The Universality of the Cause of Genital Autonomy

The following is the text of remarks that were delivered as a recorded address on 7 May 2022 to commemorate the Worldwide Day of Genital Autonomy.

by David Balashinsky

May 7th, 2022 is the tenth anniversary of an important event in the struggle for the right not to be subjected to genital cutting: the ruling by the Regional Court of Cologne recognizing that nonconsensual, non-therapeutic penile circumcision constitutes an illegal act of bodily harm.  That ruling is commemorated every May 7th as the Worldwide Day of Genital Autonomy.  

But a commemoration is not a celebration.  We observe the anniversary of that ruling because it was so groundbreaking, but that also demonstrates how far we have to go.  Instead of congratulating the Cologne Court for its decision, we should be asking, "How could any court, anywhere, conclude otherwise?"  If we lived in a world in which fundamental human rights were universally respected, the Cologne ruling of May 7th 2012 would not be commemorated because it would not be exceptional.  In a just world, rulings such as the one we remember today would be foregone conclusions and would not even be worth noting.

But we do not live in a just world.  The events of the past few months have brought that forcefully to the forefront of the world's consciousness.  As I speak these words, the unprovoked Russian invasion of Ukraine has left thousands dead, millions displaced, leveled whole cities, threatens European peace and security and threatens the entire post-World-War-Two world order.  In my own country, the right of girls and women to obtain safe, legal and timely abortions is under greater threat and already is being curtailed more than it has at any time during the past half century.  Meanwhile, the epidemic of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls continues unabated, racial justice continues to be an unfulfilled dream and antisemitic and AAPI hate crimes as well as hate crimes against other minorities continue to proliferate.  Elsewhere around the world, rape continues to be used as a weapon of war in such places as Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo and northern Ethiopia.  In Afghanistan, girls and women are denied the most basic human rights, including the right to an education, and are treated virtually as prisoners in their own homes.  In Chechnya, gay men are systematically rounded up, imprisoned and tortured.  Globally, authoritarianism is ascendant while democracy is in decline.

These, of course, are not the only human-rights violations going on in the world today, nor are the crises humanity is faced with limited to obvious and direct human-rights violations.  As I speak these words, the world has barely begun to recover from the worst pandemic it has seen in over a century, with more than five million dead.  Meanwhile, climate change, resulting from the burning of fossil fuels, poses a serious threat to the environment, to the world's economies, to millions of lives, even to civilization itself.

In short, there is no end of problems and no end of human-rights abuses that deserve our attention.  So, why this one?  Why focus on the right of genital autonomy?

The short answer is that one doesn't choose to care about the right of genital autonomy, just as one doesn't choose to care about human rights more generally.  The only choice we make is whether we are willing to apply our ethical beliefs consistently.  That means looking beyond our prejudices and moral blind spots and finding the common denominator of all human-rights movements.  

That common denominator, I believe, is the right to be secure in one's person, and that means the right of bodily integrity.  That is the most basic, the most important human right there is.  It precedes every other right because, without it, no other right matters.  As William Douglas put it, "The right to be let alone is indeed the beginning of all freedom."  The right to be free from harm, from violence, from sexualized violence; the right to control one's reproductive health and to decide for oneself whether and when to have a child; the right to an open future; the right to control one's gender identity; the right to control one's sexuality; the right to embrace or reject one's parents' religious beliefs without having had them literally marked in one's flesh without one's consent; the right to experience the fullness of one's body and one's humanity; the right to be oneself - all of these can be distilled down to the right of bodily integrity and that right means nothing without the right of genital autonomy.  For, if bodily integrity is the starting point of all other rights, that right is especially inviolable with respect to the most private, vulnerable and intimate parts of our bodies.  If one accepts the premise that fundamental human rights belong to every human being equally, and that all human bodies - including children's bodies - have a right to exist without being harmed, scarred, surgically altered or modified without consent, one has no choice but to oppose every form of involuntary, non-therapeutic genital cutting.

The right to genital autonomy, then, is simultaneously universal and quintessential: the essence to which all other rights can be distilled.  

For me, personally, the right to genital autonomy is also the conclusion to which the many particulars of my own experience and identity inevitably lead.  Accordingly, there is no type of genital cutting - from nontherapeutic neonatal penile circumcision to intersex surgery to infibulation - that does not contradict every belief I hold and, even more deeply, everything I am.  I'm Jewish; Jewish ethics demand that I oppose genital cutting.  I'm a healthcare worker; medical ethics demand that I oppose genital cutting.  I'm a secular humanist; humanism demands that I oppose genital cutting.  I'm a feminist; feminism demands that I oppose genital cutting.  I'm a progressive; progressivism demands that I oppose genital cutting.  I'm a supporter of abortion rights; the principle of bodily autonomy demands that I oppose genital cutting.  I'm a human being; my very humanity demands that I oppose genital cutting.

Why care about genital autonomy?  Because we are human, and genital autonomy is the most basic human right there is.  Genital cutting, which deprives children of their right to genital autonomy, may not be the only human-rights violation occurring around the world today, but the consistent application of our ethical beliefs demands that, if we oppose any human-rights violation, we must oppose this one.

I began by observing that today is an important anniversary in the struggle for genital autonomy.  Yet, even as we commemorate the Cologne ruling of May 7th, 2012, let us rededicate ourselves to creating a world in which that ruling is no longer exceptional but, instead, is remembered as having been only the first in a series of similar rulings, statutory-, medical-, and cultural advancements that culminated in a world in which no such rulings ever again were necessary.  When all children, everywhere, are protected from genital cutting, that will be when the Worldwide Day of Genital Autonomy represents not an event that we commemorate but an achievement that we celebrate.

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David Balashinsky is originally from New York City and now lives near the Finger Lakes region of New York.  He is a licensed physical therapist and writes about bodily autonomy and human rights, gender, culture, and politics.  He currently serves on the board of directors for the Genital Autonomy Legal Defense & Education Fund, (GALDEF), the board of directors and advisors for Doctors Opposing Circumcision and the leadership team for Bruchim.