The author responds to three commentaries on her essay "From the War on Terror to the Moral Crusade Against Female Genital Mutilation: Anti-Muslim Racism and Femonationalism in the United States," published in this symposium. The response addresses three main arguments, namely, the need for a specific ban on female genital mutilation (FGM), the multiplicity of actors involved in the anti-FGM movement, and the problematic way in which words and numbers are used in the public sphere to depict FGM. The author concludes with a call to decolonize the anti-FGM debate and to reflect critically on the political context in which anti-FGM legislation takes place.
Keywords: Republican; United States; anti-Muslim racism; decolonial thought; female genital mutilation; femonationalism.