Female Circumcision

Billy Sims

Female Circumcision

Kadi is a four-year-old girl who will never be the same because of her disturbing cultural rituals. Kali wakes up and pleads to play with the other children but her mother does not allow her. Kadi grandmother holds her down to the bare earth as her mother begins to cut her clitoris with a razor. After the very unsafe procedure Kadi cries almost five hours with a dirty rag between her legs as an attempt to stop the bleeding and possible hemorrhaging.

Most frequently the operations are performed by an old woman of the village sometimes know as the Gedda. Usually a woman performs the surgery but rarely does the mother do it. Before the surgery in certain communities there is a huge tribal dance and celebration. The music proceeds through the surgery in an attempt to bury the cries and screams of the victim.

The operation is performed in diverse communities by different people and with a variety of tools. In more sophisticated communities, a qualified doctor performs the operation with sterilized tools. In the more uninformed societies, a traditional birth mother performs the operation using an assortment of tools ranging from knives and razors to jagged stones taken straight from the ground.

Female circumcision is the fractional or complete removal of the external genitalia, varying from removal of the prepuce (hood) of the clitoris only, to full excision of the clitoris, labia minora and labia majora. There are three forms of female circumcision; the first is Clitoridectomy which is the removal of the prepuce of the clitoris; the second is Excision which is the removal of the prepuce, the clitoris and the labia minora ; the third Infibulations is the removal of the prepuce, the whole labiae minora and majora and stitching together the two sides of the vulva leaving a small orifice to permit the flow of urine and menstrual discharge. (p17 Koso) Because of poverty and lack of medical facilities, the procedure is frequently done under less than hygienic conditions, and often without anesthetic by other than medically trained personnel. Anesthesia is rarely used. Razor blades, knives or scissors are the most common instruments used.

There are several problems that arise from circumcision immediately after the surgery there is immense pain then hemorrhaging, shock, urinary retention, infection, fever and even death. After a couple of weeks the wound will begin to heal and form keloids, or Cyst. Other long-term effects are women not being able to have their menstrual cycle so the blood accumulates over many months in the vagina and uterus causing tremendous pain, which is often called haematocolpos. After the surgery sexual pleasure cannot be obtained and sexual intercourse becomes very painful. Women who have been circumcised have a hard time giving birth and are often forced to have a caesarian, which is when a child is delivered through a small cut in the mothers stomach.

Women who undergo circumcision suffer to various degrees emotional and mental distress depending on the nature of the mutilation and resultant medical condition. Symptoms, which go unnoticed, are mental depression, frigidity and mental disorders. Psychological consequences a young girl might feel is betrayal from her mother, and a scene of humiliation.

Female circumcision has evolved from early times to try and establish control over women's sexual behavior. It was seen as a cure for nymphomania, masturbation, hysteria, depression, epilepsy and insanity. Circumcision is believed to protect a woman against her oversexed nature, saving her from temptation, suspicion and disgrace. These beliefs must be understood in context of societies where female virginity is an absolute prerequisite for marriage.

The justification for the operation appears to be largely grounded in a desire to terminate or reduce feelings of sexual arousal in women so that they will be much less likely to engage in pre-marital intercourse or adultery. The clitoris holds a massive number of nerve endings, and generates feelings of sexual arousal when stimulated. Uncircumcised women in countries where female circumcision is normally performed have difficulty finding a marriage partner. Men typically prefer a circumcised wife because they are considered more likely to be faithful.

There would have to be many changes in societal attitudes if the complete abolishment of female circumcision were to occur, manly in the attitudes of the cultures where this practice is prominent. There would have to be education to the women of the harms that female circumcision can cause and a change in the men of that culture to begin viewing women as equals to them sexually. Many continue this practice because they are not fully educated as to the consequences of disease and infections caused from the unsterile conditions that female circumcision is performed under and that a woman's life does not have to include the terrible pain that comes from having female circumcision performed. To change a cultures values and morals on a subject that is so deeply rooted in their history, would take many generations to make a complete change.

The problem with those claims as cures is that men can have the same symptoms and in reality those are scapegoats for the underlining truth. Which are men want to dominate, and oppress women by tasking away their sexuality. Historians feel that female circumcisions started simultaneously in different parts of the world. It is believed that Egypt and ancient Arabs started the surgical methods but since there is no written documentations they are not sure exactly were or when the first surgery took place.

The majority of circumcision takes place on the west coast of Africa and is practiced in Mali, Sudan, Egypt, and Kenya. It is also practiced in Muslim United Arab Emirates, South Yemen, Bahrain and Omen. A new trend is for African women to take their young girls to Europe to be circumcised under general anesthesia, in hygienic conditions superior to those available in their home countries. This does not make female circumcision better just because it is done in a proper environment. The bottom line is that it is still oppressing women from their sexuality, which is wrong. Just because the women are taking to Europe does not make it better or right. There are currently over 100 million women who have had some form of female circumcision performed on them and approximately 6,000 girls go through this procedure everyday. (p )

What is being done to stop female circumcision? In Sudan in 1946 formal legislation forbidding genital mutilation and if caught would be imprisoned up to five years or a fine. The only problem with this law is under Article 284 of the Sudan Penal Code for 1974 it is alright to merely remove the