Female genital mutilation (or FGM) is a gruesome practice in which a woman’s genitalia are deliberately cut for no medical reason. Thankfully it’s being outlawed, and with UN member states aiming to eliminate the practice by 2030, women will hopefully be free from the horror that is FGM going forward.
Enter arsehole of the week Elhany Agina, the Egyptian MP who’s comments that women should ‘dress more modestly’ in Egyptian parliament led to 89 female MPs filing a complaint against him. Sounds like a nice guy, huh?
Anyway, in a weird move politically (and, y’know, as a human being) Elhany has managed to outrage both men and women of Egypt by saying that women should have FGM to 'reduce their sexual appetite,' because the men of Egypt can’t satisfy them. Nice.
Speaking to Egyptian news website Parlmany, Elhany said ‘we are a population whose men suffer from sexual weakness, which is evident because Egypt is among the biggest consumers of sexual stimulants that only the week will consume.
‘If we stop FGM, we will need strong men and we don’t have men of that sort.’
Whether or not that’s true (and I’m willing to bet there are some Egyptian men who might testament to the contrary), clearly saying that women should put themselves through an unnatural pain in order to ‘“stand by their man”’ (yes, he did actually say that phrase) is despicable and absurd.
FGM was outlawed in Egypt in 2008, but is still tragically common. The country's Health Issues Survey in 2015 revealed that some nine in 10 women aged from 15 to 49 have been subjected to the procedure.
In a laughable-if-it-wasn’t-so-vile attempt to justify himself, Elhany went on: ‘it’s assumed that it stops women going after men, and keeps the genders equal.’ Sounds just like equality as we all know and love it. Not.
We’ve come a long way in the fight against FGM, but douchebags like this guy are proof enough that there’s still plenty of work to be done.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.