Oh No! It's Another Thread About Circumcision.

[unloadonme]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

I'm not sure where you've seen a circumcision but I would hardly call them "ritualistic mutilation" -- unless of course you would classify a nose job or boob job as ritualistic mutilation because in the end it's just another body modification. My doctor had no candles lit, no chants were uttered, and my procedure was completed very quickly according to my parents, but maybe that was just MY case.

At least when you have nose or boob job it's done to consenting adults to correct perceived shortcomings. To circumcise baby boys simply because they're male is surely ritualistic. What else could it be? There's rarely any medical reason to do it.

You're right though, Americans are keener on this than the British.

 

[MIJ-VI]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

It's cultural and probably based on post WWI faulty studies when comparing Jews to Gentiles in terms of STDs. Subsequent studies and improved daily hygiene has shown no difference. The most famous study was a comparison of Israelis and Indian Farcis, both known to have high hygiene standards.

My ex-wife and my sister were pregnant at the same time. We made a pact not to circumsize in case we had boys. We both had sons and neither is circumsized. The argument sometimes used in the US is that the boys will feel out of place in the lockerroom. Personally, I don't think we should torture baby boys. The docs say it is nothing. I won't watch the video, but I remember reading the description of how it is done and I couldn't consent to that being done.

And then some of these same boys grow up and decided for themselves to pierce, etc. Go figure.

A BIG +1.

IMO medically unnecessary circumcision = a barbaric form of child abuse.

 

[Mstrshake]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

If you've got something to pull back, surely you haven't been circumcised.

You are right, I worded that wrong. I should have said that I don't need to pull back. Sorry about that.

Circumcision is one of the most overprescribed surgeries in North America. Doctors either don't know, or don't care, about safe and effective alternatives. This is especialy true for phimosis.

Did your doctor discuss the use of betamethasone topical cream for 4-6 weeks to the narrow part of the foreskin? It is simple, less expensive than surgical treatments and highly effective. It has replaced circumcision as the preferred treatment method for some physicians in the British National Health Service and much of Europe.

If you are happy with it, that's cool. But I know people that hate it, and were never even given alternatives.

My urologist did tell me that there were other ways of dealing with my condition, but my doctor specifically told me that a circumcision would be a good decision.

I first mentioned it to my urologist and he told me that before going through with any surgery that I should first try and see if it could be corrected without any sort of surgical intrusion (pulling back frequently etc), but the condition remained the same, the pain of pulling back hurt equally as immensely every single time, and so fast-forwarding from September to March we decided that I would go through with the surgery.

As for it being unhealthy...I suppose I can't make a blanket statement encompassing all other surgeries that take place (especially during infancy), but mine was perfectly safe and in the time following the procedure I have had no medical issues. The surgery was done and I was allowed to leave the hospital in the same day, very little physical activity in the subsequent few weeks and plenty of discomfort but my doctor was right in saying "it's not that bad". Most people recoil at the idea of circumcision, but I don't think that it is entirely rational. That is just my opinion after experiencing it first hand.

Anyway. This is not some sort of motivational post to "get everyone out there circumcised!" or anything like that, and it has little to nothing to do with circumcision of newborn children. I just wanted to mention my experience.

 

[milboy]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

No medical organization in the world recommends routine infant circumcision as a medical necessity.

So why are Americans so persistent with continuing this culture of having their son's foreskin removed, all in the name of cosmetics, etc. That's sick if you ask me. It's not medically necessary.

Europe was able to shy away from this barbaric procedure. Canada was able to abandon this barbaric procedure. Australia too was able to make this culture thing a thing of the past. Americans (NOT ALL, but the pro-cutting ones) are just a bunch of dumbasses.

 

[milboy]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

When I said Europe, I meant the UK. Sweden, the Netherlands, and Greece, (just to name a few countries), NEVER in their history circumcised their males. And guess what? They don't seem to have all these foreskin related problems that are all myths.

Foreskin isn't defective. It's meant to be there. It's HIS body. HIS choice. No one has the right to remove healthy tissue from an unconsenting baby boys penis.

 

[SLCBiGuy]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

Americans (NOT ALL, but the pro-cutting ones) are just a bunch of dumbasses.

Well that's your opinion but it isn't going to change my decision in the matter and it's sad that you resort to name-calling to try and prove your point. Are you going to start a crusade next against parents who decide to pierce their infants ears? That will be a losing battle for you as well

 

[Mstrshake]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

I'm from Canada, by the way.

 

[MyReply]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

For crying out loud. What else should parents not do, baptize their kids?

