Banjo,

The thread is concerned with the law applying to FGM and how to ensure the cultural practice is restricted. My posts are very relevant to that.

I notice that Tanya Plibersek has granted $1million to fifteen separate projects on FGM.

http://www.health.gov.au/internet/ministers/publishing.nsf/Content/mr-yr13-tp-tp080.htm

While I don't doubt that such community groups are likely to be enthusiastic and earnest in their intent, that alone does not dispel my argument that it is more efficient and productive and there is greater value for money obtained from coordinating all effort under the one umbrella. I will refer you again to a previous post,

<There are strong reasons for not separating the practice of female genital surgical interference from all of the other cruel practices waged against children. The main reasons being that it results in splitting of the available resources and effort, and lack of cooperation and fights for territory. It is obvious how wastage of available resporces can occur as well as ill-directed remedial effort. Addressing violence is the same.

As said earlier, rather than concentrate on just one brutal and offensive ritual such as FGM, it is more productive to ensure that Australian law is available to all and equally enforced for all, and particularly where children are concerned, with no blindness through misled multiculturalism. That applies to indigenous children as well.>

A common cause of obtaining poor value for money from taxpayers money in addressing social and health issues is the lack of direction, coordination, cooperation and robust measures of success among the plethora of public and private organisations, and the territoriality of the professionals and agencies involved. Duplication and competing objectives are other problems that ensure wastage of money.

The concern must be to get the very best outcomes and value for money from the bucket of taxpayers' money, of which there is never an unlimited supply.

Banjo I am not very good at some things you can do on a PC.
My generation mostly, is not, but I try.
Change an on line activist page seems a useful place to start a campaign.
You like me,will ignore many lefty type things but it gets results.
Not sure GY wants to turn us in to such a site but what if we could vote or put our name in support of this matter.
People power will play a far bigger roll in the future.
We must find a way around the walls politicians build to keep us waiting for true actions against this and other injustices here in our country.
Mate may be wrong but think I saw news those charges have been dropped because of lack of evidence.

Belly,
I think you may have mistaken the NSW case with another in WA which was dropped. The WA case involved a couple intending to take their baby to Indonesia for FGM. They were stopped at the airport here and charges laid. However the WA DPP dropped the case because it is difficult to prove intent. Had they actually carried out the FGM there would have been a case.

I believe the NSW case is still to go ahead. This involves 8 persons charged, including the parents, a retired nurse and an Imam. The victims were two girls from the same family.

Although the type of FGM carried out, in this case, may not have been the most severe, it will be interesting as to how the court views it. If the penalty is appropriate, I think it will be a deterrent. But alien cultural practices are hard to stop. Especially if they can be hidden.

To On the beach. I repeat, I'm not that concerned over male circumcision. I don't dismiss it's risks either. But males who have had this done to them can still enjoy life to the fullest. Women who have had F.G.M. done to them cannot. I would rather spend my time trying to stop the abhorrent practices that impact so severely on individuals than on trying to stop practices than affect individuals to a far lesser degree. I wouldn't worry about my being elected, I'm a very long shot at best. Nobody seems to care about the House of Reps, least of all the media, but that's a discussion for another thread.

turtletimtam,

You are wrong. Dozens of African boys died annually from penis cutting. Many hundreds more suffered serious harm from poor procedures and infection.

That is why African governments have outlawed the religious and cultural tradition of cutting being performed by religious ratbags in the field. But even where performed in hospitals (and even in developed countries cutting of boys is still done outside hospitals) deaths still occur.

http://endmalecircumcision.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/another-circumcised-baby-bleeds-to.html

An infant has very little blood. A mother would not notice the apparent tiny quantity lost into a nappy that will cause the baby to lapse into unconciousness and death.

It is the same stupidity and cruelty that is directed at girls by their mothers, female relatives and other women. Female cutting is performed by women in the field. Of course the girls usually between age 4 and 12 are sorely harmed and some die. If performed in hospital, deaths and infection would be greatly reduced as for male cutting.

But cutting of girls or boys remains disgusting, unnecessary cosmetic surgery. The child minor is incapable of giving informed consent to body modification and risks that could result in death.

If cutting of girls is seen as discrimination, so then is cutting of boys. In both cases it should be left to their adulthood to choose. Later, some men and women do choose surgical modification. Their choice, but the taxpayer shouldn't pay where the cutting was not medically necessary.

There is no competition. There is no zero sum game. The cosmetic cutting of girls and boys is abhorrent and should be discouraged. For those who are concerned that action against the cutting of boys might somehow reduce the government grants that are available for women's issues and girl cutting, that is completely ridiculous. So go in peace. Equivalent concern for both genders will not harm girls.

I truly hope I am wrong Banjo.
But think I may not be.
Had a conversation about this subject today.
Willing to follow others on this.
But too am trying to get a page up to let people put their names down to press state and federal police to action this issue.
Any one got a link to a page that is trying?
We should use such pages to get things done.