A new report on female genital mutilation in Indonesia

February 7, 2016 • 11:00 am

Indonesia is, of course, the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country (there are 207 million people, 95% of them Muslim). As such, it’s also the country having the most cases of female genital mutilation (FGM). A new Unicef report on that practice, as reported in the New York Times, gives some surprising news, some bad news, and some good news.

The surprising news, at least for many of us, is that even in Indonesia, often touted as a “moderate” Muslim country (I’m looking at you Reza Aslan), FGM is common; in fact, it accounts for almost a third of the world’s cases:

There has long been anecdotal evidence of the practice there, but the United Nations Children’s Fund estimated Thursday that 60 million women and girls there have been cut based on national survey data collected by the Indonesian government. The addition of Indonesia is largely responsible for raising the global tally of women and girls who have undergone the practice to 200 million from 130 million, and the number of countries where it is concentrated to 30 from 29.

We knew the practice existed but we didn’t have a sense of the scope,” said Claudia Cappa, a statistics specialist for Unicef, which released the report. She said the new data from Indonesia showed that cutting was not just “an African problem.”

Well, we already knew that, as FGM is widespread in the Middle East as well, concentrated in Muslim societies. It’s not just “an African problem” divorced from religion, nor just a “cultural problem”, as maintained by charlatans like Aslan. As Heather Hastie has shown on her website, FGM, while not totally limited to Muslims, is largely a Muslim issue, since many schools of Islam either endorse it, recommend it, or deem it obligatory. And its prevalence in Indonesia is, as the Times notes, explained by Islam:

The data from Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation, provides a snapshot of the prevalence of genital cutting in a country where secular and religious attitudes toward the practice are increasingly in conflict. Indonesian authorities tried to ban cutting 10 years ago, but religious authorities who consider it important for girls to undergo the ritual before marriage objected. In response, the government softened its stance, issuing regulations that directed cutting should be done only by medical professionals in a noninvasive way that does not injure girls and women.

. . .The practice is “regarded as part of our culture, or a confirmation that they will be officially ‘Islamized,’ ” Jurnalis Uddin, the chairman of the Center for Population and Gender Studies at Yarsi University in Jakarta, said in an email, adding that the practice “in Indonesia is mostly symbolic (no cutting at all).”

. . . Rena Herdiyani, vice chairwoman of Kalyanamitra, an Indonesian nongovernmental organization that lobbies the national government to ban all forms of cutting, wants the government to impose sanctions on people who perform circumcisions.

“They think it’s a family or cultural tradition, and an Islamic obligation, yet they can’t name any verses in the Quran about female circumcision,” she said.

The only good news is this: instead of the barbaric mutilations involving excision of the labia or entire clitoris, the practice in Indonesia often involves, as noted above, non-invasive surgery, sometimes removing only a sliver of the clitoris. But it’s still unnecessary, and the Indonesian government is still bowing to Muslim dicta that mandate this surgery:

Conflicting views have influenced public policy toward cutting. In 2006, the Ministry of Health issued a document banning female circumcision by medical professionals. In response, in 2008, Indonesia’s top Muslim clerical body issued a nonbinding fatwa or edict saying female circumcision should be performed if requested, as long as the method was not physically or psychologically dangerous.

In 2010, the Ministry of Health, at the urging of the clerical body, issued a regulation saying female circumcision should be performed only by licensed doctors, midwives or nurses using safety and cleanliness procedures detailed by the ministry. But anti-cutting activists objected to the regulation, and in 2014 it was repealed. Unicef officials assert in their report that the repeal does not go far enough because it does not explicitly prohibit cutting or set penalties for those who perform the procedure.

This is one issue that should unite feminists of all stripes with anti-theists. Here we have a government refusing to ban a totally unnecessary and dangerous surgery on women, and that refusal comes solely from pressure by Islamic “authorities.” Sixty million women in Indonesia have undergone FGM—almost a third of all the nation’s women—and it’s time to stop it. But that won’t occur until the government either grows a backbone, Islam disappears from the world, or the various schools of Islam explicitly forbid the practice.

