(Originally posted by BEYONDHIJABSG on 4 FEBRUARY, 2016. Republished here with permission.)

By: Zarifah Anuar

Country: Singapore

Community: Malay

When I was two weeks old, my mother handed me over to her bidan (traditional midwife), my grand-aunt, to be circumcised. She did not witness the procedure and did not know exactly what was done to me. To her, the sunat was an act that all Muslims, regardless of gender, had to go through. It wasn’t up for discussion or debate. It was a non-issue to her, and it should be a non-issue to me too.

I didn’t know I had been circumcised until more than twenty-three years later when a colleague asked me if I had gone through the procedure. I answered, very confidently, that I would know if I had. I knew my body. Years of struggling with my own body shape, skin colour, and facial features had taken a toll on me, but at the end of the day, I knew my body.

“You should ask your mother,” she told me.

I did, and there is a part of me that regrets asking because I now know just how much my body is not mine. From birth, or perhaps even before that, it was never mine. It belongs to God, the Creator.

Or at least, that is what religious leaders and my parents tell me. I, however, call bullshit.

My body does not belong to God. My body belongs to their perception of God. My body, and their mutilation and policing of it, is part and parcel of their desire to control the female body.

They hide this under many guises, all in the name of God: sunat will make you cleaner, purer, less susceptible to sin, more able to be His servant. When you cover your skin from the eyes of men, you will appear more beautiful in the eyes of God. Lower your gaze and your voice, that way you will be His humble follower.

When you read deeper into the meaning of these messages, it translates into: you are a woman, this is how you will look, this is how you will behave. You will listen and follow because centuries of male leadership has made our community know nothing else but patriarchy and the control of women to feed the male need to dominate and have power.

God doesn’t tell women to be less. Islam doesn’t tell women to be less. Prophet Muhammad himself was surrounded by many strong, assertive women. It is patriarchy and the men who uphold it to this day that tells women to be less, so that they will be familiar with being nothing more than second to men; so that they will not question the norms that have been forced upon them.

I don’t know what was taken from me when I was two weeks old, but I do know that it was without my consent. What would a two-week old infant know, much less understand, about the world around her? An infant that age is barely even able to lift her own head.

“Did I cry?” I asked my mother when she told me that I had undergone the sunat at two weeks old. “Was I asleep? Did I wake up?”

My mother didn’t answer and instead told me that the conversation was over.

I refuse to accept that this conversation is over. Our community insists on owning the bodies of girls and women instead of allowing us to make our own decisions. Sunat marks the start of others deciding and policing what happens to our bodies. From then on some of us are forced into the hijab long before puberty, and we are judged and criticised based on what we choose to wear. Our autonomy over our bodies is restricted, at times even taken away from us.

I want to keep talking about what was taken away from me more than twenty-three years ago. Physically, I will never know what exactly it was, but symbolically it is my ownership over my body, and I will not stop fighting for it.

(Originally posted by BEYONDHIJABSG on 3 FEBRUARY, 2016. Republished here with permission.)

Country: Singapore

Community: Malay

By Zubaida Ali

When my daughters were born, I made the decision not to have them circumcised. Female circumcision is one of the most puzzling birth rituals in Muslim society. It has no health or aesthetic value whatsoever.

Circumcision was usually performed by a traditional midwife but now it is performed by a medical doctor at the clinic for a fee. Typically, parents will have it done on their baby one month after birth and like all surgical procedures, it endangers the infant to the risk of infection, pain, and trauma.

Before I made the decision to cut or not to cut, I asked my friends and searched the internet for legitimacy.  Why, where and how was this done, I couldn’t find any valid answers. Then I turned to the one place where Muslims go to for answers, the Holy Qur’an. To my surprise, there are no verses supporting it in the Qur’an. There’s only a vague hadith about male circumcision.

