Today is International Day of Zero Tolerance to Female Genital Mutilation!

Female genital mutilation targets little girls, baby girls - fragile angels who are helpless, who cannot fight back. It's a crime against a child, a crime against humanity. It's abuse. It's absolutely criminal and we have to stop it.
Waris Dirie

Because women and girls are not valued equally as human beings, they are treated as less than such. Female genital mutilation is one example of this that has to be stopped.
Waris Dirie

Female Genital Mutilation concerns us all. It is a crime that is being committed in many countries. With my worldwide campaign I want to raise awareness of this cruel practice. I want to contribute all I can to make it possible to finally eradicate FGM worldwide.
Waris Dirie

Mama tied a blindfold over my eyes. The next thing I felt my flesh was being cut away. I heard the blade sawing back and forth through my skin. The pain between my legs was so intense I wished I would die.
Waris Dirie

A woman used to perform circumcision in Medina. The Prophet said to her: Do not cut severely as that is better for a woman and more desirable for a husband.
Abu Dawud 

I feel that God made my body perfect the way I was born. Then man robbed me, took away my power, and left me a cripple. My womanhood was stolen. If God had wanted those body parts missing, why did he create them? I just pray that one day no woman will have to experience this pain. It will become a thing of the past. People will say "Did you hear, female genital mutilation has been outlawed in Somalia?" Then the next country, and the next, and so on, until the world is safe for all women. What a happy day that will be, and that's what I'm working toward. In'shallah, if God is willing, it will happen. 
Waris Dirie

My mother named me after a miracle of nature: Waris means desert flower. The desert flower blooms in a barren environment where few living things can survive.
Waris Dirie

Women’s loyalty has to be earned with trust and affection, rather than barbaric rituals. The time has come to leave the old ways of suffering behind.
Waris Dirie

Many friends have expressed concern that a religious fanatic will try to kill me when I go to Africa. After all, I’ll be speaking out against a crime many fundamentalists consider a holy practice. I’m sure my work will be dangerous, and I admit to being scared…. But my faith tells me to be strong, that God led me down this path for a reason. He has work for me to do. This is my mission. And I believe that long before the day I was born, God chose the day I will die, so I can’t change that. In the meantime, I might as well take a chance, because that’s what I’ve done all my life.
Waris Dirie

Circumcision is not a medical decision. Preventing an improbably future infection is a spurious indication. The standard of care is antibiotics, not amputation.
Eileen Marie Wayne

It is strange that doctors in Western countries will not permit female circumcision, which involves removal of some or all of the erogenous tissue from the vulva ... but will permit, and in some cases encourage, the removal of the male prepuce, which is identical to the female prepuce in its embryological development, cell structure, and nerve and blood supply.
E. Wallerstein

The forced amputation of a healthy part of an infant's or child's genitals without his consent, whether in the name of medicine, religion or social custom, is a violation of his human rights.
Paul M. Fleiss

Those who would circumcise, implicitly suggest that they know better than nature, God, or whatever power created us and our world.
Ronald Goldman

Childhood genital mutilations are anachronistic rituals inflicted on the helpless bodies of non-consenting children of both sexes.
Hanny Lightfoot-Klein

When a child is subjected to intolerable, overwhelming pain, it conceptualizes mother as both participatory and responsible regardless of mother's intent. The perception of the infant of her culpability and willingness to have him harmed is indelibly emplaced. The consequences for impaired bonding are significant.
Rima Laibow

We recognize the inherent right of all human beings to an intact body. Without religious or racial prejudice, we affirm this basic human right. Parents or guardians do not have the right to consent to the surgical removal or modification of their children's genitalia. Physicians and other health care providers have a responsibility to refuse to remove or mutilate normal body parts.