Let Us Hope This Leads To The First Of Many Prosecutions For This Vile Practice.

[ladybirder]

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/two-held-by-scotland-yard-for-fgm-on-baby-8939302.html

[ladybirder]

I hope not Mushroom. I have high hopes of her. For those who don't know who she is:

http://www.theweek.co.uk/uk-news/54258/who-alison-saunders-lawyer-announced-new-dpp

[Hypognosis]

@ladybirder

(re link I posted)
Won't work, what do I need to do?

I didn't test the link myself, as I watched it when broadcast. Sorry.

If it gets rebroadcast, on the News Channel, it may reappear on iPlayer. If your Parental controls are set to on, you may need to unlock it to view the content.

If you've not set up the Parental control feature (needs an account ID and password when setting up) then don't worry - its default setting is ON.

[ladybirder]

No Parental Controls set. I'm on a Mac if that's anything to do with it.
I'll just have to watch out for it thanks Hypo.

[naomi24]

Fred, //If you can point to any text in the Koran or a writing binding on Muslims,that says it is religious obligation, please do.//

I will. The words of Mohammed - he who is to be emulated and, hence, a man beyond reproach:

"…When you circumcise then do not cut severely, since that is better for her and more pleasing to the husband."

According to the Shafi school of Islamic law, which is followed by Somalis (among others), it is an obligation to “circumcise” girls for their own good. (Copied, for convenience, from the internet).

I would add that you will find nothing in the Koran to endorse the practice of circumcision for either male or female - in fact the Koran specifically forbids altering Allah's creation - but this is an area in which Mohammed's word overrides that of Allah.

It has nothing to do with religion? Don’t you believe it!! It has everything to do with religion!

Ladybirder, your 'best answer' is misplaced. This is not a 'cultural' practice.

[FredPuli43]

Naomi, according to Wikipedia, those words are in the hadith, and are merely attributed to Mohammed. Wikipedia says they do not amount to an obligation. They have not stopped an Islamic Supreme Court from declaring that the practice is against Islamic law. We may take it that such a court knows more about Islam than we do.

But I was not aware that some sect thought it appropriate or even necessary, in spite of the Koran's injunction against interfering with the human body. That some sect of any religion has unusual, or lunatic, ideas, does not surprise me.

[FredPuli43]

And, Naomi, do you not think it odd that the Koran, revealed by Allah to Mohammed, should be contradicted by the words of Mohammed himself? The Islamic judges must surely have taken the view that Mohammed would not contradict the book dictated to him by Allah, but that the words which were ascribed to him were apocryphal, and created by someone else. It is easy to see how someone who was in favour of female mutilation would claim that Mohammed had said that, just to give some false credence to his own views. It is not a case of Mohammed overriding Allah. For him to have done so, given the above, would have been illogical, beyond proud, impertinent, and blasphemous, in setting himself above the very words that Allah had revealed to him.

[naomi24]

Fred, you asked for ‘any text from the Koran or a writing binding on Muslims’ and those words are indeed in the Hadith – “regarded by traditional Islamic schools of jurisprudence as important tools for understanding the Quran and in matters of jurisprudence. Hadith were evaluated and gathered into large collections during the 8th and 9th centuries. These works are referred to in matters of Islamic law and history to this day.” (That copied from Wiki). Whilst some societies do not consider these texts binding in Islamic law, others do, and this and other sayings attributed to Mohammed is the justification cited by Muslims who commit this atrocity. The recently ousted religious fanatics who make up the Muslim Brotherhood are intent on overturning the ruling out-lawing in this practice in Egypt.

There is no doubt that this is being justified on religious grounds. Amnesty International says that the practice has acquired a religious dimension, and Sheikh Yussef al-Badri, a cleric who has repeatedly petitioned courts to make female genital mutilation legal again in Egypt says, “Circumcision' is ordered by Allah, Sharia [Islamic religious law] from Allah. Orders from Allah must be realised”

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-22975400

As I said, circumcision is not mentioned in the Koran – but it is mentioned in the Hadith – and therefore, for those who champion this appalling practice, Mohammed’s word does overrule the Koran – although they would never admit it.

[ladybirder]

Naomi, I didn't give Andy Best Answer, Ed did, by mistake, as you will see at the end of his 15.56 post yesterday. As Ed points out, I can override it and will when I see a suitable one.

[naomi24]

Ah, I see. I said that because I think that categorising this as purely a cultural problem undermines the problem by failing to adequately address the fundamental issues responsible - issues that require far more than sensible laws to resolve. The people who adhere to this barbaric practice listen to potty clerics - not lawyers.

[emmie]

vile at any age, gosh i only got as far as the first few lines