Yet female circumcision is accepted and performed by all Muslim families I know like a sacred duty. It is even surprising for me to discover that it varies with different sects of Muslims all over the world, and with different degrees of severity. From a pinprick to show blood to removal of the clitoral hood (which is what is done in Singapore) to having major parts of the labia removed like in some parts of Africa and Middle-East.

I will require more validity from theological and medical sources before I hand over my child for such a procedure.

As a Muslim and a mother, my reason for not allowing my child to undergo the procedure is why would Allah create an imperfect human body? Why would Allah create a body that requires the tampering and removal of anything so natural?

My two girls now live freely and uncut, and I have never regretted my decision to not violate their bodies for a cultural practice that has no place or validity in our rational society. Just say no to female circumcision.

By: Saleha Paatwala

Age: 23

Country: India

After watching ‘Reflecting Her’ (a film on FGC) that gave me strength to fight, it has now been six months since I set out on this mission to end the hazardous practice of Khatna. In these months, I have had discussions with numerous individuals including my relatives, some of whom have been against the practice and some of whom have been in support of it. From my discussions, I have learned why some individuals support this practice and continue following it.

At first, I was extremely apprehensive to begin discussing this topic in my family group, but I knew that I had to. After my conversation with them, I realized my own relatives were living with misguided knowledge on the topic.

Below are a few reasons given by individuals who support the practice. I have also included my answers to their reasons:

• Cousin – It is Rasullah’s sunnah (the Prophet’s preaching for the benefit of people, not a compulsion) which has been taken after.
  My response – If Khatna is Sunnah, why has it been made obligatory on all ladies, then?

• Friend – It is Allah who has made us and as a dedication to him, we should give him something.
  My response – If he has made us, why does he need us to give something back to him? Also, if he truly needs some kind of devotion from us, why not cut a hand or a leg and give him, may b

• Grandmother – Women get to be devout and clean.
  My response – Why would Allah send us to earth impious and impure?  So are those who haven’t experienced this practice corrupt and debase?

• Cousin – If not done on time, she may become promiscuous and destroy her life.
  My response – How does a piece of her body lead her to promiscuity? Doesn’t that depend on her upbringing and not her clitoris?

• Cousin – You have no right over your body.
  My response – Yes, according to ‘you’, women have no privilege to explore her sexuality. People can touch her without her consent & cut any part of her because she has no right on her own body.

• Cousin– If she has undergone this practice, she will be faithful to her husband.
  My response – Are women born just to keep her better half fulfilled, to make due in this patriarchal society?

One comment which was made by a relative still echoes in my ears. “I will soon give birth to a girl, make her undergo khatna before you, and you won’t be able to stop me from doing it”. In the twenty-first century, where ideas are developing rapidly, holding on to such patriarchal thinking is pointless.

I was stunned to hear one of my friend’s thoughts on this issue. He said, “It’s good to make Allah happy by giving him something”. Many people consider it a religious practice. They think it is written in the holy book, the ‘Quran’. But when I ask them to show me where it is written, they provide me no answer.  Many of those who I asked, told me not to go further into this issue as it will lead to my alienation. According to them, I am squandering my time trying to end this practice.

Yet I know that it is imperative to understand the outcomes of this practice when it is considered to be a part of your religion and when it is done on young girls who have no clue why it is being performed on them. It maddens me to imagine that we were sliced just to control our sexuality. Why not permit ladies to live as they are and explore their sexuality without putting confinements on them.

A little seven-year-old girl, who doesn’t yet understand what sexuality is, is taken through this insidious practice which later gives her the feeling of betrayal by her own family members. This cruelty is so important that if she hasn’t got cut in her younger age, she gets asked by her in-laws at the time of marriage to undergo it so that she becomes pious, before the marriage. Many women still can’t speak out against this practice even if they want to do so because patriarchal traditions still consider women as servants of her in-laws and her husband.