63 thoughts on “A new report on female genital mutilation in Indonesia”

  2. Yesterday I was talking to a very socially liberal friend.

    It amazed me how much slack he cut to the way Muslim women are treated within their own religion. When you hear that, the bottling-up by left-wing news media of the Cologne sexual assaults makes sense.

    The left is being placed in the impossible situation of having to adjudicate between cultural “practices” and feminism.

  3. These numbers seem lower than those I’ve read before on Wikipedia.
    “97.5% of the surveyed females from Muslim families (Muslim females are at least 85% of females in Indonesia) are mutilated by age 18.”
    Maybe the difference between 60 million and and 97.5% of the all Muslim females consists of those who are too young to have been cut yet.

    1. In Indonesia it’s more often done at on babies, so probably not.

      I don’t know the reason, but I suspect there are two.
      1. Under-reporting from the period when it was illegal.
      2. Many people didn’t get it done when it was illegal.

      There’s anecdotal evidence that since it’s been made legal again there, women are flocking to have it done. Some are having a procedure that takes none of the clitoris, which these report enhances sexual pleasure. I’ve no idea whether this is true.

      In the comments on my website, two Indonesian Muslim women both said they’d never heard of FGM.

      1. “which these report enhances sexual pleasure. I’ve no idea whether this is true.”

        Sounds like BS to me. I used to hear the same argument about removing the foreskin in male circumcision, when what exposing the head actually does is desensitize it.

        1. Perhaps they’re just more relaxed now that they believe their bodies meet the requirements for divine approval?

          1. “Perhaps they’re just more relaxed now that they believe their bodies meet the requirements for divine approval?”

            LOL. Any woman who is going to get FGM by “choice”, meaning they were old enough to have already experience intercourse prior to getting it is likely going to be an advocate for the procedure, and unlikely to say it made sex less pleasurable. I also suspect if it made sex more pleasurable no one would need to be forced to have it done, and wouldn’t it making sex better defeat the purpose?

          2. This is religion – don’t expect to be able to use logic to understand the situation! 🙂

        2. Perhaps, but I’m not sure that removal of the clitoral hood (which is analogous and homologous to circumcision in males) would result in the same degree of drying out, rubbing against clothing, and subsequent thickening of the skin and desensitization. The clitoris doesn’t protrude nearly as far from the body as the glans, and moreover remains enfolded within the labia. So it might remain sufficiently protected. And given that insufficient clitoral stimulation is often reported as a problem in plain old intercourse, it seems plausible that removing the hood could increase pleasure for women. But so would educating their partners, and it’s also plausible, as you suggest, that the women who advocate FGM could be touting benefits that don’t really exist.

          1. In the USA, where non-religiously motivated male circumcision is common, the claims about its health benefits are very exaggerated. Reading these claims (some in peer-reviewed articles), one could think that half of Christian-heritage European males must die of urinary tract infections before reaching puberty, and the other half must succumb to penile cancer. Which makes me suppose that whenever normal, healthy body structures are routinely modified for cultural reasons, we can expect circulating claims of largely non-existent health benefits.

        3. I recall my grandfather had a book (I think it came from the organisation of that pillock Garner Ted Armstrong) on parenting which was the usual obsessed-with-sex crap. I had a sneak look. It recommended regularly peeling back the foreskin and scrubbing to desensitise it to avoid lustful thoughts. Fortunately my family were far too sensible to do any such thing.

          I thought I could find far more pleasurable ways to desensitise it.

          cr

    2. …207m population…
      …60m women with FGM…
      …almost a third of all the nation’s women…

      Either I’ve misunderstood something, or one of these figures is wrong.

