Intersex Genital Mutilation

Intersex Genital Mutilation, often shortened to IGM, is a term intersex advocates use for medically unnecessary surgeries and hormonal treatments performed on intersex infants and children to make their bodies conform to binary expectations of male or female. Because these procedures happen before a person can consent, and are often irreversible, advocates argue they can cause lasting physical harm, scarring, loss of sexual sensation, sterilization, and psychological trauma. Clinicians have historically called them normalizing or corrective surgeries; advocates reject that framing and stress that many of these interventions are not medically urgent. United Nations bodies and human rights groups have called for these non-consensual procedures to end and for decisions to wait until the person can participate.