Guest post by Bethany Blankley

One Facebook group insists that because Jews control the global media, the benefits of “female circumcision” (otherwise known as Female Genital Mutilation (FGM)) aren’t known worldwide. It claims that this disgusting practice has many benefits, the most important of which– prevents both a man and woman from getting cancer.

[The group’s page was recently taken down after a report by The Foreign Desk and complaints filed by conservatives to Facebook for allowing such a group to promote human rights abuses and anti-semitism. Fortunately, screenshots were taken of the page, as well as hyperlinks, evidencing that the only conspiracy is that which the page sought to promote.]

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The group’s page, “Islamic Female Circumcision” (https://www.facebook.com/Islamic-Female-Circumcision-480676625476877/?fref=ts), promoted the benefits of the Islamic practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), called “Hufaad.” Its mission was to “clear misconceptions of the Islamic practice of female circumcision and counter misinformation against it.” Here are the misconceptions it sought to promote:

Lie #1: It’s the Jews fault that people don’t understand the benefits of FGM. And, the public doesn’t know about these because:

“Islamophobic sentiments [are] expressed by a largely Jewish controlled media.”

Lie #2: People are wrongly critical of FGM and aren’t critical enough of male circumcision “because male circumcision is a Jewish practice and female circumcision is not.”

Lie #3: Several articles and an infographic argue that “female circumcision is good for women,” both health-wise and sexually. For example,

  • “Muslimahs for circumcision” insist that FGM prevents urinary tract infections and the transmission of STDs.
  • FGM fulfills women sexually. The page references a story told in the Hadith about when Muhammad told Umm Atiyyah that FGM is practiced “for it is beauty for the face and desirable for the husband.”
  • FGM prevents cancer: A meme posted on May 15 depicted an Islamic couple holding each other and claimed that if both men and women do not get circumcised they will give each other cancer. It states:

“If you love your wife get yourself circumcised because the germs in your foreskin can reach her vagina during sex and cause her cervical cancer.

“If you love your husband get yourself circumcised because the germs under your prepuce can reach his mouth when he pleasures your clitoris and cause him oral cancer.

“Yes cervical cancer in women is caused by having sex with uncircumcised men and yes, oral cancer in men is cause by cunnilingus with uncircumcised women.”

All of this information is false. 

Here’s the truth about FGM and IslamIn many Islamic-controlled countries if a girl’s vagina is not sewn shut no man will marry her.

Integral to Islam is men marrying girls between the ages of 6 and 9 years old to emulate Muhammad. (Muhammad’s last wife Aisha was 9 years old when he consummated their marriage. She was 6 years old when he married her.)

Imams encourage the remarrying of young girls as “virgins.” And girls’s financial worth lies solely in her virginity, proven by the surgical mutilation of her body. To ensure that a man marries or buys a young girl to have sex with, she must be surgically mutilated to “restore her virginity.”

In many cases, vaginas are sealed closed, leaving only a tiny opening to urinate. If the sutures are too tight, the girl will be unable to urinate or menstruate, and dies. In many cases, girls go through shock and die.

Under Shari’a law, the Imam or the husband’s word alone is enough to grant a divorce. The girl can be remarried to another man for an hour and divorced again—legally under Shari’a. Undergoing FGM is often not a singular occurrence and the Qur’an condones forced sex, which is not considered “rape” or “violence.”

A one-minute video explains the different kinds of FGM procedures.

A recent UNICEF report states that “at least 200 million girls and women alive today have undergone ritual cutting, half of them living in just three countries.”

This report adds to a 2014 estimate, including an additional 70 million girls and women, because of new data collected in Indonesia. Half of all FGM victims worldwide live in Indonesia, Egypt and Ethiopia. Somalia has the highest number/occurrence of women and girls being cut – 98 percent of its entire female population between the ages of 15 and 49.

Contrary to the propaganda this Facebook group promoted, the World Health Organization claims that FGM has “no known health benefits” and is “harmful to girls and women in many ways.” It also advocates that FGM is “a violation of the human rights of girls and women” and built a coalition of international organizations to “support specific and concrete actions directed towards ending female genital mutilation.”

Furthermore, no scientific evidence exists to prove that any form of circumcision prevents any type of cancer. And FGM has contributed to the contraction of STD’s, not prevented it. It’s also documented to have caused health complications that extend beyond urinary tract and blood infections, added to the unsanitary conditions in which they are conducted, cause death.

Cross posted from Constitution.com