Cutting, Again

So I got into it again regarding circumscision, and got called out on it. Basically, I think the caller was upset that the word I used to refer to circumscision wass “mutilation”. Here was my response:

If one disagrees with a deliberate choice of words, then I’d suggest that it’s more productive to contest their meaning or applicability, rather than resort to knee-jerk censorship that just makes one look like an arse.

Here is my continuum of word symbol maps when it comes to messing about with genitals:

Shaving of genitals.
Temporary modification.

Tattooing of genitals.
Semi-permanent modification.

Piercing of genitals.
Permanent modification.

Excision of portion of genitals.
Permanent mutilation.

Removal of genitals or modification so extreme as to result in their transformation from a former category object into a different category object.
Castration.

I make a distinction between a mutilation for ritual purposes and a mutiliation for non-religious purposes. Many different cultures and subcultures throughout the world allow parents a lot of leeway when it comes to ritual genital mutilation of their children without consent.

The key issue, as many have put forth above, is consent. My own feeling is that in the absence of attaining an age of majority, a child so young (15) cannot be held to be able to give informed consent to genital mutiliation stemming from a vague desire to fit in. My hunch is that by acceeding to those wishes parents risk creating a feedback loop that could enhance body dysmorphia issues in someone so young.

Practically every child that age is at high risk for developig some form of dysmorphia. I further believe that the only way to move beyond such issues is not to reinforce them with procedures and behaviours that validate those feelings, but instead to help the child to learn to become more confident in their presentation of their body and their self to peers.

In the case of a family with strong religious motivations, I would be more inclined to investigate how much of the desire for mutilation stemmed from an understanding of a religious or spiritual compact or union with a deity that could result from the ritual. Despite my own atheism I would give a stronger weight to a desire on behalf of both parents and children to proceed with this ritual on religious grounds. This is because such religious perseverance is more likely to be lifelong, and proceeds from a more durable and complete analysis of motivations than dysmorphia accentuated by peer pressure. Evidence also seems to indicate that involvement in many religious cultures can produce healthy benefits for adherents. Some people might call this a double standard. However, we live in a society of deists and our rationality is circumscribed by cultural norms and expectations.

Of course, disentangling the two can be quite challenging. Based on such a reaction I suspect that were we discussing the merits of a clitoridotomy versus a clitoridectomy, the caller would have little desire or motivation to distinguish between the two but would term them both “mutilation”. For my part, I would class the former as “modification”, and the latter as “mutilation”. I think it a culturally and historically contingent quirk that people in the West construct different categories for procedures on male genitalia than they do for female genitalia.