This is a response to a controversial piece in Science Based Medicine by Amy Tuteur, M.D. on circumcision: "The case for neonatal circumcision," which cites a recent journal paper of the same title [1]. Beyond calling for the American medical establishment to put pressure on parents to circumcise their infant children, the article implicitly compares those who don't circumcise or who are opposed to circumcising infants to anti-vaccination activists.
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It was only after cleaning the milk from my monitor and keyboard for the second time, that I decided to delay my already-late breakfast until after reading Amy Tuteur's article on circumcision, which begins in the following even-handed and unbiased fashion:
Imagine if we could save lives from a dread and often fatal disease simply by performing a minor surgical procedure. People would hail this simple victory and rush to adopt it… Not exactly. The disease is HIV and the simple surgical procedure is circumcision and anti-circ activists oppose it under almost any circumstances.
You can find the article here, but the main points are as follows:
- 1. Infants should be circumcised.
- 2. Furthermore, it's silly not to circumcise them.
- 3. Circumcision should be the default option recommended to parents.
- 4. "...the benefits of circumcision are real and clinically important."
- 5. "...recent studies make it clear that sexual satisfaction is not affect (sic) by circumcision..."
- 6. It is implied that those who oppose infant circumcision are 'Anti-circ activists'.
- 7. "Anti-circ activists have employed inflammatory language to express their opinion."
- 8. The AAP backed down and stopped advising circumcision in 1999 because of pressure from 'anti-circ' activists.
I want to address the last three claims first (6,7 & 8), regarding the behaviour and influence of 'anti-circ activists.' In particular, the claims about the AAP being somehow 'influenced' by these sinister people are completely unevidence and entering Conspiracy Theory territory. The 1999 policy statement of the AAP is still online, and in it they state:
"Existing scientific evidence demonstrates potential medical benefits of newborn male circumcision; however, these data are not sufficient to recommend routine neonatal circumcision. In the case of circumcision, in which there are potential benefits and risks, yet the procedure is not essential to the child’s current well-being, parents should determine what is in the best interest of the child."
The policy statement cites 119 peer reviewed articles and a variety of epidemiological data to reach that conclusion. If Amy feels that the conclusion is wrong, or the review is flawed, she needs to explain why.
Smearing the AAP because they produce a conclusion that disagrees with your personal view is not a very constructive or rational approach to debate.
Likewise, the reference to 'anti-circ activists' seems to be a deliberate play on 'anti-vax', more ad hominem attack than rational argument, and designed in my view to imply that those opposed to Amy's view are irrational or in denial of the evidence: "anti-circ activists oppose [circumcision] under almost any circumstances."
At best it's unhelpful, at worst it's inflammatory. It certainly isn't persuasive.
The word 'mutilation', as used by those opposed to routine circumcision of infants, may also be inflammatory; but they have on their side the fact that the dictionary agrees with their usage. The deliberate damaging or destruction of part of the body is technically mutilation, and while mutilation is ultimately in the eye of the beholder - one man's mutilation is his son's cool new body art - the infant beholder isn't yet capable of making this choice.
And that's the crux of this matter, for me. If you're going to advocate making a permanent alteration to the appearance of somebody's genitals, without waiting for them to be old enough to decide for themselves and consent to it, then you had better have a bloody good, watertight, and immediately urgent reason for doing so.
Tuteur's article is titled "The case for neonatal circumcision", so you might expect to actually see this case presented, but it isn't. The only evidence that is discussed in the post addresses two questions - can circumcision be beneficial, and can it impede sexual function.
Let's take the latter claim first. Tuteur confidently states the following in characteristically-loaded language:
"Anti-circ activists are convinced that circumcision reduces sexual satisfaction. Until recently, it was difficult to study that claim because very few men were circumcised after becoming sexually active, making it almost impossible to determine the sensory effect of circumcision. But recent studies make it clear that sexual satisfaction is not affect (sic) by circumcision."
Yet this simply isn't the case. Findings have been mixed, and while Tuteur is happy to cite two African studies, it's not hard to find that other recent surveys produce rather different results (e.g.[2]). Even those studies that Tuteur cites as supporting her case are in fact rather questionable in their conclusions.
The Ugandan study [3] for example found (through self-reporting) that "adult male circumcision was not associated with sexual dysfunction," but also noted that "circumcised men reported increased penile sensitivity and enhanced ease of reaching orgasm." Despite the somewhat leading use of positive language (I'm not sure 'faster orgasm' is high on many mens' lists of medical needs), the data suggests that sexual function was altered, and Tuteur's 'dissatisfaction' is not the same as the study's 'dysfunction.'
