Female Circumcision, Body Alteration and Multiculturalism in Australia

1
Female Circumcision, Body Alteration and
Multiculturalism in Australia

• Luara Ferracioli
• PhD Candidate
• Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics
  (CAPPE)
• The Australian National University
• luara.ferracioli_at_anu.edu.au

2
What is Female Circumcision?

• Female circumcision is performed across a wide
  number of cultural communities around the globe.
  Most of these are in Africa, but variations of
  the practice are also observed in the Middle
  East, Asia and Latin America. The rate of
  prevalence of FC in Africa among females ranges
  from 5 or less in the Democratic Republic of
  Congo and Uganda, and 20 or less in Senegal, to
  more than 90 in Somalia, Egypt, Eritrea, Mali
  and Sudan, and it is estimated that eighteen
  African countries have a prevalence of more than
  50.
• Why is the use of the terminology Female
  Circumcision more appropriate than Female
  Genital Mutilation or Female Genital Cutting?
• What are the meanings attached to the practice?

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• According to the WHO, FC is divided into the
  following groups
• Excision of the prepuce, with or without excision
  of part or all of the clitoris (also referred to
  as clitoridectomy)
• Excision of the clitoris with partial or total
  excision of the labia minora
• Excision of part or all of the external genitalia
  and stitching/narrowing of the vaginal opening
  (also known as Infibulation or Pharaonic
  Circumcision)
• Pricking, piercing or incision of the clitoris
  and/or labia, stretching of the clitoris and/or
  labia, cauterization by burning of the clitoris
  and surrounding tissue, scraping of tissue
  surrounding the vaginal orifice (angurya cuts) or
  cutting of the vagina (gishiri cuts), and
  introducing corrosive substances or herbs into
  the vagina to cause bleeding or to tighten or
  narrow it.  

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• Possible Reasons
• Islamic Duty?
• Oppression of women by men?
• Seclusion of women?
• FC (female circumcision) feminizes a womans
  otherwise androgynous genitalia, and thus
  corresponds to MC (male circumcision), since
  uncircumcised foreskins often are said to
  resemble female genitalia. Thus, in its early
  history, female circumcision might have been more
  associated with the construction of gender
  identity than with the oppression of women by
  men.
• Societies which practice circumcision do
  have higher sexual differentiation scores than
  societies lacking both operations (female and
  male circumcision).

5

• Most Common Health Consequences
• Severe bleeding is a common complication. In
  addition, neighbouring organs can be injured.
• After the procedure, infections such as gangrene
  are commonly reported.
• Formation of abscess, dermoid cyst and keloids
  are common.
• Urinary infection is also often reported, as the
  presence of pus and infection near the urethra
  can cause recurrent ascending tract infection.
• Infibulation (Type III) can cause complications
  related to pregnancy, as women must be
  de-infibulated before childbirth in order to
  allow the childs head to come out.
• The most dramatic outcome from FC would be death
  from severe bleeding (haemorrhagic shock), from
  the pain and trauma (neurogenic shock) or from
  severe and overwhelming infection (septicaemia).
• Effects on womens sexuality is still
  controversial.

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Why Female Circumcision still happens?

• One of the causes appointed by academics has
  been womens economic vulnerability in African
  countries. Mothers who have themselves been
  circumcised are very much aware of their
  financial dependence upon men and, therefore, are
  rarely willing to risk their daughters
  marriageability in order to oppose the practice.
  

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Female Circumcision in the realm of other body
alterations

• Understanding of body alteration as any
  socially approved practice of imposing a lasting
  physical change on the human body, administered
  by specialists with the consent of the subject or
  his or her guardians. The image one has of her
  body incorporates not only notions of health and
  wellbeing but also personal aesthetics and social
  norms.
• Surgeries becomes morally contested not only
  when they present little or no medical benefit or
  when they are carried out improperly, but also
  when the outcomes utterly challenge the idea one
  has of how the human body ought to look. This is
  inherently problematic.

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• A valid understanding of FC depends in part
  upon the willingness of Western feminists to hold
  their own practices up to the same critical
  scrutiny they apply to Others, to hear the plural
  voices of women everywhere and to learn from
  them, while also refusing to prejudge the merits
  of practices that are unfamiliar or threatening
  to those of us raised in bourgeois liberal
  societies.
• Female Circumcision and Breast Augmentation
• Female Circumcision and Other Cosmetic Surgeries
• Female Circumcision and Male Circumcision
• Question of autonomy.

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• The central question of this paper is
• Is the Australian legislature correct in
  criminalizing the practice and punishing those
  that, in order not to risk their groups
  cohesion, decide to maintain the tradition of
  female circumcision?
• There is a case to be made for changing values
  and aesthetic preferences as well as encouraging
  fully informed decisions instead of prohibiting
  the contested surgical procedures and treating
  the subjects or their guardians as deviants.
  By doing the latter, one can only attain a number
  of extremely risky underground procedures and an
  increase of the already present feeling, on the
  part of members of stigmatized groups, of being
  repressed and patronized by authorities.

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The benefits of a non-punitive approach to FC

• It is in line with real Multiculturalism, as
  Australia becomes a neutral and impartial
  political community open for the diversity of
  human ethical experience.
• Thus some ethnic and cultural identities will
  fade, and others flourish, but the question of
  which of them do so is not the proper concern of
  politics.
• Society becomes truly pluralistic and certain
  groups are not treated as deviants.

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• In addition, laws banning female circumcision
  are problematic not only for reasons of bias and
  ignorance towards African womens perspectives in
  Australia, but also because only one cultural
  group is required to meet standards of gender
  equality. That is, Anglo Australians can take
  their own time to extinguish practices such as
  prostitution, pornography and cosmetic surgery or
  any other practices that put women in a
  subordinate position.

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The Seattle Compromise

• Compromise by a group of physicians in Seattle,
• who realized that the best way to care for
  womens
• health was to understand the importance of FC and
• not treat it as a deviant behaviour.
• Thus, education, community development and
• compromise by the larger community should be
• privileged when dealing with female circumcision,
  as
• once women are economically empowered and aware
  of
• issues relating to female circumcision such as
  the health
• consequences, they are able to perceive the
  system and
• therefore, challenge it.