision is a crucial issue for discussion at the Copenhagen conference. JILL TWEEDIE, of the “Observer ” offers timely advice. Tomorrow: the practice in the Sudan. - 1