to CELEBRATE the first FGM prosecutions!

[Sallyingforth]

Breaking news on BBC. Hope they send them down for a long sentence as an example to others.

the act is barbaric the people are not

they are not coming from the same view point as you and I. we do not live with the same fears as these women have for many many generations

if women who have undergone fgm were monitored more when they themselves have children, given more support and more support groups are run within their own communities as many younger woman who have grown up her are now taking a stand this is where the changes will be made not by a group of us british telling these people we will not stand for them being cruel in our country

Yes, come here and live in accordance with the law. That is not racist; that prevents anarchy. If people do not wish to do so and cannot commit to doing so and attending educational sessions on a mandatory basis they should be turned back at the border. I know what I'd chose as a mother; my child's life over the mutilation of her private parts - being unmarried is a far better option than being dead. They can't have their cake and eat it and that does not mean they cannot follow their cultural norms and beliefs that fall within the law.

Multi-culturism is to be celebrated but it doesn't that anybody can use it as an excuse to flout the law.

so it is all about breaking the law

people flout the law the law is not the issue it is that thousand of girls are suffering even with this law being in place for many because laws mean fuck all when you have deep rooted cultural practices

this is the issue not that foreigners are breaking our laws

and what a stupid argument of course you would not choose to have your dd mutilated but you have not grown up in a culture where women are valued in a very different way. do you think these women do not weep over the harm they know only too well they are putting their daughters through but the other option seems far worse

FGM is something which is deeply embedded in the lives and understanding of these communities. They do not see it as wrong and punishment and prosecution, on it's own, isn't going to change that viewpoint, nor stop it. People that have actually worked within these communities all say the same thing that is being said here: Education and change from within is the only way to stop it.

If what you are saying is that prosecutions need to be employed hand in hand with education and assistance then i'd agree with you FreudiansSlipper .

Thosands of girls are suffering because the law is not being implemented and therefore there are no boundaries. It is exactly the same with differentiated behaviour policies in schools where allowances are made for those from "difficult" backgriunds at the expense of the majority. It is how the soft boiled left wing social policies have started to destroy this country.

no thousands of girls are suffering because of deep rooted cultural belief's not because laws are not being implemented, which as I said before I am not against but along with support and education this is the key

laws do not stop people doing what they think or feel is right

if they did we would live in a much safer world

So, why has it taken 25 years to effect a prosecution? Further on the fear of not being suitable for marriage point - in a multi-cultural society the daughters in question should not be and are not restricted to "marrying in". Taking your anti-UKIP views into account surely that is something you would support these families to embrace. They need to understand how their vile practices make a civilised society recoil.

I'm embarrassed to say, I'd heard of FGM but not really understood what it involved. A pp encouraged a poster to google and look at some pictures , which I did and I was deeply disturbed and cried for those poor poor children.

It's just beyond imagination that this horrific procedure occurred and still does.

I've done a lot of reading on it this morning and come across the desertflowerfoundation and donated and will continue to.

Education is key but also zero tolerance too.

I posted the website on my facebook and got next to nothing in response , yet some one posting what they were baking for tea had many 'likes' . This needs to more publicised, spoken about every day, in our primary schools,In well women clinics.

Why why why are women and children always treated so inhumanly, like animals?

So, why has it taken 25 years to effect a prosecution?

Because although doing FGM in this country became illegal in 1985, it was not illegal to take your daughter somewhere else to have it done until a new law was passed in 2003 (and I think then implemented 2004).

The law now prevents a person from taking a child abroad for the purposes of FGM - but if, say, a parent takes a child on holiday to a country where it is legal, leaves them with their auntie and cousins for a few days while the parents visit an elderly relative, and come back and to their horror the child has been subjected to it, how are you going to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the parent was complicit? Especially if the child agrees that this is what happened and Mummy was really upset when she realised that my auntie had done this?

On the much more celebratory side - Puntland (the northern, semiautonomous province at the top of Somalia, next to Somaliland which was once British Somalia), where nearly 100% of girls are subjected to FGM, has just made the practice illegal. Now that should I hope make a huge difference. Well done them.

So, according to the BBC, this isn't really a prosecution for procuring FGM on cultural/religious/whatever reasons, but for medically repairing one that had been procured many years ago.

This does not sit right with me at all.

I can well imagine the circumstances that took place in this case. The baby had been delivered and a repair had to be made. Are surgeons trainined in legal reconstruction? Why was a second doctor charged. Who was the senior clinician?

What was the surgeon supposed to do?

In my view this prosecution is targetting the wrong (soft) option.
I am worried that a poorly thought out prosecution fail would send out very wrong messages indeed.

No Giraffe that's not the case at all. If you read through the thread you will find what is really alleged to have happened.

Gill it's not necessarily the case that a repair 'had' to be made - reinfibulation involves restitching the whole thing, not repairing a tear.

However I would imagine that the doctor will argue that he did it at the woman's request for mental or physical health reasons.

I have read the thread.

Too much information is missing. How can two doctors be responsible, unless one is being trained by another.

If you read the reports it's nothing to do with police competence. They are bringing cases to the CPS but the legislation is too weak for prosecution. It needs to be revised urgently.

