From: wdw@math2.sma.usna.navy.MIL (Wm. Douglas Withers -- math  FACULTY <wdw@sma.usna.navy.mil>)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: What is culture? (was: Brainwashied
Date: 7 Jan 93 16:34:25 GMT
Organization: U.S. Naval Academy

In article <7578@bigbird.hri.com.hri.com> blamb@hri.com (Bill Lambert) writes:
>As I understand it, there are two forms of female circumcision that
>have been practiced among various cultures. One is the removal of
>the external skin covering the clitoris, which enhances female
>sexual arousal and orgasm. The second type consists of an excision
>of the clitoris altogether, which of course may negatively affect
>the sexual arousal of many women. Both were attempts, I believe
>to reconcile and deal with the basic human condition by adjusting
>the sexual arousal level in women to that of men - either by speeding
>up the female orgasm, or ignoring it altogether as an issue.

At the risk of wandering rather far from anything to do with Japanese
culture, I'll comment on this.  I'm no expert of female circumcision,
but my understanding is that in some places it is a custom largely
perpetuated by women.  However, I never heard of an  i n d i v i d u a l
woman choosing to have it done to herself.  I haven't heard of the first
type of operation that you describe.  In this case it is not so difficult
to imagine a woman choosing to have the operation herself and I don't
have any problem with that.  It's even conceivable that a woman might choose
to have the second type of operation and I'm not sure I have a problem
with that.  So I find that my judgment of this practice is based on a
somewhat broad principle:  Mutilation may be okay when it's based on
individual decision.

By contrast to this, I remember a case in a certain US city several years
ago where people became aware that certain recent immigrants had the custom
of eating dogs.  This occasioned great moral outrage and a law was immediately
passed forbidding the eating of dogs.  To me this is an example of unreasonable
cultural centrism.  I think it is difficult to argue from any broad principle
that eating dogs is worse that eating pigs.

>Both are bad ideas, surely, but it would be difficult to convince
>members of the cultures in which these practices are prevelent
>that it is a bad idea by using our own cultural references of
>'naturalness' or taboos against bodily mutilation as reasons,
>when the answers you get might be "woman must come" or "woman
>shouldn't come". There is little or no common frame of reference
>to properly express either side's cultural biases. This is my
>point.

Ah, now you raise an interesting point.  Imagine the most despicable
crime that you can: perhaps torturing and multilating children over a
period of several years for public amusement and suppose further that
the frequent practice of this crime was a part of some existing culture.
Suppose that all efforts at persuading members of this culture to stop the
practice were fruitless for just the reasons you describe.  Would we or would
we not be justified in using coercion to stop the practice?

>...the definition of an absolute morality to support
>your contention is still wanting.

I'm not ready to define absolute morality.  But on the other hand, if one
insists that all moral judgments are simply matters of opinion, none being
more valid than any other, than that person has no basis for arguing that
the practice of judging cultures is wrong.

-- 
Els Withers                   email: wdw@math2.sma.usna.navy.mil
          phone: (410)267-3192 / fax: (410)267-4883
When orbiting particle-beam weapons are outlawed, only outlaws will have
orbiting particle-beam weapons.