The effect of circumcision on sexual function is complex, doubtless varies from person-to-person, and remains a controversial issue in several branches of medicine. To imply that this controversy no longer exists as the result of a couple of cherry-picked findings is grossly misleading.
The burden of proof remains on advocates of non-consensual circumcision to demonstrate that it does not impair sexual function.
Likewise, controversy still surrounds many of the benefits of circumcision, and Tuteur's attempt to use data from East Africa to support a change in US policy is deeply misguided. The validity of the African trials is a subject that deserves a blog post in its own right, but their suggestion that circumcision results in a 30-50% reduction in the transmission rates of some STIs in the third world has very little relevance in the West, with different cultures, far smaller rates of transmission, better hygiene and healthcare, and so on.
Even if the numbers could be accurately applied to the West, they would be misleading given the tiny rate of prevalence of HIV in most communities in developed nations. In a country with high prevalence these figures might equate to 1 case of HIV/AIDS being prevented for every 72 surgical interventions, but in the West this figure would be far, far greater.
And it's not as if these surgeries are risk free. Tuteur fails to discuss the risk of complications in her article, but they do occur, and at significant rates. The American Academy of Family Physicians cite in their position paper a fatality rate of around 1:500,000, and cite a variety of conflicting evidence that puts the rate of complications at anything from 0.1% to 35%. Even if you choose to ignore ethical concerns (and it's notable that Tuteur's article makes no mention of ethics at any point), at some point the medical costs begin to outweigh some of the the benefits.
I tend to agree with Harriet Hall's assessment that circumcision is medically fairly neutral, with small risks and small benefits. But while so much uncertainty exists over the long-term effects, and with so little demonstrable benefit for public health in the West, putting pressure on parents to circumcise makes very little sense to me.
Meanwhile other interventions like simply improving hygiene, wearing a condom or adjusting behaviour are likely to result in far greater reductions in STI transmission, with no requirement for surgery.
Infant responding to Tuteur's article.
The AAP's advice is to leave it up to parents, but I say leave it up to the kid himself, when he's old enough to decide. In the absence of any great medical need for early intervention, we should let people make their own decisions about the appearance of their genitals. If Tuteur disagrees with this, she needs to present some sort of evidence to explain why.
So far, she hasn't, and a largely unevidenced rant at 'anti-circs' isn't exactly helping to get her point across.
[1] Tobian, A., Gray, R., & Quinn, T. (2010). Male Circumcision for the Prevention of Acquisition and Transmission of Sexually Transmitted Infections: The Case for Neonatal Circumcision Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, 164 (1), 78-84 DOI: 10.1001/archpediatrics.2009.232
[2] Kim, D., & Pang, M. (2007). The effect of male circumcision on sexuality BJU International, 99 (3), 619-622 DOI: 10.1111/j.1464-410X.2006.06646.x
[3] Krieger, J., Mehta, S., Bailey, R., Agot, K., Ndinya-Achola, J., Parker, C., & Moses, S. (2008). Adult Male Circumcision: Effects on Sexual Function and Sexual Satisfaction in Kisumu, Kenya Journal of Sexual Medicine, 5 (11), 2610-2622 DOI: 10.1111/j.1743-6109.2008.00979.x
http://layscience.net/trackback/878
Have had 3 sexual partners (so far!) who were circed as children and lots more not. It definitely changes sexual function, in that circed cocks respond differently to stimuli, especially manual. Whether this change is an impairment is not for me, as a girl, to say, but to pretend that the change is non-existent is bloody ridiculous.
Doctors need more ethics classes.
I'll pass the link to this post onto the Secular Medical Forum who are currently researching the subject.
I don't disagree, but there is an issue with leaving "it up to the kid himself, when he's old enough to decide", which very few commentators seem to recognise. Neonatal circumcision is a minor procedure which heals much more rapidly than in adults or older children, and with less evidence of distress.
If there were clear medical advantages to circumcision, one could argue that waiting until the kid is old enough to decide deprives him of the benefit of having it done at the easiest and safest time.
Safest time? The complication rate from adult circumcision is extremely low, whilst that from infant circumcision is anywhere from 2 to 10%, depending on how dramatic you wish to consider "complications". Pediatric urologists in the US do a very steady business correcting the awful mishaps of neonatal circumcision. Moreover, the foreskin performs some of its most essential functions in the first few years of life to ensure proper and full development of the glans, to which it is anatomically fused at birth and for years afterward, and to keep the delicate meatus at a distance from pathogens and irritants. The foreskin itself represents more than half the entire skin system of the infant penis. The horrific lysing that physicians need to do to prep a newborn penis for circumcision should in itself contraindicate any surgery.
