Oh my word....

[Creampastry]

Just listening to the radio and hear that every hour a female is treated at a medical facility (doctors, hospital etc) in the U.K. for FGM....

I assume the majority will be girls and young women .... but 1 every hour.... it's disgraceful.

When I lived in Streatham there was a newsagent/greengrocers shop on streatham high road which had a poster up by the till advertising a facilitator to help you with the logistics of taking girls to Africa for FGM!

This was 50 yards (if that) from the police station which was 4 doors down on the same side of the road. I marched into the police station to report it and asked that the poster be removed, and was told it wasn't a police matter

This was 4ish years ago, not decades. The fact that there is no attempt to prosecute this vile practice is a public disgrace.

This is one step too far in cultural relativity. If people aren't prosecuted for doing this to their children, the practice will never end.

As for people who live in this country not understanding it's illegal, I don't buy this, otherwise they wouldn't go abroad to get it done. It's barbaric.

Just because your parents think something is acceptable, doesn't mean you shouldn't question it. My parents were racist. Doesn't mean I think that's acceptable.

Holy shit, Smoky, that's appalling. I wonder if it's still there?

This is just horrific. One is horrific, of course, but I am just in shock at the numbers involved here. I genuinely thought it was a few small communities still practising in the U.K.

What is being done to let women and girls at risk report themselves or others as at risk before it happens? Are there campaigns in schools and GP surgeries. Like posters with phone numbers to call?

I've just done my mandatory online training programme for FGM. It's really quite shocking.

The law was recently amended in 2015 so that as well as being illegal, it's also illegal for a UK national or resident to travel abroad to carry out or facilitate FGM on a UK national or resident.

I understand that the police are now taking FGM much more seriously and many forces now have a dedicated task force to tackle this crime.

It's catch 22, would they stop from fear of persecution or would they just stop the females being allowed treatment at medical facilities.

it is in places where abortion is illegal, women with complications from illegal abortions die as they can't go to hospital.

Wow everyone makes it sound so simple. Do you think parents are advertising that they are sending girls away to have this done? It is a very prolific practice, it happens abroad and in this country. ( cutting parties). It is done by a practitioner with usually no medical training, no instruments or anaesthetics ( sometimes on the floor while the girl is held down and cut with an old piece of glass or metal etc). In the worse cases their legs are tied together after for several weeks. To prosecute you need a victim to be identified and to agree to a medical examination and participate in a prosecution by giving a statement and giving evidence in court. Do you think many girls will want to give evidence against their parents? Think about the implications for the girl in those circumstances? In France they have had prosecutions because of compulsory medical exams ( which we don't have) and because they arrested a cutter who had kept written notes of victims. In the U.K there is a lot of work done be agencies - operations at the airport etc so don't assume there is any complacency.

It depends how you are defining FGM though - because I have a genital piercing (that I had done at a reputable piercing place in the UK) that now counts as FGM, which means every time I see the midwife I am technically a woman with FGM being treated at a medical facility! It's ridiculous as draws attention away from the real issues involved.

There are certainly campaigns to publicise it in London in The Evening Standard, health settings and schools. A group of girls have been involved in a production of a DVD etc. There are poster campaigns and a dedicated hotline etc. Medical staff, midwives etc receive specialist training etc.

Re piercings... they would technically come under this legislation but I wouldn't expect any action by a professional under those circumstances since it's not in the spirit of the law.

No, but it was recorded for audit purposes when I had my booking in appointment.

So what do we as a society do, Spirited? Ignore it as its difficult to prosecute? Say "oh it's cultural, we must respect this" ?
Prosecuting parents would lead to children ending up in care yes, but that may be better than being brought up by people who think it's ok to slice your genitals off with a razor blade and no anaesthetic. Doctors or others who enable or carry out this procedure should be locked up fir a very long time imo, if they are a hcp they should be prevented from practising here ever again.
You can dress it up how you want, there is no place for this in a civilised society.

It depends how you are defining FGM though - because I have a genital piercing (that I had done at a reputable piercing place in the UK) that now counts as FGM, which means every time I see the midwife I am technically a woman with FGM being treated at a medical facility! It's ridiculous as draws attention away from the real issues involved

It's not ridiculous, what would be ridiculous is re-writing the definition to suit people with piercings, this giving a loophole for mutilators of young girls.

You will be swiftly filtered out of the "concerning" pile so long as your piercing happened after 18yrs. If it didn't, it'll rightly be followed up.

user1471443813 regarding labial and clitoral piercings - my understanding from my training is that consented labial or clitoral piercings carried out professionally on someone 18 or over doesn't fall under the FGM legislation.

So for example when a woman attends for a smear with me and has a labial piercing I am not obliged to report it.

However if a female under 18 attended for something and I saw that she had some genital piercings/labial alterations/evidence of genital surgery I would be obliged to report to the police.

SpiritedLondon is right - this isn't easy or straightforward. But a lot of work and money has gone into making it criminal and educating the police etc about their responsibilities. Clearly not enough, but anyone who reckons this is just down to failure of political will doesn't understand what's going on.

FGM can cause huge problems in pregnancy and birth, and I imagine that features highly in these stats.

Though it's true that technically intimate piercing counts as FGM, and you could say the same of aesthetic labiaplasty, in practise it is quite clear that neither are prosecutable under current law (bit of a shame in the second case).

I'm not dressing it up.... I was involved for a number of years in work against it. I'm trying to clarify why it's difficult to prosecute in response to some PPs who are asking why nothing more is being done. ( to paraphrase). There are no Drs that we can stop practicing as a rule.... it's a woman in a village overseas. Families club together to bring them over. Sometimes another family member like an Aunty or Grandma will arrange to have the procedure done while the child is abroad visiting in the summer holidays. The parents don't always know it's going to happen.

That sounds like a lot.

What's the source?

I don't think genital piercing.....choice and FGM with the emphasis on the M belong i the same conversation.

A lot of is it is down to economics. The girl is worth more after procedure.

FGM is a sick form of a chastity belt, a medieval way for keeping girls and women down, horrific practice. Read the various books by Warris Darie, Desert Flower etc. Chilling reading, but highly recommended

There was an edition of Hardtalk last year where Fuambai Sia Ahmadu defended FGM and spoke quite proudly of the procedure she'd had in Sierra Leone, in fact she was celebrating it and found it aesthetically pleasing

Well there are different levels

Oops posted too soon. There are different levels and the most serious form there is a chance of death. ( I think there is a 10% death rate). That's not to mention the numbers of women who die in childbirth because their vagina is sewn shut ( plus the death of the baby) Maybe she did not undertake the most serious form. In any event if she's had the procedure she doesn't have much choice about it... perhaps her memory of excruciating pain has faded.

What level would you consider acceptable? The Economist theorised but didn't gain a lot of support.

Cross posted with the bit where you sounded unawful!

lucky - it's not always being carried out in the UK (although it does happen here). Some young girls are taken out of the UK to a country where it is common practice (Kenya,Ethiopia,Somalia) to have it done.