From the Twitter debate in July, organized by Sahiyo, numerous arguments came forward that supported Khatna. One such lady said, “I had experienced it and I don’t considerably recall the agony. It was managed without harming me and I have no unforgiving memory of it”. She continued, “I also gave consent to my parents to have my ears pierced & it didn’t harm too”.  I have heard many arguments comparing khatna to ear or nose piercing. While ear piercing doesn’t remove any skin, FGC in the Bohra community includes partial or complete removal of the clitoral hood.

If I didn’t have the support of my folks, it would have been difficult to speak out against this practice. My mom, who couldn’t stop her mother from taking her and us to have this practice performed, now strictly condemns this act and wants me to fight FGC until it ends.

Khatna was considered a secretive act and so I never spoke about it to anyone, not even with my sisters. After gathering more courage, I spoke about it to my father and he said “yes, I knew about this act. Your grandmother was so stubborn that she didn’t listen to me at all.”

When my father tried to stop her, my grandmother told him, “Don’t you want your girl to be pious? Do you want her to become promiscuous?”

He lost that argument which is what prompted my sisters to get circumcised as well. He also now wants me to speak out against the practice so that no other girl goes through such a practice which is neither religiously based nor has any health benefits.

By Mariya Taher

When I was in graduate school in 2008 for my Master of School Work degree, I began seriously and thoroughly researching the topic of Female Genital Cutting (FGC). Some of you reading this blog might already be aware of my personal connection to the issue due to the research and writings I have been doing on this issue for close to nine years now. (See more at Underground: American Who Underwent Female Genital Mutilation Comes Forward to Help Others). Upon researching FGC, I learned that there were many different terms given to the practice. Terms such as Female Circumcision, Female Genital Mutilation, Female Genital Cutting, Female Genital Surgeries, Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting, Khatna, and other native terms used by other communities who continued FGC.

The terminology used for this practice has been the subject of debate amongst academics, activists, as well as the communities continuing the practice as well. However, the debate does not revolve around what is the correct name but relates to the viewpoint an individual has towards understanding the practice and their feelings towards the perpetuation of the practice. In other words, for those continuing the practice, colloquial terms like khatna or female circumcision are preferred. Many activists working to end the practice of FGC choose to use the term Female Genital Mutilation, believing that this term correctly identifies the harm being done to a girl child’s genitalia.

None of these terms are incorrect. They all refer to the same practice. And when Sahiyo works with community members, we use the terminology that they use to refer to the practice. This means if someone uses the term ‘khatna’, we use khatna. If someone uses the term female genital mutilation, we use female genital mutilation.

There are reasons, however, that we do choose to use female genital cutting or FGC when referring to the practice.

Dawoodi Bohras use the word “khatna” or circumcision to refer to the removal of the prepuce from the genitalia of both boys and girls. There is a sentiment amongst some in the community, that the form of “female circumcision” practiced in the Dawoodi Bohra community is in no way related to “FGM” as recognized by World Health Organization or as practiced in many African countries.

Sahiyo believes, however, that “female circumcision” cannot be directly compared with male circumcision. We choose, therefore, in large part to use the term FGC or khatna because we are attempting to work with the community and we recognize that if in our everyday language we use FGM, it makes our work much more difficult — we know from research and best practices, that to engage in dialogue and to create social change, we can not come from a hostile position and some community members view the term mutilation with suspicion. This suspicion, in turn, makes it difficult for us to engage with people willing to discuss the topic.

Sahiyo also recognizes that the term ‘mutilation’ comes with the connotation of ‘intending to harm’ and as activists engaging in dialogue with communities to abandon the practice, by not using ‘mutliation’ we recognize that communities are not intending to harm their daughters. Rather they may continue FGC because they truly believe it is in the girl’s best interest and/or they may feel pressured into having FGC done on their daughter by others in the community. The term ‘mutilation’ can be riddled with a judgemental tone which can work against FGC activists working to end the practice as Gannon Gillespie mentions on Tostan’s website:

We should remember that all of us, no matter where we are from, tend to greet judgmental outsiders in similar ways. When our beliefs and actions are challenged or condemned by a stranger, we are likely to become defensive; rather than taking their concerns to heart, we view their accusation as an unwarranted and uninformed attack on our character. We certainly won’t feel inclined to change in order to satisfy this judgmental critic; we may even respond by holding on more tightly to the belief or action being questioned. Our experience has shown us that it is dialog and discussion that can lead to change, and dialog requires a relationship of trust and respect. But calling the practice “mutilation” prevents this relationship from developing and invites defensiveness rather than productive discourse.