We can debate the intrinsic sexual value of the adult foreskin (me, I love mine, thanks), but the developmental value of the intact penis right up through puberty cannot even be seriously in doubt.
@ Anonymous 21:23
If the the benefit is worth the risk then the individual will choose it. The rate of complications are not all that different between adult and infant. The big difference might be that an adult can complain more. Also I've never heard of an adult dieing from a medical circumcision I have heard of children dieing though.
Nice article, I love the baby's picture at the end.
Circumcision is also very popular in US because it's performed on unconsenting infants. If the choice was given to the child when he's old enough to decide, this routine procedure would disappear very quickly imo.
Call me an anti-circ activist (I certainly use the term genital mutilation) but the debate about when to do it and benefits to it and is sex better with it... always leaves a bad taste in my mouth because it boils down to discussing whether it's OK to cut bits off a baby.
I can't get past the fact that people think it's OK to cut into a healthy baby's genitals. It's so black and white for me I can't take part in the discussion.
This whole issue is rather complex, and is more in the realms of culture and emotion than any real scientific or rational position.
There are both medical costs and benefits to circumcision, and I suspect (admittedly without having all the evidence) that they are probably margnal and there is no overwhelming benefit oor cost either way.
So the decision on whether or not to circumcise pretty well comes down to culture. To say a parent shouldn't 'force' their child to be circumcised sounds good in theory, but parents are always making decisions for their children based on culture and their own experiences, and to deny that right is fairly disengenuous, unless it could be demonstrated they were causing the child harm. In this case, that is unlikely (should we ban Jewish people from circumcising their children as well?).
I am circumcised. I have no memory of it, and didn't even know my penis had been modified until I saw one that hadn't been done when I was about 7 or 8. All my other friends and family were exatly the same as me (no, I'm not Jewish).
I have no problem with sex, and almost all my partners (female) have said they prefer circumcised penises - my current wife certainly does.
My experience does not mean that is the only way of doing things, and may not suit someone else. So I return to my main point. Unless it can be demonstrated conclusively either way that circumcision is either harmful or harmless - and I don't think it can be - then it should remain a cultural issue for the parents to make on behalf of their children. If they want to leave the decision to the child himself when he is old enough to do so, that's fine.
"So I return to my main point. Unless it can be demonstrated conclusively either way that circumcision is either harmful or harmless - and I don't think it can be - then it should remain a cultural issue for the parents to make on behalf of their children."
It's broadly speaking irreversible. That alone makes it something that should be a choice for the individual concerned later in life, and not one for the parents.
Ed
I guess you are saying Jewish people should be banned from having their children circumsized then?
In using HIV as a justification for circumcision we can consider this question: if circumcision were a HIV vaccine, would it be routinely given?
The idea of a neonatal vaccine is to prevent a disease that may even be relatively rare through a simple intervention applied to most of the population around the time of birth. They have vanishingly small complications rates and many of them can produce total protection if a sufficient proportion of babies are vaccinated.
By comparison, our circumcision vaccine causes the bizarre side-effect of the foreskin falling off. In addition, given protection rates of 30-50% in a vaccinated population, herd immunity cannot be achieved. This means that even if complications were few, it would at best be equivalent to, for example, the BCG vaccine for childhood tuberculosis (actually it wouldn't even be that good). In the UK, BCG is now only given to neonates in high-risk populations.
Given the additional ethical concerns about autonomy over one's intimate functions as an adult, circumcision is probably difficult to justify as a prophylactic measure. It would be interesting to explore as an idea for populations at high-risk of sexual transmission. Should circumcision be offered to all men who have sex with men by GPs? Would this be unacceptably stigmatising or an effective, compassionate public health intervention? More widely, should circumcision be routine in populations with very high risk of exposure, such as those who live or frequently travel to countries in Sub-Saharan Africa?
Orion: Yes. It's a religious choice, and until the child is old enough to make the choice about their religion themselves, they shouldn't have permanent religious choices forced upon them. When they're old enough they can do what they want with their bodies, and I'll be the last person to stop them. Before that, I'll be the first person to stop someone else doing things to them.
Edd,
"...Before that, I'll be the first person to stop someone else doing things to them...."
So, see you at the temple this weekend then? What are your plans to stop this practice taking place?
There is lots of publicity about the reduction of HIV risk in circumcised men, but the study showing an increased HIV risk for women with circumcised partners gets little attention. The Lancet published a study that showed that the women partners of circumcised men have a more than 50% increased risk of HIV infection. The study looked at the partners of the men from Uganda who participated in one of the three cited Africa trials.
