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Underground > Laboratory >

Female Circumcision: the good news and the bad news.

14:15 / 30.09.02

New Scientist reports: Female circumcision does not reduce sexual activity :

"Circumcised" women can still have normal sexual function, according to a new study.

This means that there's *really* no reason to do it, since the main rationale is to lower women's libido so they're less likely to engage in "improper" sex.

From the article:

Circumcised women experience sexual arousal and orgasm as frequently as uncircumcised women, according to a study in Nigeria.
The researchers also found no difference in the frequency of intercourse or age of first sexual experience between the two groups of women. These findings remove key arguments used to defend the practice, they say.
Friday Okonofua and colleagues at the Women's Health and Action Research Centre in Benin City studied 1836 women, 45 per cent of whom had been circumcised.
During the operation, all or part of the clitoris and the labia are removed. Proponents of female circumcision claim it makes virginity at marriage and marital fidelity more likely. Opponents condemn it as dangerous and painful.
The women filled in questionnaires, asking about their sexual history. The results show "female genital cutting cannot be justified by arguments that suggest it reduces sexual activity in women," write the team in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology.

ONLY NICE THINGS

15:02 / 30.09.02

Oh, for Heaven's sake.

Men do not hack up women's genitals because they are afraid they will commit adultery.

Men hack up women's genitals because they *can*.

Jack The Bodiless

20:37 / 30.09.02

Haus, surely that's "some men", or "some cultures". Unless I've been off performing misogynist acts in my sleep again... and grant did use the phrase 'main rationale', not 'sole reason' or 'reasonable justification'.

21:25 / 30.09.02

You mean you haven't been taking broken glass to your sisters' privates? What are you, some sort of queer?

I think "female genital cutting cannot be justified by arguments that suggest it reduces sexual activity in women" doesn't necessarily indicate that it ever could be justified, even if it did work. On the other hand, it does take the argument onto the terms of those who would try to rationally argue that reducing sexual activity in women was a good thing - something that needs to be rejected.

I'm glad that women who've had FGM are better off than previously considered, but it doesn't change the underlying argument against it.

Less searchable M0rd4nt

22:25 / 30.09.02

Haus: While the men of a community may bear some ultimate responsibility for female genital mutilation, it's usually practiced by the women. On occasion it's been found that men are easier to talk round to the idea of abandoning the practice, either because they find the effects distasteful (having to take a knife to the marital bed is such a bother) or because in many cases they have to pay someone to perfom the "ceremony". Since a daughter is already seen as an unecessary expense, some men are very happy to save the money.

Women who are asked why they support and perpetuate the practice often point to the supposed reduction in sexual activity. Whilst anything that might help to re-educate them is well and good, you'd still have to get the info. out there. Not easy.

22:36 / 30.09.02

The disagreement, though, is not on the basis of whether or not it works to reduce sexual activity... that's the problem with statements like these. Informing them doesn't challenge the basic disagreement. You wouldn't want to imply "well, if you want to stop women having sex, this doesn't work, try something else".

To me, it's more of a happy story (x number of women who we though might have been deprived of an aspect of physical happiness, haven't been) rather than one which will actually affect the number of women who go through it in the future.

ONLY NICE THINGS

23:38 / 30.09.02

I confess that I'm struggling to find the happy in "Well, they have been horribly genitally mutilated, but on the bright side they can still reach orgasm". OK, better than no clitoris *and* no sexfun, but nonetheless. I would be interested to see if this finding makes any difference whatsoever to the levels of female circumcision.

10:58 / 01.10.02

True, this is a somewhat relative "happy". I don't think it's going to be the plot of the next Disney.