        1. If half of the population of 207 million is women, that’s approximately 104 million women. If 60 million women have been subjected to FGM, 60/104 is about 58%. Closer to two-thirds than one-third.

  4. Ban Ki Moon (UN Secretary General) has just launched an initiative to ban FGM worldwide too. It’s great to see this issue getting some high level attention.

    1. I’m sure the root cause of FGM is the belief that women would be less than ideally monogamous if they weren’t damaged in this way. Theoretically then, the Islamists should be content with chastity belts or ankle chains locked to the kitchen table. There’s an African tribe that put huge discs in women’s lips. That could also deter wild roaming behavior (but that’s a form of “cutting” too).
      More seriously, perhaps it would be good to get beyond the superficial and do something about the even more fundamental cause of misogyny. Could be you have to eliminate religion from the face of the earth. Get Ban Ki Moon on it pronto!

      1. Good luck with that!

        One of the strong candidates for next UN Secretary General is Helen Clark, the current head of the UN Development Programme. Not only would she be the first woman in the role, she’s an atheist. (She’s also a former PM of NZ.)

  5. Aslan should get some kind of Trump award on this matter I would think. Being the expert he is on religious matters and this “African problem.” Biggest lie of the month award maybe. Hugest piece of garbage to escape the mouth on television.

  6. It’s rather one-eyed and discriminatory these days to condemn FGM without making any reference to circumcision of boys, widely practised by Muslims in Indonesia and elsewhere – and with as little scriptural warrant: the Koran mentions neither male nor female circumcision, though the prophet is reported as stating that each has equal value as s sign of piety. Current thinking in bioethics is that FGM and circumcision of boys are equally morally problematic. For a recent summary of current research:

    https://www.academia.edu/19117334/In_defence_of_genital_autonomy_for_children

      1. No one said they were of equivalent harm, but I notice responding to that strawman is a wildly popular choice among people who wish to ignore that both practices violate medical ethics and general right to bodily integrity.

        In other words they fail the same moral standards but to differing degrees.

      2. The glans clitoris cannot be compared to the glans penis, the former being the size of a pea, and the latter being roughly the size of a crabapple. In addition, it is not the glans penis that triggers orgasm in men, but rather the frenulum, so removal of the frenulum is more comparable to removal of the clitoris than the glans penis.

    2. The bad news in this respect: Heather Hironimus’ treatment (though it might lead some to reconsider their opinions and so bring positive results in the long run).

      The good news: many our urbanized, secular Muslims reportedly skip the procedure. They don’t see why you must subject your healthy preschooler to cosmetic surgery, then invite tons of distant relatives whom you don’t necessarily like and throw a party with the recovering child at the center.

    3. I’ve been told that the hadith are interpreted to mean “since the prophet did this or said it was a good thing, we should do it” – even if it is strictly speaking optional. And supposedly FGM is in this category …

      Once again, the higher order principles have to be overcome I think …

  7. It seems to me that the practice in Indonesia (as described here) bears very little resemblance to the rather barbaric practice elsewhere in the world. Almost to the point where it would be useful to have two different words to describe it.

    Maybe ‘circumcision’ for the Indonesian variant and ‘mutilation’ for the African/Middle East version.

    Put it this way, if my granddaughter converted to Islam (won’t happen!) and had an Indonesian circumcision, I’d be saddened. For philosophical reasons. If she had an African FGM, I would be looking to kill somebody.

    cr

    1. “Put it this way, if my granddaughter converted to Islam (won’t happen!) and had an Indonesian circumcision, I’d be saddened. For philosophical reasons. If she had an African FGM, I would be looking to kill somebody.”

      A choice, made by an adult, converting to Islam is a completely different than an infant or young child undergoing FGM without their consent, which is the case with the overwhelming majority. It’s barbaric no matter how it’s done.