Besides these reasonings, a recent report by Islamic Relief Canada, Female Genital Cutting in Indonesia: A Field Study, showcases that specific terminology can also lead to retraumatization of survivors as the quote below from the study demonstrates:

While Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) appears to be the term used most frequently by international agencies, experiences from community-based interventions indicate that the term ‘mutilation’ can, in some instances, actually add to the traumatisation of an individual. Girls and women who have undergone FGC can feel victimised, stigmatised and offended by the word ‘mutilation’ and its derogatory connotations. In general, it is important that any intervention strategies do not actually add to the trauma already felt by females who have had to undergo the practice, and referring to people as ‘mutilated’ – while correctly identifying the severity of the practice – has the potential of traumatising sufferers even more.

Sahiyo recognizes that to work at the community level and to advocate for the abandonment of FGC, we must first acknowledge that FGC is viewed as a social norm in practicing communities. Dialogue and discussion can only occur if communities themselves are willing to engage with us, and through our own work, we have learned to understand the importance of looking at our language choices.

To read more on the use of FGC terminology, please visit Tostan FAQ: FGC vs. FGM.

(Originally published on Café Dissensus website on May 5, 2016. Republished here with permission from author).  

(Trigger Warning: Below is the account of one woman’s experience of her sister undergoing FGC. We thank her for being brave and sharing her story with us).

Country: India

By Insia Dariwala

I still recall that wet rainy day in our four-by-four cramped shoebox. To the world it was a pit – dark and dingy; but to us this was home – a royal home that ceremoniously ended where it began.

In our spare time, my sister and I loved sitting at the windowsill that overlooked years of dirt and misery. Imagining the intertwined pipes that crawled off our chawl to be a game of snakes and ladders, I wondered if we would ever escape the venom of this dreaded place. The narrow and smelly cramped lanes had pain written all over them. Every stain on the walls lining the chawl was a reminder of a dream splattered perhaps by a .32 pistol. Luckily my father’s stains were far more conventional: two betel paan leaves with lots of limestone and kimaam (an intoxicating ingredient).

Each night as we prepared for our descent into the world of dreams, we would be awakened by a loud bang at our door. In his usual drunken state, our neighbor had once again forgotten his house. His constant arrival at our doorstep was a grim reminder of how easy it was to get lost here. Most of the time we lulled ourselves to sleep under a wrinkled, patchy blanket and my sister and I felt more at ease there than anywhere else in the world. It was here that we plotted our future, and re-lived our Cinderella moments of getting rescued by handsome knights in shining armor.

Fatema would joke, “But what if he doesn’t come?”

To which I would widen my big eyes, make a sword from my long braid in one hand and say, “Fear not, my dear sister, I will protect you no matter what.”

Fatema would then giggle loudly, only to be shushed by our mother-hen who was always on the lookout for boys peeping through our broken glass windows.

Our mother-hen was a dutiful wife with an unflinching tolerance for dad’s consistent tyranny. Thanks to my father, our never-ending poverty was sponsored by his alcoholism. His frequent showers of physical and verbal abuse were far more generous than the money he put in her hands.

Almost all of our mornings dawned with mom’s screams and dad’s abuses. That day too was no different, or maybe it was, because this time the shrieks were not just mom’s. Dad hit mom hard across the face. Hurriedly, we ducked behind the tattered curtains, getting our uniforms on and struggling to dodge the gaping holes in the curtains, lest someone should see through our innocence. Looking through those holes, I wondered if my future too would be this hollow.

