The Daily Observer in The Gambia printed a piece saying that female genital mutilation was un-Islamic, and now Alhaji Abdoulie Fatty, the Imam of State House Mosque, says Not So Fast: you can't say anything about Islam without a degree in Islamic studies, and you can't say anything about FGM unless you've been through it. But does Dr. Jack Faal qualify on either count?
"Imam Fatty rebuts FGM claim," by Sanna Jawara in The Gambia's Daily Observer, with thanks to Twostellas:
Alhaji Abdoulie Fatty, the Imam of State House Mosque has rebuted claims published on 1st June edition of the Daily observer, entitled “Female Genital Cutting Unislamic” as utter rubbish.In an interview with the Daily Observer, Imam Fatty said “as far as Islam is concerned “we do observe circumcision not mutilation”.
He then noted that the tradition has been in existence hundreds of years ago, well before the advent of the modern civilisation.
According to him, “in the Muslim ummah nobody can tell us what is good or not good for our tradition. Before anyone tells us about our tradition, you must convince us that you have a degree or degrees in Islamic studies”
He did not hesitate to describe the publication as a big insult to the Muslim ummah and then urged the perpetrators to desist from such in the interest of religious tolerance and world peace.
According to Imam Fatty, a person who has never experienced Muslim circumcision cannot say anything genuine about it. “If the individual has undergone through the process, and as a result, contracted HIV/AIDS, and died at delivery process or the child died, this can then serve as an evidence of the dangers associated with the practice,” he added.
Imam Fatty further stated that as far as Islam is concerned, Prophet Muhammad (PBU), and his disciples, Islamic Schools of thoughts and Haddish, have all spoken well of the circumcision. He then quoted verse 36, which states that ‘Those who disbelieve and spend their wealth to hinder ‘men’ from the part of Allah, so will they continue to spend it. But in the end it will become an anguish for them. They will be overcome and those who disbelieve will be gathered unto hell”.
The Imam made several quotations from Dr Jack Faal, a renown Gynaecologist, who conducted extensive research on female circumcision, saying “despite all that has been said about it, the surgery in Female Circumcision is simple. What happens is a cutting of the skin, a piece of skin, no bone is involved in it. It amazed people who say you bleed to death in circumcision”.
Given stories like these and the way Islam in general has treated women I am almost astounded that Mr. Perfect simply didn't embark on an extermination of women program. A woman would be better off dead than being a Muslim given the circumstances Mo mandated.
I don't want to be catty, but this chatty Fatty, aside from being ratty, is also really tatty. Maybe someone in Cincinatti will give him the ratta tat tatti -- and then batty Fatty would go SPLATTY.
I suppose you could say that this practice (and its defenders) are barbaric, but then that's not really fair to barbarians.
The name "Jack Faal" doesn't come up much in a Google search, in spite of his alleged world renown.
But I did find this:
http://www.infoweb.gm/doctors.htm
Faal works in Gambia, and I'd venture a guess that he has a vested interest in the FGM business continuing.
He's world "renown" all over Gambia.
The Gambia is the country on both sides of the Gambia River. It starts out in the west shaped like Tennessee, and in the east undergoes a strange transformation, and is shaped like a large, or possibly small, intestine, laid out sideways. Not very appetizing.
Neither Imam Fatty nor Dr. Faal, both of The Gambia, has undergone circumcision, which they declare one must have experienced to speak with authority on the matter of female genital mutiliation. Curiously, neither thinks of himself as being disbarred from speaking with such self-assigned authority. One wonders how they reconcile what they practice with what they preach. On the other hand, Ayaan Hirsi Ali is someone who as a young girl was forced to endure the practice, and its aftereffects, and she speaks forthrightly about the matter in her book "Infidel" which is recommended to all those who, unlike Imam Fatty and "Doctor" Jack Faal, are not already experts in the matter and wish to find out more.
"He then quoted verse 36, which states that ‘Those who disbelieve and spend their wealth to hinder ‘men’ from the part [sic] of Allah, so will they continue to spend it. But in the end it will become an anguish for them. They will be overcome and those who disbelieve will be gathered unto hell”."--Imam Fatty, quoted in the article.
This "verse 36" is from the Quran's chapter "Spoils of War" (Chapter 8). It has nothing to do with female circumcision. Whether or not it is "hindering from the path of Allah" to oppose FGM depends on interpretation of some hadiths. Imam Fatty seems ready to go to war over FGM:
"He did not hesitate to describe the publication as a big insult to the Muslim ummah and then urged the perpetrators to desist from such in the interest of religious tolerance and world peace."
..."According to Imam Fatty, a person who has never experienced Muslim circumcision cannot say anything genuine about it"...
..."Imam Fatty further stated that as far as Islam is concerned, Prophet Muhammad (PBU), and his disciples, Islamic Schools of thoughts and Haddish, have all spoken well of the circumcision"...
Have all these bums experienced circumcision before?
Sorry, what I meant in my earlier post was:
..."According to Imam Fatty, a person who has never experienced Muslim circumcision cannot say anything genuine about it"...
..."Imam Fatty further stated that as far as Islam is concerned, Prophet Muhammad (PBU), and his disciples, Islamic Schools of thoughts and Haddish, have all spoken well of the circumcision"...
Have all these bums experienced (female) circumcision before and yet had so much to comment about it (female genital mutilation) ?
According to Imam Fatty, a person who has never experienced Muslim circumcision cannot say anything genuine about it.
Perhaps Imam Fatty needs to read Ayaan Hirsi Ali's "Infidel". Her account of her and her sister Haweya's circumcisions was one of the most disturbing, sickening things I've ever read; it hardly sounded like the benign, simple procedue the last paragraph of the above article makes it out to be.
"urged the perpetrators"??
No bias at all at that journal, oh no.
