From: blamb@hri.com (Bill Lambert)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan
Subject: Re: What is culture? (was: Brainwashied
Date: 7 Jan 93 21:08:07 GMT
Organization: Horizon Research, Inc.


=> In article <7578@bigbird.hri.com.hri.com> blamb@hri.com 
=> (Bill Lambert - that's me) 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.

In article <2600@usna.NAVY.MIL>, wdw@math2.sma.usna.navy.MIL 
(Wm. Douglas Withers -- math  FACULTY <wdw@sma.usna.navy.mil>) writes:
=> At the risk of wandering rather far from anything to do with Japanese
=> culture, I'll comment on this.  

Since Mr. Anonymous introduced us to nasal-to-genital contact, anything
goes.

=> ............................. 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.

So your taboo is about individual choice, not female circumcision per se.
You should have said so! But the women who perform those ceremonies
on young girls do so before they reach sexual maturity, and they
never know what they're missing. How you gonna convince... never
mind... you know what I will say. We'll drop FC before we get in
more trouble.

=> {.... gross stuff about canine cuisine deleted}
=> 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?

Beats me. Seems so... do you think so? If so why?
(some parallels to Iraq and Somalia here)

=> >...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.

Certainly I would have the basis of a moral judgement based on
my personal opinion then, wouldn't I :-) Just like everyone else
it seems.

Seriously though... I never insisted that all moral judgements are
simply matters of opinion, I just couldn't find any here that weren't
(still haven't). And I am not arguing that the practice of judging
cultures is wrong, but that the *method* of judging cultures is wrong,
if it ultimatley relies solely on personal preference.

- Bill Lambert
Newsgroups: soc.culture.japan