I disagree with that. I also find it quite incredible it's taken the CPS 25 years to come to that conclusion

We don't even need FGM specific laws we alreday have GBH, ABH etc which could be used.

The reason we have not prosecuted befire is appeasement - pure and simple.

I am happy about this, but will not be totally happy until more charges are made, and against those doing it to children.

Also, education is key. Parents who have this done to their children believe they are doing the right thing. Yes It's totally nonsensical to me as a product of British culture to do this to a child, but to them, It's a necessity, It's normal. That's what needs to change.

Who put this link on MN a while back? I just read it again and my blood is now boiling. But it is a display of the ignorance and the commitment to the practice in just one culture-if people in the UK are seeing it as the norm, they need to be educated as to why it why it shouldn't be. www.irinnews.org/in-depth/62471/15/kenya-justifying-tradition-why-some-kenyan-men-favour-fgm

And I would be all in favour of girls deemed at risk to be subject to health visitors or SS being lawfully able to talk to their parents beforehand and warn them of the consequences, as well as the reasons why it shouldn't be done to their daughters.
Consequences need to be followed through, and need to be more than a slap on the wrist.

And I would be all in favour of girls deemed at risk to be subject to health visitors...

So what criteria would you use to identify those girls?

That's where it all falls down.

FGM comes in many forms. The WHO sets out 4 categories:

1. Clitoridectomy: partial or total removal of the clitoris (a small, sensitive and erectile part of the female genitals) and, in very rare cases, only the prepuce (the fold of skin surrounding the clitoris).

2. Excision: partial or total removal of the clitoris and the labia minora, with or without excision of the labia majora (the labia are "the lips" that surround the vagina).

3. Infibulation: narrowing of the vaginal opening through the creation of a covering seal. The seal is formed by cutting and repositioning the inner, or outer, labia, with or without removal of the clitoris.

4. Other: all other harmful procedures to the female genitalia for non-medical purposes, e.g. pricking, piercing, incising, scraping and cauterizing the genital area.

In the UK, many women choose to have genital piercings, yet this is also FGM. Yet some NGOs that are trying to tackle FGM by changing the act practiced from one of the severe types to a ceremonial pricking have been condemned.

The issues are much more complex than many people realise.

Giraffe
The police have been bringing cases. If you listen to the DPP interview she explains why they haven't resulted in prosecutions.

i dont know much about this case but i am disappointed that the first ever case
1 is not prosecuting the people who did this to her originally
2 is not prosecuting the people who caused this to be done originally
3 involves surgery on an adult (?) so presumably carried out with consent. women should be able to consent to procedures imo, even if it is horrific. whether the nhs should pay is a different question.

Indeed, it's complex creamteas. Most of those involved in wanting to stamp it out know that the best route is education, making men and women here and in the home countries realise it is an appalling practice but some prosecutions here will be good. I still don't know what the doctor in this first case is alleged to have done and I doubt it is the best test case to start. It may well result in not guilty and parents will take that as a message you can get away with it.

As the adult woman who had just given birth involved had had FMG as child I assume then the doctor must have done one of these two and not for reasons connected to childbirth although it must be hard to know if it was connected to children birth (there is a defence if it is); So one of:

3. Infibulation: narrowing of the vaginal opening through the creation of a covering seal. The seal is formed by cutting and repositioning the inner, or outer, labia, with or without removal of the clitoris. Surely if she had had FGM before there might be no labia left to reposition so instead he must have done something else?

4. Other: all other harmful procedures to the female genitalia for non-medical purposes, e.g. pricking, piercing, incising, scraping and cauterizing the genital area. [ As said above that includes genital piercings ]

The Act prohibits:
1)A person is guilty of an offence if he excises, infibulates or otherwise mutilates the whole or any part of a girl’s labia majora, labia minora or clitoris.

There is no definition in it of excise, infibulate or otherwise mutilate.

Jane, are my posts invisible to you?

THE DOCTOR PERFORMED REPAIR OF EXISTING FGM, RETURNING IT TO THE STATE IT WAS IN BEFORE SHE GAVE BIRTH, THEREBY PERFORMING FGM HIMSELF. WHAT HE SHOULD HAVE DONE IS DO A COSMETIC REPAIR WHICH WOULD REMOVE THE SEAL OR FLAP OF TISSUE COVERING THE WHOLE AREA. DOING THIS IT IS SOMETIMES POSSIBLE TO RECREATE LABIA AND THE OPENING TO THE VAGINA IS UNRESTRICTED.

Apologies to everyone else for the shouting.

I can't understand why jane keeps posting the same thing either?

Sorry, the doctor is ALLEGED to have performed this. We can only hope that a conviction is made.

I think the point is traffic that we have no idea what form of FGM that women had. Hence we had no idea what surgery actually was done by the surgeon.

You are making assumptions about both of these.

And the fact is also that a second unnecessary procedure was carried out on this woman. If she consented that's up to an adult woman. But under no circumstances should this have been done on the nHS. If consenting adults want unnecessary surgical procedure they should payy for them. That I think is a secondary issue but a serious one when we debate the state of the NHS.