By Taiwo Oluwadare
Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), also known as female circumcision, remains one of the most pressing health and human rights issues confronting women and girls across Africa and some parts of the Middle East and Asia. Despite decades of global advocacy and local campaigns, the harmful practice continues to thrive largely due to myths, cultural beliefs, and misconceptions about female sexuality.
In many communities where FGM is still practiced, parents believe that cutting their daughters will preserve chastity, prevent promiscuity, and make them more desirable in marriage. The idea is rooted in the assumption that reducing a woman’s sexual pleasure will keep her faithful and morally upright.
However, health experts, researchers, and survivors have consistently debunked this belief. In fact, contrary to the cultural myth, studies have shown that FGM often contributes to greater sexual dissatisfaction, marital strife, and even the very promiscuity it claims to prevent.
Findings from health experts and testimonies of survivors reveal that women who undergo certain types of FGM especially Type I (clitoridectomy) often struggle to achieve sexual satisfaction. Because orgasm is delayed or difficult to attain, many affected women may find themselves seeking multiple partners in a desperate attempt to experience what their culture denied them.
“This is one of the deepest ironies of the practice,” says a Lagos-based sexual health therapist. “The community believes it curbs promiscuity, but in reality, it can increase it because a woman who is denied natural sexual fulfillment may look elsewhere.”
Beyond sexual dissatisfaction, FGM comes with life-long health risks: severe bleeding, infections, childbirth complications, and in some cases, death. Psychologically, it leaves behind trauma, low self-esteem, and a fractured sense of identity. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), over 200 million girls and women alive today have undergone FGM. Every year, millions more are at risk, despite global calls for eradication.
Some cultural defenders of FGM attempt to give it religious legitimacy. But theologians and faith leaders stress that no major religion mandates the cutting of girls. In fact, many point to scriptural references that highlight male circumcision only. For instance, the Abrahamic covenant mentions the circumcision of male children, but makes no requirement for girls.
“This is why it is critical to separate harmful tradition from divine instruction,” notes Pastor Samuel Adeyemi, a Christian cleric. “Circumcising women was never God’s command; it is man’s creation, and it destroys what God designed.”
Survivors, activists, and medical experts continue to push for stronger legislation, community education, and support systems for victims. Campaigns are ongoing in Nigeria, Kenya, Somalia, and other high-prevalence countries, but progress is uneven.
Ending FGM requires more than laws; it requires dismantling the cultural myths that sustain it. Communities must understand that true virtue is not found in mutilation, but in education, empowerment, and respect for women’s bodies.
As one survivor put it:
“They cut me to make me faithful. But the cut did not give me faithfulness; it only gave me pain. No girl should suffer this again.”
