Perhaps not openly, but I think it underlies and informs the arguments you do make, and should be recognized as such, since one can't understand your positions without that.
For example, it is quite clear to me that if society A develops practice M, and society B develops practice N, and A thinks M is the right way and has a consistent ethical and moral framework within which to make that argument, and B thinks N is the right way and has a consistent ethical and moral framework within which to make that argument, the dilemma as to which is truly the right way is absolutely unresolvable without recourse, either directly or by implication, to some external standard.
So when you say that female genital mutilation is simply wrong, and is wrong even in the societies which think it is right, I think of necessity you have to be asserting the existence of a standard of rightness which is external to the two societies. |
