Letters

Female genital mutilation

EDITOR--Is the abolition of female genital mutilation just another feminist issue? Is it racism or cultural insensitivity to stamp out this practice in Britain? Should we continue to avoid doing anything about it on the grounds that it is "a private, difficult, and sensitive" issue? Anyone who does not know the answers to these questions should take another look at the photograph of a female infant being mutilated¹ because it answers all questions relating to what the correct stance of the Western world to this practice should be.

Concerted action should be taken to abolish female genital mutilation in Britain, with full judicial and government support. The French example is worth studying.¹ The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists has pioneered many initiatives in the past aimed at improving the health and welfare of women and may be best suited to coordinating activities aimed at evaluating the size of this problem and providing viable intervention strategies.

A lasting solution to this issue can, however, come only through a workable global initiative. The influence of Western-type education in stopping this practice has been documented in an indigenous population of Nigerian Igbos.² This has been confirmed in many other reports, but it would be naive to believe that education alone is enough to eradicate the practice in every region of the world: education in this context probably acts as a marker of female emancipation and so may be a strong factor in certain parts of the world while in others its influence may be suppressed by stronger cultural factors. Furthermore, it is not realistic to wait for all women to become educated.

Contrary to J A Black and G D Debelle's assertion,¹ female genital mutilation is not largely confined to Muslims, and attempts have been made to correct this misrepresentation.³ The perpetuation of this myth may provoke antagonism in the very areas where maximum cooperation is required for any global intervention to stand any chance of success. Religion has never nurtured female genital mutilation, except for that practised by the Christian Skoptozy sect in Russia, which in the past supported female genital mutilation with quotations from the Bible (Matthew xix, 12).⁴ Tradition is the main reason why this barbarous act still continues in parts of the developing world, and many Islamic areas do not have this custom.

Eradication of the practice in those Islamic countries where it is still carried out may be easier than everyone thinks because religion is the dominant component of the complex mix of religion, culture, and nationalism that exists in such parts. Thus if Islamic scholars and leaders established that this practice was not required, support for it might melt away--rapidly, too, if a public stance was then taken against it by these leaders. The Western world can contribute positively to this by making quiet, unpublicised representations to these leaders: anything else might elicit negativistic responses. In the animist and Christian parts of the developing world, education, particularly of women, will lead to the disappearance of this custom in the long term, while intensive public health campaigns will hasten this process.

Clinical research fellow London Gynaecology and Fertility Centre, London W1N 1AF

Health psychologist Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham NG1 4BU

Clinical research fellow University Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Jessop's Hospital For Women, Sheffield S3 7RE

Godwin I Meniru, Maryann O Meniru, Uchechukwu O Ezeh 

1. Black JA, Debelle GD. Female genital mutilation in Britain. BMJ 1995;310:1590-4. (17 June.) [Free Full Text]
2. Meniru GI. Female circumcision among the Igbos of Nigeria: trends. Nigerian Journal of Medicine 1991;1:55-60.
3. Meniru GI. Female genital mutilation. Br J Obstet Gynaecol 1994;101:832. [Medline]
4. Mustafa AZ. Female circumcision and infibulation in the Sudan. Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology of the British Commonwealth 1966;73:302-6.