The problem with Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) – it is still happening right here in the United States
Every single day, an estimated eight thousand girls endure the horrific practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), a practice the World Health Organization (WHO) deems a “serious human rights violation” and is also considered a blatant infringement of the Convention of the Rights of the Child (CRC). The procedure, sometimes called female circumcision, involves fully or partially slicing out a girl’s genitals for non-medical reasons.
However, the procedure also has a searing host of physical and mental consequences – from sexual dysfunction, incontinence and uncontrolled bleeding to an increased risk of HIV transmission and deadly infection. The ramifications last the rest of one’s life and, all too often, can lead to severe disability or even death.
FGM is considered not a religious practice but rather an economic or cultural one designed to ensure girls retain their “purity” before marriage despite its grave ramifications. The concept of “purity” is often directly linked to family financial gain regarding bride price, with the notions of shame and honor as dramatic determination factors.
The UN Population Fund (UNFPA) notes that about 14.8 million girls and women globally are at risk. While FGM predominantly occurs in Africa, the Middle East and Asia, it also happens here – underground, of course – in the United States. Given the clandestine nature of the problem, exact figures are impossible to determine, yet it is a critical issue that must be illuminated. And U.S. officials have been doing just that in recent years, highlighting that the number of girls at risk of being forced into FGM has doubled between 2007 and 2017. Data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows that approximately 513,000 women and girls have experienced FGM or are at risk of being subjected to FGM and its consequences on U.S. soil.
“Not a day goes by where I am not contacted by a girl who has been cut in this country or forced to visit another country to have it done,” Jaha Dukureh, an infant FGM survivor, activist and founder of the support and educational foundation Safe Hands for Girls, once told me. “Sometimes, it is doctors performing it under the guise of plastic or vaginoplasty procedures or in quiet and underground settings.”
According to the Centers for Disease Control, more than half a million girls in the United States have endured, or remain at risk, of suffering FGM – a threefold uptick from their 1990 projection. FGM is considered a cultural practice that ensures “a girl’s purity and eligibility for marriage” and typically involves the partial or complete extraction of the external female genitalia.
However, taking legal action on the matter has been surprisingly tough over the years, with bills to shutter legal loopholes often cast as bigoted and ultimately rejected.
In particular, Somali-American nonprofit groups have raised concerns that further criminalizing FGM would push the issue deeper underground, effectively worsening the problem. Instead, They have argued that funding outreach and immigrant education would be more effective.
But still, perpetrators of the violation often go unpunished even though the practice is – on a federal level – outlawed. It is also illegal for families or caregivers (and this has been the case since 1996) to transport their daughter or another minor abroad to undergo FGM in an act labeled “vacation cutting.”
Several years ago, an Indian-American physician based in Detroit, Dr. Jumana Nagarwala, became the first individual indicted under the U.S. law criminalizing FGM. Authorities charged her with conspiracy, genital mutilation, transporting minors with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity, lying to a federal agent and obstructing an official proceeding. Nonetheless, a judge in 2022 ultimately dismissed the landmark case, claiming that prosecutors maliciously pursued new charges after a federal female genital mutilation law was declared unconstitutional.
Does anyone ever think to ask underage and violated girls about their constitutional rights?
Critics were further inflamed in late 2018 after a Michigan judge ruled that the 1996 legislation banning FGM was “unconstitutional” – thus dropping critical charges against practitioners accused of performing FGM on nine young girls.
However, some steps are taken in the right direction in protecting children, and there are still leaders who are not surrendering to the fight.
The bipartisan legislation, known as the Strengthening the Opposition to Female Genital Mutilation Act of 2020, or STOP FGM Act of 2020, was introduced in Congress by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, just before the coronavirus pandemic paralyzed much of the country in March. The law ultimately empowers federal law enforcement to prosecute perpetrators of female genital mutilation (FGM), increases the punishment from five to 10 years imprisonment, and requires government agencies to estimate the number of women and girls impacted by or at risk of FGM in the U.S. and report their actions taken to end the practice.
And despite federal prohibitions, several states have yet to legislate against FGM. As it stands, anti-FGM laws exist in 41 states, meaning that the District of Columbia and nine states – Alabama, Mississippi, Nebraska, New Mexico, Maine, Connecticut, Alaska, and Hawaii – have yet to take any meaningful action.
Activists in the U.S. have also long underscored the importance of educating refugees and immigrants on arrival – especially from countries in the Middle East and Africa where it is widely practiced – of its strict illegality in the U.S., something the State Department itself has not historically done.
We need to do much more to protect our girls.
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