I’m still catching up with my writing, so this is a recap of another workshop I went to on Monday - even though it is now Wednesday!

By far, this is the workshop where I have been exposed to new information. It was about Female Genital Mutilation. I took lots of notes and I hope you can learn something too! I took pictures but most somehow got deleted off of my phone.

*Trigger warning for information about clitoral excision*

Female Genital Mutilation

In countries where female genital mutilation is practiced, it is not just men who defend it, but women too.

They argue that it is religion and a cultural practice, so it should not be stopped. And in fact, they accuse those trying to stop it as violating their right to freedom of religion.

My thoughts throughout this whole presentation was that this is the same argument that many Western activists use, the “cultural relativist” idea that we are just reifying colonial power by enforcing our eurocentric values on African women. There is also a perspective that anti-FGM activists are only White. Both the cultural relativist and idea that anti-FGM advocacy is only White could not be more wrong. 

Many of those who are in favour of FGM do not have access to the education they need to free themselves from the mindset that it is okay. The right to exit is a fundamental right humanity has. However, it does not count if the women do not have any knowledge of any other experience.

FGM is a patriarchal practice that in it’s basic form was rooted in Ancient Egypt and Greece. Even though women are pro-FGM and act as clitoral excisers themselves - this doesn’t mean FGM is not a patriarchal practice. People can and do participate in their own oppression.

Before FGM was made illegal, it was practices out in the open, with the whole village gathered around, dancing in celebration. This is both in Christian and Muslim villages.

The Nyatura people of Tanzania - one tribe of many in the country - practice ritual tooth extraction, clitoraldectomy and forehead burning as a rite of passage for their women.

In 1967 the TANU government banned  FGM.

As it happens in other countries when they ban culturally practiced things, FGM moved underground. FGM was no longer publicly celebrated and made it harder to convict those performing it on women and girls.

To continue the practice of FGM, male chiefs and elders created the “Lawalawa” myth. They told parents that when their children have vaginal itching and infection it is “Lawalawa”, a curse from the ancestors because they have not yet excised the clitoris. This myth has no historical root in the Nyatura tribe. In fact, “Lawalawa” is a urinary tract infection or Thrush. But the Nyatura do not have access to medicine so FGM continues. The reason “Lawalawa” goes away after FGM is because the children are washed thoroughly washed and treated with herbal remedies. Generally, children are not bathed regularly and clean themselves with sand and dirt after defacation as opposed to with leaves which is the norm when they get older.

Not going through the transition of Ihongo means you are not a woman or suitable for marriage in the communities that practice FGM. So FGM has started to be practiced at a younger and younger age to make sure women will be married.

FGM is practiced at as young an age as 7 days old.

So - FGM is complicated. And it is a cycle.

 But there is hope!

One of the panelists (didn’t get her name!) was the founder of the first African Women’s round table on FGM which happened in 1984 in Dakar, Senegal (I think that’s where). African women who had experienced FGM and those who had not came together to pressure the government and the UN to act.

In African countries, campaigns are being started, primarily supported by youth. Young men engaged to women who have not been excised wear pins that say “I am proudly marrying a woman who has not been excised” and women who have not been mutilated and are engaged to men wear complementing pins that say “I have not been excised and I am engaged”.

This is because there is still a social stigma and shame if you are not excised.

In Scandinavian countries, The Women’s Front (a radical feminist group) and a Nyatura women - Chiku Ali - started the program “Agents of Change” within immigrant communities. Through empowerment and story telling, women form honest, trusting relationships - and through this holistic approach, many women open up about their history with FGM and their conflicting feelings about continuing to practice clitoral excision in their new countries on their daughters. 

Through education and self-realization, these women are finding their way - by way of their own accord - and not because people are handing out pamphlets and just telling them “FGM is wrong”.

Chiku also explained that really, the root cause of this is the patriarchal ignorance to the practical functions of ALL parts of the vagina. An example of this at a macro level is that even to this day, research funding for health issues relating only to women is substantially less than for men’s. Except breast cancer, but I’m sure you can connect the dots on that one. Women’s bodies have been made invisible by the lack of education and knowledge around them. Women’s bodies have been denied pleasure for centuries because patriarchy has “inceptioned” the idea that men deserve sexual pleasure and women do not, in fact it makes them dirty into our social consciousness. FGM is a practice that follows from that.

Only through reaching out to women and men with holistic and transformational education can we create real positive social change.

FGM can end.