The "activism" over this topic always reads so cartoonish and overboard. And I notice how it's usually gay men (suffering a case of exaggerated penis envy, after logging too many hours of taking in porn featuring guys from overseas) who're especially passionate over this. A circumcised penis does everything it's ultimately supposed to do: it urinates, it erects, it ejaculates and it makes babies.

Right now there is a baby boy being born to a mother who will abandon him after the delivery, and some are more concerned about if a millimeter of foreskin from around his penis head is being removed or not.

 

[bankside]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

Parents should also not baptize their kids. It's silly to think that philosophical positions about the nature of the universe should be heritable.

However, that is not the question at hand. What I find interesting is remarks like "mind your own business" given by pro-circumcision people.

Well, yes, mind your own business. If it is your personal penis, do whatever you like with it. If it is not a penis growing somewhere out of your own personal body, then mind your own business.

Oh, and one more thing: the topic here is not "All people who are happy to be circumcised are wrong." The topic is not "Cut people have ugly dysfunctional penises." The topic is, it shouldn't be done to babies on some autopilot assumption that this is what the child would want. One day, the child will grow old enough to make up his own mind, about a part of his own body, as is his right.

 

[theFallenGod]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

I have always been kinda resentful of the fact that feet rarely look pretty ...

I think because I don't like the way feet look... I will have my childs feet removed at birth. Just so they don't have to grow up with ugly feet.

I will refuse to give my child a choice in the matter.. But because feet ...to me... are aesthetically unpleasing to view I feel it is my right as a parent to make such a choice.

I don't care that feet serve a purpose to me they are ugly.

I also find tattoos pleasing so when my child is born I am going to put tattoos on my child...ones that I like... so that he will be more pleasing to me...

 

[BearBoi]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

Right now there is a baby boy being born to a mother who will abandon him after the delivery, and some are more concerned about if a millimeter of foreskin from around his penis head is being removed or not.

You imagine there is a finite amount of care and concern people can allocate to Human Rights causes?

There isn’t.

Many people can and do care passionately about a wide range of issue involving human rights violations. Sexually mutilating infants most definitely falls into that category.

I'm happy that you uncut individuals are satisfied with the decision your parents made. You are completely entitled to your feelings/opinions but they are NOT going to change what my family feels/thinks.

Why are you are speaking about this issue as if it has anything to do with you, let alone your whole family? It doesn’t. This isn’t about the way your “family” thinks/feels, because the only opinion being considered belongs to you and your partner, while the only person who will actually live with the life-long irreversible decision does not have a say.

Nobody has the “right” to cosmetically amputate another person’s body parts. If I were to remain silent and pretend that you do, than where should I stop?

Oh, and one more thing: the topic here is not "All people who are happy to be circumcised are wrong." The topic is not "Cut people have ugly dysfunctional penises." The topic is, it shouldn't be done to babies on some autopilot assumption that this is what the child would want. One day, the child will grow old enough to make up his own mind, about a part of his own body, as is his right.

+1!

 

[freefall]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

29 boys die from circumcision in the USA!!

Just for info: most death cases during circumcision are due to works of incompetent people (e.g. witchdoctors, which are still prevalent, even in developed countries). If done professionally and the operation wound treated adequately, the worst thing that can happen is the remaining scar.

The problem is that boys are not erecting as much as adults, so the healing process after the circumcision is easier, hence the choice of early circumcision by many doctors, with or without the consent of the parents.

 

[doctorsun]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

^No, this is an issue about doctors going out of their way to needlessly mutilate and scar children forever. Doctors are evil...EVIL! lol

Maybe you would feel better if you held a memorial service for the foreskin that was mercilessly STOLEN from you and MURDERED. Forget about aborting unborn babies...foreskins are the helpless victims we REALLY need to be protecting.

 

[bankside]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

You might also look for a clue.

I don't know how people could put the point more moderately and objectively. But it seems to be a good point if people are reduced to opposing it so ludicrously. I'm cut. I enjoy sex. I don't stop halfway through to weep for my lost foreskin. I don't call up my mom halfway through sex to say "Mommmmm....Whyyyyyyyyy!!!!" Get a grip.

This is just an issue of right and wrong. Nowadays we just know better. It's like how we don't give kids the strap in school any more or break rulers across their knuckles. Did it destroy our civilization to do that to children? No. But it was still wrong. And with mandatory circumcision, we have the opportunity to make it better, by letting boys make the call for themselves.

Why are people afraid of letting boys grow up to speak for themselves on the issue? What is wrong with letting a kid enjoy his foreskin if it is important to him, or even if it just doesn't bother him?

