In
the Eyes of the Beholder:
Female
Genital Surgeries and the Illegitimacy of Universal Human Rights
In order to
protect certain inalienable, universal human rights, a just society
must place a limit on its tolerance of the practices of other,
less just societies. This statement seems innocuous enough, and
repeated aloud in most social circles in the U.S. or Europe it
is unlikely to draw harsh opposition. Some may even deride it
as being a statement of the obvious. Considering, however, that
the West is scarcely more than a century removed from the age
of colonialism and slavery, perhaps we should be a little shy
about affirming any ideology that alludes to concepts like inalienable,
universal, or just.
A substantial number of human rights activists are not afflicted
with such modesty. Disturbed by a growing sense of moral relativism
among their peers, activists cry out that "the line must
be drawn somewhere." Marching under the banner of insidious
ideals like equality and progress, activists espouse a myopic
worldview built upon the faulty assumption that universal human
rights could exist in a world with such an astounding diversity
of interests, values, and beliefs. Activists overlook the fact
that concepts like individual autonomy and egalitarianism are
not necessarily prized by the men and women of every society.
Even the very word tolerance is loaded with patriarchal and latent
imperialist attitudes. It portrays the West as a patient father,
condoning the minor moral infractions of the "undeveloped"
but always prepared to set limits on truly extreme behavior.
INTOLERANCE APPLIED
To properly explore whether Westerners should still be in the
business of drawing lines in other cultures' moral and legal systems,
let's consider one of the most widely agreed-upon limits to tolerance
in contemporary political discourse: female genital cutting in
Africa. Notice the purposeful avoidance of the more popular designation:
"female genital mutilation," a label that effectively
closes the debate before it begins. The term mutilation implies
disfigurement, degradation, and cruelty; its unquestioned acceptance
reflects the consensus denunciation of the practice, even by so-called
relativists. The widely held view is that FGC is a barbaric, cruel
practice—an instrument of male dominance designed to keep
women celibate before marriage and faithful during.
Fuambai Ahmadu, a post-doctoral researcher at the University of
Chicago, suggests that the issue is not that clear. Born a member
of the Sierra Leonean Kono tribe, Ahmadu offers an astonishingly
underutilized perspective: that of a native. As she points out,
ritual excision is a means of social empowerment and an integral
part of becoming a woman in Kono society. On average, Kono women
attending college in African cities support FGC, and many even
return to their native villages to undergo the procedure themselves.
Available footage of ceremonies (and Ahmadu's own personal account)
reveals a celebratory atmosphere where initiates willingly and
even eagerly participate. And contrary to the notion of sexual
control, women who were sexually active before undergoing the
procedure report little or no difference in sexual experience.
Further, FGC is typically a female institution with which the
men of the community have little or no involvement. Ironically,
efforts to eradicate the practice enlist the help of men; thus,
activists are essentially using men to destroy a female institution,
and doing so in the name of women's rights.
ETHNOCENTRISM STRIKES AGAIN
If it is not a matter of ignorance or compulsion, why is this
radical procedure considered a necessary step in the ascension
to womanhood? A fundamental cultural belief—so deeply ingrained
that Americans and Europeans don't even recognize it as cultural—offers
some insight. The Western view that the female body is complete,
beautiful, and sexually differentiated at birth is not shared
by many African cultures. Instead, they consider both male and
female bodies to be androgynous at birth. In their view, features
like the "masculine" clitoris and "feminine"
foreskin must be excised in order for an individual to become
a member of one distinct gender or the other.
This sociocultural explanation is overlooked by those who campaign
against FGC. Since they perceive no benefit to the practice, they
argue that it should be stopped for health reasons alone. It is
unclear, however, whether FGC adversely affects health. In August
of 2006 a World Health Organization study headed by Emily Banks
found a significant risk of health complications associated with
FGC. But analysis of the published data reveals that the conclusion
was greatly overstated. The data actually shows low relative risk—on
par with any procedure that breaks the skin. Inexplicably, the
headline and findings of the report simply did not match the data.
Even more telling is the massive public relations campaign that
accompanied the study's release. As one social scientist at the
University of Chicago put it, he had never seen a study "launched"
in such a manner, let alone one with such paltry findings. To
date, no study shows a legitimate link between FGC and significant
health complications despite enormous, politically motivated attempts
to establish one.
MIRROR, MIRROR
Another tool used to cultivate opposition to FGC is propaganda
involving graphic descriptions of the procedure. The tactic takes
advantage of the fact that almost any bodily modification can
be made to sound barbaric if described in the right way. Consider
the literal descriptions of just a few common procedures that
American culture condones under the umbrella of cosmetic surgery.
Women have their faces sliced open and stretched toward their
scalp just to smooth out their skin. Some have poison injected
into their face to slacken their muscles and create the illusion
of a youthful visage. Others have fat from their buttocks or from
farm animals injected into their lips in an attempt to increase
sexual appeal. Women whose breasts do not match the almost humanly
impossible ideal choose to either have artificial objects crammed
into them or large chunks of flesh and glandular material carved
out. The question, then, may not be whether human rights advocates
should campaign against FGC, but whether Sierra Leoneans are morally
bound to fly to California and campaign against comparably alarming
American practices. If not, how can Western activists possibly
justify their third world campaigns?
When an individual judges the practices of other cultures, it
is inevitably done against the backdrop of his or her own society.
Seen through the eyes of the Christian or secular West, certain
foreign behaviors are bound to be horrifying. Similarly, certain
American practices surely horrify individuals from other cultures.
Until the substantial variation among the world's population is
recognized—until people realize that we are not the world;
that people are not everywhere the same—misguided attempts
at establishing universality will continue to masquerade as more
socially acceptable agendas. There was a time, more recent than
we realize, when colonialism and institutionalized racism were
similarly condoned. Everyone in our culture has been drilled in
the importance of learning from past mistakes. The trick, it seems,
is to recognize when to put that education to use.
Les
Beldo has been a Thirdeye staff writer since 2005. He is currently
working toward his Ph.D. at the University of Chicago, where he
studies Cultural Psychology in the Department of Comparative Human
Development.
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