What were we saying about FGM? Egyptian cleric Sheikh Yussef al-Badri sets us straight, explaining to the Beeb’s Aleem Maqbool why it’s such a great idea.
I transcribed the heart of it. The ellipses represent his pauses to hunt for the word; he’s not fluent in English so make allowances for that.
Allah gives us orders, we don’t understand them.
But we have no real reason to think it is “Allah” giving us the orders. We have better reason to think it was a human being writing down either hallucinations or his own ideas dressed up as those of “Allah”.
This make the girl control her common sense about sex. Because the woman is quickly… feel…sex. Before man, for this. If we make Islamic circumcision, it will control her common sense, sex common sense, then she cannot be…feel…in need for man.
It’s clear enough what he means – women can get aroused quickly because of those pesky dangly bits, so if you shave them off, it’s much harder to arouse her – hey, maybe even impossible! Score! So that way she won’t be just wandering around feeling the need to grab a man all the time.
Maqbool: Man feels need for woman, as well.
Sheikh: Oh, Allah control this with marriage. [beams] Marriage! [beams more broadly]
Maqbool: Why would God make a woman like this if he wanted an operation?
Sheikh: [beams again] Ohh, I cannot ask Allah!
No, you cannot, and that’s exactly why you should shut the fuck up about it!
But I am his servant! I should obey! Because…in the [inaudible] of doom, he will give the punishment!
If you cannot ask Allah, then how the hell do you think you know any of that? It’s not something to laugh off as a jolly good joke, it’s a total deal-breaker. But of course he doesn’t see that, and he thinks this contradictory mess is a perfectly valid reason to shave off the genitalia of small girls.