Media Research Center President Brent Bozell and ACT for America Chair Brigitte Gabriel are criticizing the major networks for overlooking the first federal legal case of female genital mutilation (FGM) in the U.S.
Bozell and Gabriel publicized their criticisms in a report at NewsBusters, an online site run by the Media Research Center.
The U.S. Department of Justice announced charges last Thursday against Detroit physician Jumana Nagarwala. She is accused of performing FGM on girls between the ages of 6 and 8. While the brutal practice is common in parts of Africa and the Middle East and is known to occur among some immigrant groups in the U.S., this is the first case brought in the U.S. under the legal code that criminalizes FGM.
According to an article in the Detroit Free Press, an attorney for Nagarwala admitted in federal court Monday that Nagarwala performed a procedure but said it wasn’t cutting. The lawyer said the doctor removed the membrane from the girls’ genitals as part of a religious practice connected with an international Indian-Muslim group of which the doctor is a part. The membranes were given to the girls’ parents to bury in keeping with their custom.
Bozell and Gabriel noted that the morning and evening news shows at ABC, CBS and NBC as of Tuesday morning had been silent about the case, even though other outlets including The New York Times, Fox News and CNN.com had picked up on the news.
Bozell and Gabriel said:
The media’s moral compass is hopelessly broken. We have the first case of the brutal practice of FGM in the United States, and the networks are AWOL. You would think an extremely brutal practice of violence against women would make TV headlines here at home, but you would be wrong.
“Where is the outrage? The hypocrisy is staggering. The networks, which have for years championed the causes of left-wing feminists and women’s rights, are conspicuously silent on this case and their silence is deafening. This is real exploitation of young girls and the usual suspects who ought to care have little to say about this form of torture making its way to America. This practice is illegal and immoral. The networks have an ethical responsibility to report that it’s happening here at home. If they don’t, they are guilty of aiding and abetting violence against women out of a politically correct fueled fear of offending Muslims.