When the storm settled, we peered into hell. Maa’s eyes were red. Her lip had a bluish tinge and it was hard to tell if it was from the slap she must have got or from biting down her urge to retaliate. Pappa nonchalantly spat his venom out of the window and looked at us with disgust. 

We then sat down to eat our breakfast, hoping we would not lose our only meal of the day to the joint family system. The daily bread of salt from my tears was getting quite tasteless now.

Just then Rukaiya aunty walked in, surprisingly, far more pleasant than usual. Mom watched her offer some candy to Fatema. Hopeful and hungry, I put out my hand for one. Instead, she just walked away, leaving me salivating at the candy in Fatema’s mouth. Poor Fatema felt horrible seeing me in tears, but not as horrible as she was going to feel later on. 

Mom asked us to run off to school but no sooner had we reached the door aunty called out to Fatema. “Look, Fatema.”

Fatema’s angelic face lit up with excitement as she saw her dream flutter in aunty’s hand. Two tickets to the matinee show of the hit film, Sholay. Fatema always had a weakness for Hindi films and Hindi songs. Even at the tender age of seven, she could sing every song with more proficiency than our older cousins. Had there been an Indian Idol then, she would have surely won. On one occasion, Fatema had come storming into the house, waving a ten-rupee note that the uncles had given her. ‘Golden voice’, they used to call her. We listed hundreds of ways to spend those ten rupees. It’s incredible the things you can do with ten rupees, when that’s all you have. Chandu’s sandwich was first on the list; watching the much awaited Sholay, second. Children below eleven were free, so we could treat our mother to a film as well as the sandwich. After all, she did eat more salt than us. But while our taste buds danced to the thought of Chandu’s chutney, and Mom dreamt of styling her hair like Hema Malini, Dad had already reached into our hopes and vanished with the money. Some other golden voice must have got lucky that night. So on that day when Fatema’s dream of watching Sholay was finally coming true, I too joined in the excitement and begged Aunty to take me along. My pleas, though, fell on deaf ears. They don’t love me as much, I thought.

The tantrums and pleas continued. Fatema looked towards Maa, who kept giving us the look, which meant business. But Dad’s voice overpowered her.

“Let her go. Study is useless anyway.”

Mom reluctantly gave in. Fatema shrieked with joy. I fumed with jealousy.

That’s so unfair, I thought. I reached for my school bag and Fatema looked at me guiltily. Our poverty had always taught us to share everything. Unfortunately, what she came back with that day was something I could never share.

Hours passed. I came back from school, anxiously waiting for my sister. Mom, too, was getting restless. Suddenly the door opened. For some strange reason, Rukaiya aunty was carrying my sister in her arms. Fatema’s excitement was replaced with a deathly paleness. Rukaiya aunty put her down and handed over Fatema’s bloodied underwear to my confused and shocked mother. She ran to Fatema screaming, “What happened baby?” Fatema was in a state of shock. Mom reached to hug her. She winced in pain, trembling like a leaf. Her body was burning up. Mom lifted Fatema’s dress and found blood-stains on her leg. She moved her aside and lunged at my aunt, roaring, “What did you do to my baby? You horrible woman, what did you do?”

My aunt was unremorseful. “Keep your voice down and stop this drama. Every girl in our Bohri community has to go through this. I too went through it, when I was seven. It’s God’s will and a woman’s fate. She is clean now. Just wash her up and she will be fine.”

Mom broke down, helplessly looking at Fatema. “My poor baby, I am so sorry. I don’t even know what these butchers have done to you.”

Wash her up even though she is clean? Every girl’s fate? What was Aunty talking about? The suspense was driving me crazy and my tiny head could not take in the events around me. All I could see was that my beloved sister was crying in pain. Her pretty pink dress had stains of blood. She must have fallen, I thought. I ran in and brought out our blanket, tucking both of us under it. Whatever it was, this magical blanket would surely make it go away.

