"Cutting" to the Chase Re Female Genital Obliteration

The ravaging of the genitals of young girls is both epidemic in and endemic to the U.K. The Beeb recently aired a documentary on the all-but taboo subject, and the information it uncovered is highly disturbing, to say the least:

FGM is endemic in Muslim-majority countries across Africa, Asia and the Middle East. Three million girls between infancy and age 15 are subject to FGM every year, and it is believed that 140 million women worldwide are suffering from the lifelong consequences of the practice.

FGM has emerged as a major problem in Europe due to mass immigration. The European Parliament estimates that 500,000 girls and women in the European Union are living with FGM, and every year another 180,000 girls in Europe are at risk of being "cut."

Britain has the highest levels of FGM in Europe. According to a government-funded study published in 2007, at least 66,000 women and girls in Britain have had the procedure performed on them, and more than 20,000 girls under the age of 15 are currently at risk.

These figures, however, may be only the tip of the iceberg. A 2011 Department of Health policy paper warns that "it is possible that, due to population growth and immigration from practicing countries…FGM is significantly more prevalent than these figures suggest."

FGM is thought to be common in Britain among immigrant groups from Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gambia, Indonesia, Iraq, Kenya, Kurdistan, Liberia, Mali, Nigeria, Northern Sudan, Pakistan, Sierra Leone, Somalia and Yemen.

The Times of London has reported that circumcisers -- also known as "house doctors" because they conduct the procedure in private homes -- are often flown to Britain from Africa and the Middle East to carry out the mutilations.

Alternatively, families who have immigrated to Britain from countries where FGM is practiced may send their daughters back to those countries to undergo FGM there, ostensibly under the guise of visiting relatives...

Given the rapidly rising number of immigrants from the above-mentioned lands arriving in Canada, one wonders how many newly Canadians girls are being subjected to the "house" butchers. One wishes but doubts the Ceeb would ever undertake a similar investigation: it lacks the backbone to withstand the outcry that would in all likelihood ensue.