In the US the doctors did a study
http://www.texmed.org/ata/nrm/tme/texmeddec00feat.asp
168, 000 in the USA!!! Never mind muslim countries where it more like 100% of females get some form of circumcision.
Right…it’s popular in Egypt/the horn of Africa, and it’s popular in West Africa, as Tamerlane has said, and as your cites show, but that’s different than saying it’s popular among Muslims, because most Muslims don’t live in West Africa or Egypt/the Horn of Africa.
This shows the pressure a family undergoes even the the USA!!
See, specifically, this is the factual statement you haven’t supported yet. You haven’t shown that almost 100% of women living in Muslim countries get some form of circumcision.
Why are you saying this, when better informed people have told you that you are wrong?
FGM is predominantly an AFRICAN practice, not an Islamic one.
Try this BBC link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/2977426.stm - “Genital mutilation still common.”
In the right hand column there are links to archive stories. Note the countries involved: Sudan, Kenya, Cameroon, Ethiopia.
Okay,
the good news!!
In some places 97% is very close to 100%
Some places it is not done in the middle east…but some places it is done in the middle east…
AND the prevalence is going down in Egypt!! Yay!! Also, a less severe form is being chosen more often in Bahrain.
However it is still popular and widespread and common.
NOw, as I said, it was popular, and I never mentioned any countries at all, and I never said it was a religious practice.
if 6,000 girls getting circumcised every day is not ‘popular’, then of course I don’t what is.
Again, I never mentioned countries originally, and I never said it was a religious practice, and
my main point had to do with the ‘dryness’ comment someone else made.
Why don’t you make that person prove that dryness is popular???
It is populare among Islams in Africa. 97% of Islam women were circed in Egypt…now it is less, but still popular.
It is done in the middle east too, Yemen, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Oman.
I don’t know that it is popular.
The reference to “dryness” is from a historical sex manual.
It seems very odd that “dryness” would ever have been popular in any society, given the discomfort it can cause both men and women.
Friction, Love…friction.
Of course, i’ve been trying to get my wife to stop smoking…
Yeah, it was a manual…and I’m extrapolating there, figuring if it’s in a manual and called ‘preferable’ that it is a popular view, and of course I don’t know that!:smack:
I’m sure it would be uncomfortable for men too! I wonder if anyone did follow that manual? Yuck!
It just ticked me off to hear that…dryness being good…and circumcision being hygenic. Both false.
Dryness is not preferable, and the extreme form of circumcision in women causes a multitude of health problems (thier menstraul blood is trapped-as i read) Yuck!
You can see I’m touchy on woman subjects where I read that something uncomfortable or harmful is preferable for dumb reasons.
It also has a section that says that if you mix leeches with other materials then grind it all up and smear the paste on your penis, it’ll make your penis gets better. The section on making your penis bigger even includes the note “I tried all of these things and they REALLY work”.
My guess? The manual’s the medieval Muslim version of e-mail spam… 
I live in the middle east and I have friends from all the countries you are quoting… Have you ever been to the Middle East? Or Bahrain for that matter…lol… You know, there’s a saying…“Do not believe everything that you read.” Try thinking abt that one before you pass hasty generalizations.
FGM is not “popular” in any of those countries…
And FYI, Egypt is quite forward thinking…there are women there who are not veiled.
I don’t understand why you haven’t taken the time to read the posts, ppl have told you that it is commonly practiced in African countries…and some of those countries which are quoted follow CHRISTIANITY. FGM is cultural and not religious…
Neph - WELCOME!!!
Am so glad to see you here!
All right then, cite an actual passage that says a woman’s worth is less.
Ahem…
I can’t think of any faith that doesn’t discriminate against women.
Ever since man found out that he was also “partly” responsible for procreation…women have been subjugated.
What happened to the days when women were revered?
So, we have a new poster with the logical and argumentive capacities of our illustrious december.
So our Drabble, with liberal use of exclamation points, goes shrieking on about how “widespread” and “popular” the practice is, in the Middle East and among Muslims.
It should be fairly clear from Drabble’s own citations that this is far from the case and indeed a gross and inaccurate exaggeration.
As his or her own quoted citation (although the sourcing is obscure) indicates, the practice is not known in North Africa at all, except Egypt, nor the Sham or and is largely unknown in the Gulf / Arabian peninsula where it is a minority practice (probably given the context associated with African slaves imported from the Horn) in Yemen, apparently Oman and the small Gulf states.
Now somewhat less hysteric background:
WHO Fact Sheet No 241
June 2000
FEMALE GENITAL MUTILATION
http://www.who.int/inf-fs/en/fact241.html
“Prevalence and Distribution of FGM
Most of the girls and women who have undergone genital mutilation live in 28 African countries, although some live in Asia and the Middle East.” – the largely African distribution.
Female Genital Mutilation – The Facts
http://www.path.org/files/FGM-The-Facts.htm
FGM is Practiced Globally
• FGM is practiced in at least 26 of 43 African countries7; the prevalence varies from 98 percent in Somalia to 5 percent in Zaire. A review of country-specific Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) shows FGM prevalence rates of 97 percent in Egypt8, 94.5 percent in Eritrea9, 93.7 percent in Mali 10, 89.2 percent in Sudan 11, and 43.4 percent in the Central African Republic.12
• FGM is also found among some ethnic groups in Oman, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen, as well as in parts of India, Indonesia, and Malaysia.13
Again the African predominance and the qualifier for the Gulf, where insofar as there are North East African derived minorities it seems reasonable to guess the practice is among such groups.
