A cowardly silence over butchery of young girls
ALI Selim now says that he didn’t understand what he was being asked when he advocated ‘female circumcision’, the mutilation of female genitalia, on Prime Time last week. He says English isn’t his first language and, as far as I can make out from his explanation, he thought he was simply discussing intimate cosmetic surgery – ‘vajazzling’, basically – for young Muslim women.
Even though presenter David McCullagh repeatedly described to him, in very clear and simple language, what was meant by ‘female circumcision’, it seems Ali thought they were discussing an episode of ‘Embarrassing Bodies’, where some daft women wanted their bits trimmed to look like porn stars. Well, that was an easy mistake to make – I’m sure that’s a subject that comes up all the time in those devout Muslim households to whom Ali appeared to be directing his Prime Time message.
And his message boiled down to this: come to me and I’ll find you a doctor who will do this thing to your daughter. He quoted the Koran: ‘Ask the people of knowledge’ if you are uncertain. If someone came to him seeking this procedure, which you and I know as ‘female genital mutilation’, he said, ‘I will advise him to ask the doctor’.
The suggestion was that Ali knew just the doctor to ask, too, which is one of the reasons why he should not be enjoying any kind of public profile or public job right now.
Instead, Ali Selim is still lecturing in Trinity College, and in other educational venues too. Despite having such a poor grasp of English that he thinks he’s being asked about labiaplasty – a cosmetic procedure favoured by X-rated actresses, rather than a repulsive Muslim practice that involves lopping off women’s genitalia – he’s still the spokesman for the Islamic Cultural Centre. And he is still the darling of the liberal media, quoting with approval The Irish Times’s publication of his ‘explanation’ of how he was so confused by the bright lights and the big words when he found himself on Prime Time last week.
Ali Selim’s ‘explanation’ is shocking but expertly judged. He may have guessed that the liberal media, all of whom have been nimbly sidestepping his outrageous comments all week, would seize gratefully upon the perception that this poor, uneducated, dark-skinned man (he invoked a ‘darkskin’ bias repeatedly) was tripped up by smart-alec journalists and blurted out something he didn’t mean. He may have guessed that Morning Ireland, which has avoided this story all week, would continue to ignore the fact that a Trinity College lecturer, and truly influential political and theological figure, is in favour of mutilating female children. He may have guessed that all those ‘liberal’ columnists who took several runs at George Hook and Kevin Myers, both commentators who made a living from provocative outbursts, would be strangely distracted by Brexit and other such breaking news this week. They’d be far too distracted, he may have calculated, to take on a ‘dark skinned’ man for suggesting that women be mutilated to deny them sexual pleasure. If he did, he was dead right.
The real scandal here is no longer Ali Selim, and his vile beliefs and his weasely explanations. The shame is the cowardice of the Irish media, and the social media virtue signallers, in their failure to take him on.
THIS is about all those commentators who profess themselves supporters of the Me Too, Times Up, Waking The Feminist sand Repeal The 8 th movements. This is about all those socalled ‘women’s rights’ activists whose support for women’s rights is conditional on the identity of the oppressor. This is about those pompous fakes who don’t understand that if your support for female equality is not absolute, then it’s counterfeit.
When it’s a fat, failing Hollywood producer, or a Catholic bishop, or a patriarchal law, or an ageing radio host, they’re awfully brave in the safety of the mob.
But when it’s a darling of the liberal press – Ali Selim gets a regular platform in the Irish media to complain about Christian school crests and nonsegregation of Muslim girls – they scurry for cover. And the thousands of young Irish girls, currently at risk from this truly barbaric practice, won’t cost them a second thought: It doesn’t matter what else gets mutilated, basically, so long as their own liberal credentials remain intact.