Perversion and Perpetration in Female Genital Mutilation Law: The Unmaking of Women as Bearers of Law
| Published date | 01 April 2020 |
| Author | Nan Seuffert,Juliet Rogers,Maree Pardy |
| DOI | 10.1177/0964663919856681 |
| Date | 01 April 2020 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Article
Perversion and
Perpetration in Female
Genital Mutilation Law:
The Unmaking of Women
as Bearers of Law
Maree Pardy
Deakin University, Australia
Juliet Rogers
University of Melbourne, Australia
Nan Seuffert
University of Wollongong, Australia
Abstract
Female genital cutting (FGC) or, more controversially, female genital mutilation, has
motivated the implementation of legislation in many English-speaking countries, the
product of emotive images and arguments that obscure the realities of the practices of
FGC and the complexity of the role of the practitioner. In Australia, state and territory
legislation was followed, in 2015, with a conviction in New South Wales highlighting the
problem with laws that speak to fantasies of ‘mutilation’. This article analyses the
positioning of Islamic women as victims of their culture, represented as performing their
roles as vehicles for demonic possession, unable to authorize agency or law. Through a
perverse framing of ‘mutilation’, and in the case through the interpretation of the term
‘mutilation’, practices of FGC as law performed by women are obscured, avoiding the
challenge of a real multiculturalism that recognises lawful practices of migrant cultures in
democratic countries.
Corresponding author:
Nan Seuffert, Legal Intersections Research Centre, School of Law, University of Wollongong, Building 67,
Northfields Avenue, Wollongong, NSW 2522, Australia.
Email: nseuffer@uow.edu.au
Social & Legal Studies
2020, Vol. 29(2) 273–293
ªThe Author(s) 2019
Article reuse guidelines:
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DOI: 10.1177/0964663919856681
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Keywords
Critique, female genital cutting, female genital mutilation, sticky associations, women as
bearers of law
Introduction
In 2015, the crime of ‘female gential mutilation’ (FGM) was prosecuted for the first time
in Australia. Three members of the Dawoodi Bohra Muslim community were arrested
and convicted in New South Wales (NSW), see R v. A2; R v. KM; R v. Vaziri (No. 2)
1
As the first case to mobilise the provisions
for criminalising FGM in NSW, the Crimes Act 1900 (NSW) section 45, it provides the
first opportunity to assess the application of the law. The case attracted a good deal of
media attention, which included reports of the practice of ‘mutilating the clitoris of each
girl’, and described how a midwife ‘cut both girls’ genitals’ with a ‘silver tool-ish thing’
that ‘looked a bit like a scissor’ (Partridge, 2016). There were also references to, and
images of, a man described as an ‘Imam’
2
who, like the parents, according to media
reports, showed no remorse (Australian Associated Press, 2016). He was charged with
being an accessory after the fact for instructing the women in the case, and the Dawoodi
Bohra Muslim community in western Sydney, to be obstructive with the police.
The convictions in Magennis and Vaziri came almost two decades after laws crim-
inalising female genital cutting (FGC) were enacted in every state in Australia. Western
Australia initially resisted introducing such laws due to concerns of racial discrimina-
tion, and the targeting of particular communities and cultures unfairly, but by 2003, it too
had enacted criminal provisions.
3
In 1997, the United Nations General Assembly called
upon all States to pass national legislation prohibiting ‘customary practices harmful to
women and girls, particularly female genital mutilation;’ the European Commission
would soon do the same (UN General Assembly, 1997: 3(e)) and similar law reform
was being implemented worldwide.
4
In 1994 in Australia, the Family Law Council (FLC) consulted on proposed legisla-
tion on practices known as FGC, more controversially termed FGM in their report (FLC,
1994a, 1994b; see also Rogers, 2013).
5
The anti-FGM sentiment within ‘the Australian
community as a whole’ (FLC, 1994b: 4), and the urgency attached to the perceived
prevalence of FGM in Australia, meant the passage of the provisions implementing the
FLC’s recommendations to criminalise these practices was remarkably hasty. The speed
and enthusiasm for ‘eradicating FGM’ in Australia, in the post-Kuwait war climate of
heightened anti-Muslim sentiment, overrode concerns of what the FLC called ‘the
affected communities’ who, at that time, expressed worries about the potential ill-
effects of the laws. As we discuss in the following, these communities were also con-
cerned about the lack of consultation (see FLC, 1994b: 2–3; Rogers, 2013). We argue
here that an atmosphere of urgency and fear occasioned this exclusion of the voices and
views of the affected communities from the consultation
6
and further obscured the reality
that it is the women in these communities who are the ‘bearers of law’; it is the women
who practice, influence and often make the laws of FGC.
274 Social & Legal Studies 29(2)
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