Years passed. I never met every girl’s fate or became clean but I always wondered what it was. Like every other family, we too wore the garb of denial and went on with our lives. From that day onwards, though, things just changed, even Fatema. I was no more a part of her gang. No more blanket games. Since that day, she stopped sleeping under it.  So I tucked it away, along with all my memories of that day.

As we matured, small girlie functions in the family took place without me. Fatema would come home from these functions, with henna on one hand and gifts in the other. My hands meanwhile would be full of thousands of reasons for not having those gifts. They don’t love me as much. Maybe I am not pretty enough. Maybe only one child can participate. She is older than me. Maybe next time I will go. Maybe I have to be a good girl and then I would get to go. Maybe she is the preferred one. My list of reasons, along with my self-esteem, was running out.

Life has moved on quickly since then. We took different roads and have done well for ourselves, leaving childhood scars behind. At least, that’s what I thought, until one day, a sleepover turned into my worst nightmare. Fatema was visiting and stayed with me. We spent hours talking about our lives and in my excitement I pulled out our good ol' blanket. Fatema went pale when she saw it. Tears trickled down her face. I was confused. Surely the blanket could not have been that bad.

“I am sorry. I’ll put it back,” I said.

“Wait,” she said. “Bring it here please.” 

Hesitating, I gave it to her. She put it over her body, tears gushing. She looked at me and said, “Remember how you wanted me to tell you the Sholay story? Well, I would like to tell you today.” I was about to tell her that I had already seen it, but she started anyway.

April 14^th 1977. On my way to what I thought was a theatre, I saw the film unfold in my head. But I was led to a small dark room in one of the dingy by-lanes of Mumbai, where four women were waiting for us. I was asked to lie down on a dirty bed. I kept asking why. No one answered. I resisted, but my panty was pulled off.  My legs were spread apart. Something cold was then applied between my legs. One of the ladies pulled out a sharp instrument and cut me down there. I screamed in agony, but was no match for those women. They held me down tight. It felt like I was going to pass out with the pain. The process was quick for them, but an eternity for me. The women then asked me to keep my legs apart as they left the room. I felt something warm engulfing me from the waist down. It was blood; lots of it. That burning and painful sensation between my groin is something I will never forget. I felt betrayed and humiliated.  Locked in that dark room I wondered how aunty could be so cruel. After a couple of hours when aunty returned to check on me she explained how every good Bohra girl has to go through this to become clean. For years I have lived in regret for choosing Sholay over mom’s warnings. Life changed completely after that day. Trust was hard to come by.  Not even with my husband. It took him a long time to assure me that when he touched me there, it was not to cut me. Dreams were replaced by nightmares. I lived in fear every day after that day. Every dark place took me to that dark room. The day this happened, I just felt pain, unbearable pain. But today I just feel loss. Every time I bathe, I try to locate that missing piece. I wish it would grow back. I wish I could become a complete woman once again. 

Her words trailed off as I touched my own body in the dark. Her pain had traveled to my groin. My tears rolled down my lips and into my mouth. This time, the salt tasted different. Not poor like it used to be, but blood, oozing out of a wound dried up a long time ago. Struggling to breathe, I tried hard to reach out for words that would make sense. But like Aunty, they too had betrayed me. Fatema was silent, and her body was as calm as on that dreadful day. I was trembling. The blanket had failed me this time. For years it had always been our shelter, our safety zone. No one could trespass here. It was our world and I was the protector. But this time, as I watched Fatema curled up next to me like that little girl of years ago, I realized I had not kept my promise. I had failed to protect her. Full of guilt, I lay down beside her, trying to make sense of the endless pain that tradition had put Fatema through, of the blade that had managed to miss my body, but had succeeded in slicing away my soul.

Bio:
Insia Dariwala is an Advertising and Mass Communications graduate from New York and an award-winning filmmaker and child activist. She campaigns against child sexual abuse and female genital mutilation.