"According to Imam Fatty, a person who has never experienced Muslim circumcision cannot say anything genuine about it. “If the individual has undergone through the process, and as a result, contracted HIV/AIDS, and died at delivery process or the child died, this can then serve as an evidence of the dangers associated with the practice,” he added."
Unreal.
"He did not hesitate to describe the publication as a big insult to the Muslim ummah and then urged the perpetrators to desist from such in the interest of religious tolerance and world peace."
Aha, it's that Islamic logic again.
"Islam is not violent. But if you claim that Islam is violent, there will be violent reprisals from Muslims."
How would Imam Fatty feel if, rather than a poor woman having her genitals hacked off, he had his penis, entirely, removed?
Fair, or fair enough?
That's the question.
Fair enough I'd reckon.
"According to him, “in the Muslim ummah nobody can tell us what is good or not good for our tradition....."
.....maybe someone should inform bozo that his tradition is 1400 years old and that in the ensuing 1400 years medical science and heatlh care procedures have improved greatly....in fact, women in Non Muslim cultures lead healther lives and live longer thanks to modern medical techniques and medicines...and of course, if the woman goes to the Emergency Room in the hospital, she can be treated immediately...
Islam is a phenomenon that has failed to contribute to the improvement of its followers lives, Islam has withheld advancements in technology, improvements in healthcare, and denied its follows of many of the conveniences that we take for granted.....
All Muslim dominated countries are poverty stricken, violence plagued,and suffer terrible health conditions....and it is Islam that is to blame.....
....it is clear to me that Islam should be outlawed and Muslim Immigration should be banned...you do not want these people in your neighborhood...
Besides Ayaan Hirsi Ali's account of Somali style female genital mutilation, there is another account, also by a formidable and gorgeous Somali woman - Waris Dirie. See the two books 'Desert Flower' and 'Desert Dawn'. She was subjected to FGM as a little girl; she recalls one of her elder sisters dying due to blood loss and/ or infection. When she was 13 her father decided to marry her off to a much older man; her mother helped her to flee, she went to richer relatives and then with them to London, and finally was able to make her escape - she finished up as a star fashion model and in 1997 'she was appointed by the UN as special ambassador for women's rights in Africa, in its effort to eliminate the practice of FGM'.
It's quite clear that this hideous practice predates Islam, and it is carried out by certain non-Muslim groups, but Islam has done NOTHING to stop it and seems indeed, if anything, to be spreading it to populations that historically did not practise it.
The practice amounts to a major cull of the female population, since 1. quite a few girls die under the procedure and many are permanently psychologically traumatised 2. the health, fertility and life expectancy of many is damaged by the fact that urine and menses are not able to escape quickly or easily and therefore back up, inviting infections 3. childbirth is extremely dangerous and difficult, such that more mothers and babies die than would happen otherwise and 4. women are much more likely to suffer fistulas during childbirth, which leads to infections, social isolation, and often death. This is one cultural custom that - like the now blessedly-defunct old Chinese custom of the breaking-and-binding of women's feet - has NOTHING to recommend it.
I love how Muslims always try to put up specious roadblocks to outside discussion of their practices and beliefs. From "You can't discuss the Koran unless you read it in Arabic" to "You can't complain about FGM unless you've undergone it", the whole way in which they try to defend themselves from the only universal thought system in history, i.e. logic, is quite amusing on one level, and fills me with murderous rage on another level. I wouldn't have believed that creatures with the bodies and brains of homo sapiens could be so utterly and completely useless to the rest of the species. If Darwin had studied Muslims, he would most likely have retracted his theory of evolution.
"Imam Fatty further stated that as far as Islam is concerned, Prophet Muhammad (PBU), and his disciples, Islamic Schools of thoughts and Haddish, have all spoken well of the circumcision."
He's probably referring to this hadith, which seems to be the most frequently cited in favor of female circumcision:
Sunan Abu-Dawud hadith Book 41, Number 5251:
Narrated Umm Atiyyah al-Ansariyyah:
A woman used to perform circumcision in Medina. The Prophet (peace_be_upon_him) said to her: Do not cut severely as that is better for a woman and more desirable for a husband.
If this is what they're basing it on, then it seems they ought to at least note the part about not cutting severely. From that perspective, while circumcision is apparently quite islamic, outright FGM would not be.
Is that Dr. Jack OFFaal?
"I wouldn't have believed that creatures with the bodies and brains of homo sapiens could be so utterly and completely useless to the rest of the species. If Darwin had studied Muslims, he would most likely have retracted his theory of evolution."
Posted by venividivici
My theory is that muslims descended from neanderthals, once thought to be extinct.
So ... you can only comment if you're dead?
According to Dr Phil McGrath: 'You do not have to put your hand in a blender to learn that it is not a good idea to put hands in blenders.'
When even Dr Phil knows better than you, I'd say you're in serious trouble.
(Although this imam does have the BEST NAME EVAH.)
WSW
We understand that rape has nothing to do with relieving sexuall tensions. It's a power kick. Agreed? The perpetrator dominates the victom. As self apointed armchair psychologist today, in my opinion, cutting off part of a human body (as in the fgm form) is one of the most blatent power kicks amaginable. Jsla; thanks for the side splitting laugh.
"You cannot comment on how much more superior your religion/race/country is than mine until you've fully experienced mine."
Street runs both ways, dude. I'd also like to add one from the female perspective:
"Forget FGM for one minute. Have cramps, bloating, irritability, fatigue, and all the other fun stuff FIRST. Then you can have all the stupid opinions you want."
- She who also gets migraines
My favorite quote from Dr. Phil:
"If anyone here thinks this is a good idea, I think somewhere out there a village is missing its idiot."
Jsla - your rap is number one with a bullet. Outstanding.