There are some uncut kids who always wanted to be cut. They invariably get their way. Their wishes are respected. The only way for everyone's wishes to be respected - about their own bodies - is to leave them alone until they can decide for themselves.

 

[PolterGUYst]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

My personal opinion is that parents shouldn't circumcise their babies. It is a permanent change and a child should at least be old enough to discuss the decision with their parents before any procedure is done.

However, I'm not going to demonize parents who make the decision to circumcise their babies as if they do it because they have some sort of fetish for blood and infant tears that are the product of a horned doctor slicing into their little boy with a scythe.

I don't resent my parents for my own circumcision, and I'm pretty sure if you polled every circumcised man in existence who holds resentment towards his parents, I'm pretty sure that, on average, lack of a foreskin wouldn't be in the top 5 reasons for wanting to punch their father in the face. I'm also pretty sure that, on average, lack of a foreskin wouldn't be in the top 5 reasons for why a man thinks he has a crappy sex life.

 

[BearBoi]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

You anti-cut men are making a terrible mistake in logic: you all believe that the choice to circumcise is always cosmetic.

Speaking for myself, this is in no way true.

I carefully phrase my points to include the words “cosmetic” or “aesthetic” to differentiate between people who circumcise their infant sons for those secular reasons, and others who may do so for religious.

I don’t think the religiously based reasons are in any way superior, and I do privately disagree with them, but I’m not about to get involved in the theological issues certain communities place on this practice.

Before you decry me as a hypocrite, my reasoning is quite simple: nothing I say to such communities will mater. The only way that real change comes to a religious movement is from within. I am not ‘within.’ Therefore, I respectfully step back from those circles and allow their own internal anti-circumcision movements to flower. Both Judaism and Islam have growing groups of reformists that, among other things, oppose circumcision. Change is coming.

I vigorously dispute this notion. I believe that, as often as not, the issue is hygenic/medical.

Preventative medicine does not include amputating healthy functional body parts.

It is illogical to promote amputating a functional body part from an infant due to the assumption that its owner may not practice proper hygiene which may lead to infection which may be a problem at some point in the distant future.

As for medical; it is true that there are some forms of illness for which circumcision has been a prescribed remedy. We’ve covered a couple of them in previous posts. However, as medical knowledge expands other treatment options are becoming favoured. Perhaps in time they will outstrip the age old remedy of slashing off a body part just as surely as blood-letting and vapours to affect the humours have died a quiet death.

 

[fetaby]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

^You missed the point, bearboi.

I merely assert that some people circumcise for hygenic/medical purposes, NOT cosmetic purposes like everybody here was saying.

I don't assert that those hygenic/medical ideas hold verisimilitude.

Then why even bring it up? If you don't have faith in your own argument, what are you doing?

 

[arpeggi]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

I also find tattoos pleasing so when my child is born I am going to put tattoos on my child...ones that I like... so that he will be more pleasing to me...

I like that.
As I was actually planning on having a female baby, I plan to go a tad further with the cutting. My son will be having a full on sex change operation directly after birth. Also, since I'm gay, I think this will make the child's life much easier as I am horrible at sports, will not be teaching him any, and would not want the boy ridiculed for having two dads and poor hand-eye coordination. The child's life would be much easier as a girl.

Sure it'll be painful, but I'm told babies won't remember it anyway.

 

[fetaby]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

Fetaby, maybe I didn't explain it right.

Many of the posters seem to be under the impression that people circumcise their sons purely for cosmetic reasons.

I am saying, "No, there are other reasons people circumcise their sons. First and foremost, they're trying to create a hygenic environment that they believe will reduce the risk of disease transmission."

(Whether or not this belief reflects reality is quite a different matter, you see.)

Yeah, I read ya. And honestly I don't care about this topic. What's done to me has been done to me, and until I'm in a position to make a decision for my own child this doesn't affect me.

BUT, a weak argument is weak.

This debate isn't about the reasons WHY they do it. It's more about them not being the people to make that decision.

But here's the thing. They made you. You belong to them. You are property.

There maybe some decorum around that fact. Polite rules set forth by society to give the appearance that this isn't the case. But it is the case.

 

[Dduder]

Re: End Routine Infant Circumcision

Ok, as a medical student I could write at length over this, but I have found out that debating this with Americans is pointless for many reasons. There are many reasons why circumcision is redundant but convincing Americans of this is almost impossible because they simply don't want to hear it.

And I am circumcised myself, so it's not like I am biased in favor of uncircumcised penises because I have one.