    2. No. Just no. If I may, “a totally unnecessary and dangerous surgery on women” does not cover it. It is also a procedure which exists explicitly to prevent women’s pleasure during sex with a further end of controlling her body, her sexual decisions, and her freedom. It transforms her from a person with sexual agency into an empty vessel for a man to ejaculate into. It is in every way barbaric, and I don’t care how “mild” it is by comparison to practices elsewhere.

      Honestly, do you think that because the women (or, I should say, girls) don’t suffer from infections and die it’s somehow not horrifying? Infection and death are not the only issues here. If we were talking about cutting off men’s testicles, and I popped into the comments to say, well, let’s call the one version castration, and the other one, which is still mandatory, but done in clean conditions, “vocal enhancement procedure”, would we be having these same exchanges about how sad and angry the various degrees of mutilation? Because somehow I think we wouldn’t.

      And as for the person upthread suggesting that this procedure is possibly really really good for female sexual pleasure, enhancing the sex lives and personal empowerment of Indonesian women everywhere, I expect you to either provide substantial, reliable evidence both that cutting off part of the clitoris can provide this in a majority of women and that this is the procedure that is actually practiced in Indonesia, again on a majority of women, or to rescind your comment.

      Finally, male circumcision, while (in my opinion) ridiculous and even potentially horrifying, is not the same thing. NOT THE SAME THING. Men who have undergone circumcision are not, then, unable to partake in physical sexual pleasure with their genitals. Also, the practice is not embedded in a culture which systematically accords men lesser rights than women, denies them the freedom to make choices about their bodies, including sexual choices, and thinks they should exist primarily as sex slaves and/or incubators for women. Call me when that happens, and I’ll move male circumcision up on my list of concerns to somewhere near where FGM is now. Until then, give me a freakin break with outraged calling out of so-called hypocrisy.

      Honestly, have ALL the feminists migrated to the regressive left and this lukewarm accomodationist bullshit is now all we have left? I bet you wouldn’t feel “sad” if we were talking about cutting off YOUR genitals.

      1. READ the damn article!

        If it is accurate then the Indonesian version is physically trivial. It is *not the same thing* as the African/Middle Eastern version. Your castration analogy is therefore flat-out wrong.

        You might see them as both equally reprehensible but I’m damn sure that Indonesian women are very thankful there’s a difference.

        In the same way, if you like (and I’m sure you won’t), as wearing a headscarf to comply with religious dictates is very different from wearing a burqa.

        They’re both ethically unjustifiable by our lights but one is vastly worse in physical consequences than the other. I don’t think it’s being accomodationist to note that fact.

        cr

        1. The damn article says, “the practice in Indonesia often involves, as noted above, non-invasive surgery, sometimes removing only a sliver of the clitoris”.

          In other words, SOMETIMES it doesn’t only remove a sliver of the clitoris, not that removing a sliver of the clitoris seems like it is any way acceptable. Again, let’s place it in another context. We’re going to have a new cultural practice that allows boys to be men and get married. The practice often involves non-invasive surgery, sometimes removing only a sliver of the penis.

          I don’t know if you’re fully familiar with the clitoris and what it does. I don’t necessarily want to get into the details on a feline-friendly site such as this one, but let’s just say that nerve-endings are a major feature, and claims to painlessness when cutting off parts (sorry, slivers!) of it strike me as dubious.

          The damn article also indicates that Unicef researchers were surprised by their findings and that they had been operating without any kind of clear data for many years, relying on anecdotal evidence. Even these data were collected thusly:

          “Respondents were not asked what type of FGM/C had been performed nor were they provided with a definition of what should be considered as ‘circumcision’.” (from the Unicef fact sheet, which I also read).

          Now, of course, we have the assurances of a fatwa and a university professor that it’s a kinder, gentler FGM, so by all means let’s proceed to call it two different things, give it two different labels (and why stop at circumcision? Why not say it’s the good FGM?), and move it off our list of things to worry about, except in so much as it makes us feel sad.

