Tuesday 22 October 2013

Cutting Tradition at the Sage in Gateshead for BBC Radio 3's Free Thinking Festival of Ideas

What is the place of religious traditions involving genital cutting in today’s world? How do we draw the line between parents’ rights and religious liberty on the one hand, and children’s rights on the other? These are very difficult questions...


I am going to attempt to answer them in only 13.5 minutes this Sunday (October 27) at the Sage in Gateshead as part of BBC Radio 3's Free Thinking Festival of Ideas

I am going to look at recent debates among medical ethicists and lawyers about male infant circumcision, performed on around one third of the world’s male population. I will explore what these debates reveal about the relationships between parents and children, religion and human rights, and the differences between male and female bodies.