Call the Midwife - FGM

[Littlepiglittlepig3letmeIN]

At first I thought the programe makers were doing a good job at highlighting how wrong this practice is, and yet at the last moment, they normalized it by making out it's tradition.
I felt they missed a good opportunity to get through to the right people.

The programme makers can try and dress it up however they want - trying to make out it's tradition and it's the women that facilitate it.
Women may carry it out, but
It's men who are behind it.

It's heartbreaking to think that even in this day and age, little girls are still being butchered and disfigured by these barbaric animals.

Read an interesting artivle on Indonesia where they are trying to balance the cultural expectation with a less damaging practice so are putting forward a ritual fgm practice of running a cotton bud over the childs clitorus. Some are also using a slight prick with a needle which causes no lasting damage. Still not ideal but at least better tham the more damaging forms.

There is a video on youtube where a woman who was a victim of FGM was having a discussion with a woman who choose to be cut as an adult. Was interesting and if I find it will post a link.

My job involves working with pregnant women and women with babies in a borough where there is a very high rate of immigrants and refugees from countries which practice FGM. I attend a weekly maternity safeguarding meeting and there are 3 or 4 cases every single week of pregnant women who have had FGM, sometimes more. They are always referred to social care but all that that means is that the woman is spoken to and told in no uncertain terms that it is illegal. If the woman then says that she has no intention of having it done to her child, there isn't much more that you can realistically do. We had a case recently where a new mother disclosed to one of the midwives that she planned to take her DD back to her own country to be cut. The midwife obviously reported this and the Police confiscated the mother's passport and put a block on her applying for a passport for her daughter. So, yes,it is taken very seriously but it's extremely rare for parents who are planning on getting their daughters cut to announce their intentions.
The midwife who this woman disclosed to was from the same country of origin so she wrongly assumed that she would be sympathetic.

Agnes - i've seen the video you're referring to. The frustration felt by the FGM victim as the american woman waxed lyrical about her voluntary FGM amazing cultural experience made me want to reach in and slap the woman.