          The Unicef fact sheet, again, says, “Various forms of FGM/C are practised in different parts of Indonesia. Type I (commonly referred to as clitoridectomy)
          and less invasive procedures (Type IV) are the two forms generally practised in the country.” This source also provides some data on the context for women’s rights in the country, like the fact that 17% of women were married before the age of 18 and that 35% of them think it’s ok for a husband to beat them under certain circumstances.

          Finally, I also pondered the turn of phrase “non-invasive surgery”, which is quite baffling as surgery is, by definition, invasive. There is such a thing as MINIMALLY invasive surgery, which appears to mean a procedure used instead of open surgery, which means cutting open a body cavity entirely. By this “definition”, I’m pretty sure I could perform non-invasive surgery on a person by waterboarding her, punching her in the face until she passes out, or taking out her liver laproscopically. I’m not 100% sure of the origin of this term, whether it comes from Indonesian authorities, the NYTimes article, or here, but it’s not something that makes me feel like our work here is done.

          1. Yeah yeah yeah but that’s not what the article says and most of that is off the point of my comment.

            I’m not (at this moment) arguing the social justice of it, just the physical reality – as reported. I don’t think it helps discussion to take everything to extremes.

            cr

      2. Male circumcision, as I detail in my direct comment to this blog post, is the exact same as female circumcision (WHO Type Ia/Ib). Sometimes, male circumcision is worse than Type Ia/Ib, removing as much shaft skin from the penis as is removed from the labia minora.

        The key to ending genital mutilation of girls, boys, and intersex children, is for all of us to stand together against it. If we splinter off and only oppose the types of genital mutilation that are personal to us, then we will never succeed in eradicating it.

        Now, obviously precedence should be given in Africa and the Muslim world for curtailing FGM over male circumcision, because a large percentage of FGM is much worse than male circumcision, and it will be much harder to stop male circumcision in these parts of the world until we stop male circumcision in the Western world.

    3. No, the word you’re looking for is ‘euphemism’. Nontherapeutic/cosmetic cutting of the genitals is always mutilation, end of.

      The actual label for Indonesian FGM that you’re looking for is “WHO FGM Type IV”, which is symbolic circumcision of women or “pinprick circumcisions”. Unless the glans clitoris is actually removed, in which case it’s FGM Type Ib.

  8. Oh dear, I’ll try and clarify that.

    If my daughter converted and subjected my granddaughter (who is a child) to Indonesian-style circumcision (as described above) I’d be saddened. If she was subjected to African FGM I would be homicidal.

    Does that clarify?

    In both cases it is without her consent. But in the first case it does no physical harm and is probably painless (“non-invasive” is the description above). I don’t think you could call it real ‘mutilation’ any more than the teens who have studs inserted in various unlikely places.

    In the other case it’s a horrific and damaging assault.

    One of these things is not like the other.

    cr

    1. That was, of course, a reply to Mike Paps.

      (One of these days I will learn how to operate WP…)

      cr

      1. Oh, and I didn’t say it shouldn’t be stopped. But on my list of things to stop, it (the Indonesian variant) would rank fairly low, alongside male circumcision maybe, and way below burqas and far, far below African FGM and pro-lifers.

        cr

        1. > alongside male circumcision

          How did you come to that conclusion? I laid out the specifics in a direct comment to this blog post, but male circumcision is EXACTLY THE SAME as the WHO’s Type 1a/1b FGM, a.k.a. female circumcision, or what you call African FGM. Sometimes it can be as bad as FGM Type II, with FGM Type III only being equal to penile subincisions in severity.

          And if you have an issue with pro-lifers, I assume you are pro-choice, and it seems you have some cognitive dissonance. Why do you believe, “It’s her body; it’s her choice!” but you do not believe, “It’s his body; it’s his choice!”?

          All arguments used to support male circumcision are exactly the same as the arguments used to support female circumcision: “It’s healthier!”, “It’s cleaner!”, “It simply looks better!”, etc.

