Casualty

[HungryClocksGoBackFourSeconds]

Did anyone watch? What did you think to the FGM story-line?

Yes. I think first generation wouldn't see it as their problem but a problem with the UK - the difference was shown on casualty by "Tanisha" being horrified and going to great lengths to protect her sister from what had done to her earlier whereas the mother just binned the leaflet.

I am very impressed that the BBC tackled it in a main stream programme.

so was i soup - and as i said i thought it was done sensitively

HungryClocksGoBackFourSeconds and Pixel I am so sorry, I posted to you ages ago and then forgot to check back. my apologies.

I still think checking children would help, even though I realise that or many reasons it will never be impplemented. I don't think young children would find it so hard to show their private parts to a trained doctor with a parent there in a private place. I would not see this as a violation and if it were required by law I would be happy for me or your child to see a doctor to confirm that I or my child had not been abused in this way.

I don't think the UK has a good track record on this. I believe that no one has been prosecuted about this in the UK.

www.dw.de/uk-tackles-female-genital-mutilation/a-16733487

"Yet new figures show that girls in Britain are more at risk of FGM than anywhere else in Europe. Approximately 66,000 women living in the UK have already been through the procedure, said Lynne Featherstone, the UK's International Development Minister, in an interview with DW.

An additional 20,000 girls a year are at risk of being subjected to female genital mutilation, she said, whether within the UK or on trips abroad to countries where the procedure is performed."

Also

"Even though FGM has been illegal in the UK since 1985, no cases have ever made it to trial - a fact that doesn't surprise human rights worker Efua Dorkenoo, who runs the female genital mutilation program at Equality Now and has been distinguished as an Officer of the British Empire (OBE) by Queen Elizabeth II in recognition of her services to Britain.

Dorkenoo was recently asked for help by a 17-year-old teenager whose mother had taken her to have the procedure performed.

Prosecution is now unlikely, however, since the girl is terrified that testifying would send her mother to prison."

The whole article is short and worth a read.

This is an interesting website and mentions the Casualty storyline

28toomany.org/

SORRY, me or my child!!! Posted before checking. I really meant Me or MY child to be checked.

Good site greyhound thanks.

Thanks Clocks I also meant to say I do feel education is the key and also taking the whole community with 'you', 'you' being human rights for girls etc! By that I mean (in that brief article it was reported that) the girl who was being asked to testify against her parents would rather commit suicide than testify because it meant prison for her parents. So really if we want a whole community to re-think one particular practice it is best to find a way round it that is acceptable to the majority of people but does not lose the safety of the girls. So for example a rights of passage thing that does not involved violence or cutting or violation but which celebrates the girl young life and which the whole community can feel is special. I wonder if any groups are working on producing that kind of thing? I bet they are somewhere.

I've said before on this topic that foot binding in China stopped very quickly because of a concerted effort and I just wish there was that concerted effort on behalf of this practice.

<a class="break-all" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foot_bindingen.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foot_binding" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foot_bindingen.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foot_binding

This article is very long, I have not read it all but have read some of it and it makes some fascinating points.

www.tostan.org/data/files/mackieasrnew.pdf

However, reading this article it is not much about rites of passage but also about superstition and mostly about marriage prospects.

In Africa, alternative rites of passage are v popular with anti FGM activist groups, but I haven't heard of anything like this in the UK.

Oh I wasn't saying they shouldn't be checked, far from it. There was a discussion on here a couple of years ago following a documentary about FGM and how the french are dealing witht the problem (think it might have been Newsnight), and I remember they were doing compulsory checks. People involved in cutting were arrested and prosecuted and I remember there was an old woman who ended up supporting the measures and admitting that what she'd did was wrong.
For once I think the French have got it right and I wish our govt would stop being so lily-livered.

what she'd did Honestly, I can speak English .

It was me who didn't agree with checks. I think it will only serve to postpone cutting until girls are old enough to refuse checks. Plus it doesn't address any of the motives for cutting.

I guess it just gives the girls more of a fighting chance to know what they want and what they bloody well don't want. Sorry swearing at the mad mad mad ness of it, not at you clocks. The more I read and think about it the more I cannot quite imagine how anyone could ever imagine it would in any way benefit anyone! What I have read also suggests it is the women who continue it. I know they do it for men, for marriage but I just think WTF is going on (and I don't usually swear!).

This was the film www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-18900803

VERY moving.

I love the words of the young woman to Cameron 'Grow a pair and do something about FGM.

There's an excellent documentary on 4OD which covers FGM in Kenya. there are some upsetting scenes but it shows some young girls so determined they will not be cut they are taking their parents to court.

If you decide to watch it, be aware that it shows a mutilation taking place, and although you don't actually see the 'surgery' you do see the girls reaction, I would not be able to watch it again.

Clocks I've watched a bit of it, I've watched the husband who didn't want to let his wife have an anesthetic because his friend would laugh at him. I can't really find the words.....

utter coward that I am watching it and turning the sound down so I can't hear these poor girls crying. The girl's poem is so very very sad. This is so pointless!

That film is so moving but also terrible. I was so amazed to see the church being lovely and supportive. I just felt so very sorry for the girl and her mum, her mum clearly had no idea why there was a problem!

I mean that's how the church should be (I am a Christian) but I was just pleased to see that she had a tiny bit of happiness amid the obvious pain. It is just so unthinkable. Thanks for sharing it clocks.