Kenyan girls fight back against genital mutilation | Madeleine Bunting | Global development | guardian.co.uk
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/apr/18/kenyan-girls-rebel-against-fgm
But even worse it causes huge emotional conflict within the closest, most important relationships. We see a daughter arguing with her mother over why she refuses to be cut, and a wife arguing with her husband. One of the most poignant moments is when Nancy, an exemplary daughter in every respect, challenges her mother’s authority. She doesn’t want a life like her mother’s, she declares. You can see the bewildered hurt on the mother’s face; this kind of rejection may be familiar to many a western parent but perhaps still a novelty in a culture where the idea of making your own fate in life, particularly for a girl, is completely alien.
Implicit in this rejection is a judgment of the inadequacy of the mother’s life, a repudiation of her form of love. “I don’t want to grind stones all my life like you,” says Nancy. “I bury you, you bury me in a vicious cycle of daughter and mother.”