          1. I don’t want to get into debating definitions. Most of us aren’t experts on anatomy anyway. But it seems there is considerable confusion on what constitutes FGM, and I think it is probably misleading to regard all forms of it as equal or equally bad. (Before anyone misinterprets that – I’m not saying any are good, OK? Just that some are far worse).

            Just in this thread it’s obvious there are differing opinions on what does usually happen in Indonesia.

            Other minor points –
            My impression is/was that male circumcision was limited in its impact, based partly on the number of males in the West who apparently have it and also on the notable absence of headlines “OMG! Jews mutilate babies!”

            I’m definitely pro-choice. I never said male circumcision was okay, I just didn’t rate it in terms of crimes up there with preventing women getting abortions, the worst types of FGM, or making people die in agony because they’re not allowed voluntary euthanasia.

            cr

          2. I recognized and appreciated your stance against male circumcision, but my point is that bodily autonomy for men must be regarded as equal to bodily autonomy for women.

            You can’t expect, in this age of political correctness, and the fear of being called a racist, sexist, homophobe, anti-Semite, or Islamophobe, that the mainstream media will publish disparaging articles against Judaism and to a smaller degree Islam (you never hear “Muslims mutilate baby [boys]!” either).

            For instance, how much did you hear about in the news on oral suction circumcisions?

            http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/05/jewish-mohels-banned_n_5650672.html

            And the repeal of government regulations to PREVENT Jewish infants from being infected by mohels:

            http://forward.com/news/215428/new-york-city-changes-policy-on-controversial-circ/

            Liberals campaign against the Catholic church for pedophilia amongst its priests, why don’t they campaign against Orthodox Judaism for pedophillic rituals amongst its mohels?

            Nor do you hear about the vast number of baby boys that die every year from circumcision in industrial countries that practice it:

            http://news.nationalpost.com/health/ontario-newborn-bleeds-to-death-after-family-doctor-persuades-parents-to-get-him-circumcised

            This is an example from Canada. In the United States, more than 100 boys die every year from circumcision and it is widely under-reported.

            http://www.academia.edu/6394940/Lost_Boys_An_Estimate_of_U.S._Circumcision-Related_Infant_Deaths

            To conclude, if you are pro-choice because you want to protect women from the dangers of childbirth, or the risk of a back alley abortion in countries where it is illegal, then disregarding the loss of life caused by male circumcision is either cultural bias or cognitive dissonance. Male circumcision is absolutely an equal issue to abortion.

          3. “disregarding the loss of life caused by male circumcision is either cultural bias or cognitive dissonance.”

            Or just that it’s not generally known.

            To revert to my original point – if FGM in Indonesia is generally Type 4 (as I think you described it) then it is very different in severity from other variants of FGM. ‘WHO FGM Type IV’ unfortunately doesn’t mean anything to most of us.

            Hence my suggestion for giving it a description that made it clearer what we were talking about. Unfortunately the terms I suggested seem to have been as confusing (and likely as misleading) as everything else about this topic.

            cr

          4. This focus by certain Muslims on the genitalia of female children, to whatever degree, is for the sparrows, to say the least.

            Let them be bloody well content with clipping one hangnail and be done with it.

      2. “One of these days I will learn how to operate WP…”

        Same here. In the mean time I quote people so there is little doubt who I’m responding to.

        And sometimes it one just posts “I agree”, the only person who will know you’re agreeing with them is that person. It might appear in the thread that you just agreed with the person calling for genocide rather than the one who called him/her out on it. :p

    2. “But in the first case it does no physical harm and is probably painless (“non-invasive” is the description above).”

      How the heck could cutting off a piece of an organ be painless?? And the clitoris being the size it is, even removing a “sliver” could result in removing a significant number of important nerve endings. (And how is that non-invasive?)

