Actor Alan Cumming has slammed the routine mutilation of males, saying that male circumcision should be treated in the same way as Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).
Speaking in The Guardian the actor said that the removal of the foreskin should be treated in the same way that female genital mutilation is treated.
Currently, in the UK, the practice of religious or cultural FGM is illegal, while the religious or cultural circumcision for males is still sanctioned by the Government. It is thought that less than 20 per cent of males are circumcised in the UK.
In the US, circumcision is a far more widespread operation usually performed on babies – with no real medical necessity. It is thought that around 75 per of the US’s males are circumcised, regardless of religious or culture.
Alan told the Guardian that when he started to have sex with people in the US, he was made to feel “weird and freakish” because, like the majority of Brits, he is uncircumcised.
He revealed, “I never thought anything about my foreskin, and then I came to America and I was having sex and people would just be gasping because they’d never seen a foreskin before”
He brandished the procedure ‘mutilation” and said, “It’s genital mutilation. And I think people say: ‘Oh, that’s hysterical.’ “But we do it to girls and it’s called genital mutilation.”
He also believes that circumcising for religious purposes is “ridiculous” saying, “We choose to keep doing some things and we just let the weirdest things go.”
Circumcision in the UK
In 2018 a mother planned to sue a doctor who performed a circumcision on her son without her permission. Her son was allegedly taken by the son’s paternal grandmother for the procedure. The mother’s lawyer, Saimo Chahal QC said at the time, “While some people with religious beliefs see circumcision as normal, there are others who see it as an unnecessary assault which can be physically and psychologically harmful.”
The doctor and the child’s grandparents were all arrested in June 2017.
The Crown Prosecution Service decided it would not take any further action in October 2017.
The doctor, Dr Mehat, who performed the procedure was suspended for a month after a tribunal in 2019.
