Medical ethics and rites involving blood.

Although the discussions in the Netherlands on ritual circumcision of girls, ritual circumcision of boys and hymen construction started more than ten years ago, these discussions about rituals of blood are not connected and offer a range of very diverging views. The significance of this article is to make clear that these diverging views and separated discussions fail to make distinctions. As a result, strategies to achieve abolition of these practices are not well thought through. The objective is to connect and to deepen these discussions by a practical method, starting with the dilemmas aid workers are confronted with. The conclusion is that other issues play a role, the issue of the space we allow others to be different and the manner in which the juxtaposition of "individual versus the group" influences this issue.