I note that unlike in the case of African data, I am unable to locate firm studies of prevalence in Asia and most literature and programmatic focus on ending the practice seems to omit Asia entirely. It would appear from this context the prevalence is insignificant, unlike in Africa. For example in the resume from the Center for Reproductive Law & Policy global study mentions Asian minority groups only in passing.
Female Circumcision/Female Genital Mutilation (FC/FGM):
Global Laws and Policies Towards Elimination
November 2000, Item: F027
http://www.crlp.org/pub_fac_fgmicpd.htm
Prevalence of FC/FGM
It is estimated that the worldwide prevalence of FC/FGM is about 130 million women, with an additional 2 million girls and women undergoing the procedure every year. FC/FGM is prevalent in about 28 African countries and among a few minority groups in Asia. The prevalence in African countries varies widely from about 5% in the Democratic Republic of Congo (former Zaire) and Uganda to 98% in Somalia. In addition, there are many immigrant women in Europe, Canada, and the United States who have undergone FC/FGM. It is estimated that 15% of all circumcised women have undergone the most severe form of FC/FGM - infibulation. However, approximately 80% to 90% of all circumcisions in Djibouti, Somalia, and Sudan are of this type.
Very well, some very rough estimates over all.
What we can glean then as, insofar as the bulk of the world’s Muslims do not live in Africa, but rather in Asia and the Middle East-North Africa, where except for Egypt, such practices are either unknown or minority practice, it is, as I originally stated, a gross and inaccurate distortion to characterize this as “Muslim” or in any way popular in the Islamic world in a generalized sense.
Just to illustrate, look at the numbers: some 65 millions live in the Arab Maghreb, where the practice does not exist, some 45-50 millions in the Sham & Iraq area, again where the practice is unknown, some 60-70 millions in Iran, where the practice appears to be unknown, some 65-70 millions in Turkey, again where the practice is unknown.
So, here we have, in the Islamic core, some 245 millions of largely and indeed overwhelmingly Muslim populations in countries where the practice is essentially inexistent.
Now we can add the handful of millions in the Gulf: around 23.5 millions in Saudi Arabia, where the practice is essentially unknown or unreported; 2 millions in Kuwait, which is not noted to have the practice extent; around a half million in Bahrain where a minority is reported to practice it; Qatar, around 700 k, same notation as Kuwait; Emirates, around 2.5 millions where it is noted as a minority practice; Oman roughly 2.7 millions, again where it is noted as a minority practice; Yemen, with its 18 millions is the only populated area where again it is noted as a minority practice.
So in the Peninsula / Gulf we may add some 50 millions (rounding to a round number to account for estimations) where some minority of the populations practice female circumcisions. Let’s be fair and guess perhaps 1/5? 10 millions yes versus 40 millions not.
Now then we could go on to account for Central Asian, Caucasian, Balkan, Sub-Continental and other Muslims where the practice is either unknown or essentially inexistent, we can easily add another several hundred million to the Muslims who do not practice female circumcision, and maybe a handful of millions to the count of those who do. Pretty fucking popular then, isn’t it? As we get a rather lopsided count against.
So, we have only one Muslim nation with any demographic weight where it is a popular in any sense of the word, practice: Egypt with its 70 millions – although Sudan with its 37 millions is an ambiguous addition insofar as the practice is (as in Egypt) both Xian and Muslim, and in any rate apparently lower than Egypt.
Rather clearly our “Drabble” is dribbling both ungrammatical and unfounded hysterical nonsense. Final word of advice, don’t try arguing with me in ignorance on Middle Eastern affaires.
The manual by the way is medieval and a translation from the 19th century. While all fun and that, it is not the most advisable method to try to judge a literature based on what is available online, for free.
I’d also throw in Nigeria, with another ~65 million Muslims, as a demographically major country. It does seem that severe versions of FGM are common in some sections of the Muslim population there. Of course, as I’ve already noted, it seems just as endemic in some Christian and ( I believe, though I’d have to double-check ) animist populations ( which make up the other half of Nigeria’s 130 million people ). At the same time some of the Muslim populations in Nigeria don’t practice FGM at all, like the Fulani ( and Yobe state, with a population of Kanuri, Fulani, Manga, and Hausa, among others, in the overwhelimgly Muslim northeast of Nigeria, has the lowest incidence in the country ).
And just to show how local it can be, in overwhelmingly Muslim Niger, less than 5% of the population practices FGM ( of note - it borders Yobe province in Nigeria ).
There is also reason to believe that is may be a fairly widespread ( if not very well quantified ) practice in at least a few areas of Indonesia, another big country, but there the practice seems to overwhelmingly be of the least invasive sort, hardly comparable to the ‘Pharaonic Circumcision’ found in the Horn, Nile and parts of the Sahel.
Useful table:
http://www.state.gov/g/wi/rls/rep/9305.htm
- Tamerlane
Actually, re-checking the figures for Nigeria, I’ll withdraw it - At “only” 25% of the populace, even if that number where overwhelmingly Muslim ( and there is nothing to indicate it is ) it can probably only be called popular in the loosest of senses.
- Tamerlane