Censorship: New York Times Unwilling to Say ‘Female Genital Mutilation’

NYT Tiptoes Around Feelings Of People Who Mutilate Little Girls.

Amber Randall reports: Worried the term “female genital mutilation” might sharpen the divide between those who oppose brutally cutting away a little girl’s genitalia to deprive her of sexual pleasure and those who practice the “rite,” one New York Times editor instead refers to the ritual as “genital cutting.”

“There’s a gulf between the Western (and some African) advocates who campaign against the practice and the people who follow the rite, and I felt the language used widened that chasm,” NYT science and health editor Celia Dugger explained Friday. She also said the widely used term (FGM) is “culturally loaded” in the explanation, which came as a result of inquiries from The Daily Caller News Foundation regarding a reporter’s decision to use the term “cutting” in a recent story about a doctor in Michigan.

YAAN – FEB28 – Author Ayaan Hirsi Ali talks about her autobiography. tb (Photo by Tony Bock/Toronto Star via Getty Images) By: Tony Bock. Collection: Toronto Star

The doctor was allegedly caught mutilating innocent little girls as young as six and charged with a felony. Performed in American culture and subject to American laws, female genital mutilation carries a sentence of up to five years.

Dugger said she made the decision to ditch “mutilation” for “cutting” after traveling to sub-Saharan Africa for an immigration story in 1996. While she says she never “minced words in describing exactly what form of cutting was involved” and the “terrible damage” it inflicted on young girls, Dugger apparently wanted to soften the instinctive horror by many who oppose the brutal practice by using “cutting” instead … (read more)

Source: The Daily Caller

Related articles

• Female Genital Mutilation A Punishable Family Crime – Lawyer (sundiatapost.com)
• Doctor charged with genital mutilation kept behind bars over Kenya, India ties (mlive.com)
• US: Bohra doctor arrested for allegedly performing female genital cutting on minors (scroll.in)
• Feds: More female genital mutilation victims likely exist (bostonherald.com)
• Migrants face stern English test to become Australian (telegraph.co.uk)
• Michigan Muslim Doctor Arrested After What She Did To Young Girl’s Genitals (madworldnews.com)
• Most children who identify as transgender are faking it, says ‘gender clinic’ psychiatrist (thecollegefix.com)
• Investing in maternal health can save Nigeria $1.5b annually – UNFPA (vanguardngr.com)