      I do agree with you that there is a gradient of FGM operations and that some are much more severe than others, thus probably the most outrageous, but every type is outrageous to some degree. (And there’s always the danger of accidentally causing greater damage whilst in the midst of a totally unnecessary operation.)

      1. “How the heck could cutting off a piece of an organ be painless”

        I’d say it’s certainly possible. Minor operations are done all the time for various reasons with local anaesthetic. I had a warty growth removed from my tongue once – plenty of nerve endings there. I don’t recall any pain after the local wore off.

        As to how any op is ‘non-invasive’ I don’t know, I was just quoting the original article.

        I guess what I was saying was it would be helpful to differentiate (since everybody is basing their arguments on what they think ‘FGM’ in Indonesia actually means) between a purely nominal procedure and a physically severe one.

        cr

  10. I flat out do not trust the claim that it “mostly symbolic” in Indonesia.

    Also the symbolism is in and of itself an endorse of the ostensible need to any thing to any healthy child’s genitals in the name of religion or culture.

  11. No person should be subject to any elective surgical procedure (not required for medical reasons) until they reach a suitable age of consent, say late teens/early twenties (18-22), at which point they can decide for themselves.

    1. Agreed, though many teens seem to start at a much younger age. Or does the drilling of holes for the insertion of hardware (gives me the creeps, actually) not count as a ‘surgical procedure’?

      cr

      1. When I was at a high school camp, one boy had this procedure… done by a peer… with the tool that was available, a rusty safety pin… which remained inserted in the hole instead of an earring… grrrrrrr…

          2. About 10 years ago two of my smartest 12th Grade Calculus students ( one male, one female) came to class after lunch, giggling. One could obviously see through their T shirts that they had gotten their nipples pierced. OUCH! I really don’t get it….

  12. There are a lot of correlations and nuances between male genital mutilation (MGM) and female genital mutilation (FGM), that are lost on most people.

    The WHO recognizes four types of FGM. Type I is referred to as female circumcision and includes the removal of the prepuce (clitoral hood) (Ia) and usually the clitoris as well (Ib). Male circumcision includes removal of the prepuce (foreskin) and usually parts of or the whole frenulum.

    The glans clitoris cannot be compared to the glans penis, the former being the size of a pea, and the latter being roughly the size of a crabapple. In addition, it is not the glans penis that triggers orgasm in men, but rather the frenulum, so removal of the frenulum is more comparable to removal of the clitoris than the glans penis.

    Just as removal of the clitoris prevents a woman from experiencing a clitoral orgasm, removal of the frenulum prevents a man from experiencing what would be considered a normal orgasm for most men around the globe. Circumcised men must instead thrust harder to get enough stimulation for an orgasm.

    Female circumcision (FGM Type I) and male circumcision are, therefore, the EXACT same in terms of severity, or rather the spectrum of severity that each includes, except for few instances where male circumcision is in fact worse.

    Some instances of male circumcision remove almost all of the shaft skin and erections are painful or result in skin tears, bleeding, etc. Type II female genital mutilation is removal of the labia minora in addition to Type I. In these cases, male circumcision can be as bad as FGM Type II.

    FGM Type III, the sewing shut of the labia majora, is comparable only to penile subincisions, the cutting open of the urethra lengthwise on the ventral side of the penis. Both affect fertility, sexual satisfaction, and hygiene comparably.

    1. It is never the removal of the clitoris, it is only the removal of the clitoral glans. The clitoris is a large organ, of which only the glans and part of the shaft are visible. The clitoris extends from the visible portion to a point below the pubic bone. The clitoris is a complex structure, containing external and internal components. It consists of the glans (including the frenulum clitoridis, which is a frenulum on the under-surface of the glans and is created by the two medial parts of the labia minora), the clitoral body (which is composed of two erectile bodies known as the corpora cavernosa), two clitoral crura, the clitoral hood (formed by the labia minora) and the vestibular or clitoral bulbs. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clitoris#General_structure_and_histological_evaluation)

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