See http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(09)60998-3/abstract
Also, I was circumcised at birth. After starting to restore my foreskin I am even more convinced that infant circumcision removes a valuable part of the male genitals.
Orion,
A few parents were arrested for tattooing their children in the news recently. According to your logic, that shouldn't be no? Since tattoos are pretty much harmless.
If you say no, then you're entering the territory that people are talking about: The child deserves his autonomy and body integrity.
"I guess you are saying Jewish people should be banned from having their children circumsized then?"
Why not? We stop people from certain cultures from mutilating their girls. Why not stop people from other cultures from mutilating boys? I mean, if we don't, how is that not sexist?
I've always been very anti-circumcision, so it is with heavy heart that I had to take my little boy, who was 5 at the time, to be circumcised for medical reasons.
We explained things as well as we could, and he seems to be OK with it, but I was very aware of the risks of the procedure.
These, in my view, are underplayed heavily in Amy Tuter's article, and far outweigh the minimal improvement in overall risk from HIV.
That said, however, there seems to be an order of magnitude difference in negative outcomes between male and female circumcision, so if we're going to attack one first, it should be the females that get our attention.
Orion: fair point, I'm not the first, and I'm not going to go about stopping it with force.
I still am quite happy to answer your first question with a big 'yes' and say that religious beliefs are no excuse in this case. The procedure can wait until the individual can be expected to weigh the benefits for themselves, and understand the religious beliefs that argue for it.
Your comment ignores the consequences of the event on the child. Circumcision is a primal wound and it interferes with the maternal/infant bond, disrupts breastfeeding and normal sleep patterns, and undermines the baby's first developmental task of establishing trust. It leaves a scar on the body and the psyche of the non-consenting minor and it is an assault on the baby's body. Circumcision is where sex and violence meet for the first time.
The Number One complaint of circumcised males in America is premature ejaculation, which occurs because the specialized, erogenous nerve endings in the foreskin that let a man know what his penis is feeling and allow him to ride the wave to orgasm are missing. Without them, a man goes "Ooh, ooh, oops! Sorry, honey, it's because I'm so sensitive." Nope, it's because he lost what was rightfully his, a normal penis, with the 20,000-70,000 nerve endings that encircle the opening of the foreskin.
At the other end of life, the exposed, calloused, desensitized, glans becomes more and more difficult to stimulate. It's no surprise that males in the US have a high rate of erectile dysfunction, and the USA has the highest sales of Viagra in the world.
You cannot alter form without altering function. When a male's foreskin is amputated, it affects him for life and his partner's sex life is affected as well. The mechanics of sex must be altered to compensate for what was lost. As CJ Fallier wrote in JAMA in 1970, "...the fundamental biological sexual act becomes, for the circumcised male, the satisfaction of an urge and not the refined sensory experience it was meant to be."
Circumcision is not a medical issue, it is a human rights issue. We protect females from genital cutting in the USA and it's time we protect our males as well.
I was actually very surprised to see such a poorly argued piece in SBM. I came away with the idea that Amy actually could not understand why there would be any ethical problems with the procedure, and an unwillingness to accept that there was more than one side to the argument.
Unfortunately for those trying to claim there is no harm from circumcision, there is OBJECTIVE and scientifically credible proof of harm from circumcision.
http://www.cirp.org/library/anatomy/taylor/
http://www.urotoday.com/42/browse_categories/erectile_dysfunction_ed/fin...
Fine-Touch Pressure Thresholds in the Adult Penis l
http://www.nocirc.org/touch-test/bju_6685.pdf
"Analysis of results showed the glans of the uncircumcised men had significantly lower thresholds than that of circumcised men (P = 0.040). There were also significant differences in pressure thresholds by location on the penis (p < 0.0001). The most sensitive location on the circumcised penis was the circumcision scar on the ventral surface. It was remarkable that five locations on the uncircumcised penis that are routinely removed at circumcision had lower pressure thresholds that the ventral scar of the circumcised penis.
This study suggests that the transitional region from the external to the internal prepuce is the most sensitive region of the uncircumcised penis and more sensitive than the most sensitive region of the circumcised penis. It appears that circumcision ablates the most sensitive parts of the penis."
http://www.prweb.com/releases/2007/3/prweb512999.htm
"A new study in the British Journal of Urology International shows that men with normal, intact penises enjoy more sexual sensitivity — as much as four times more — than those who have been circumcised. Circumcising slices off more of a male's sensitivity than is normally present in all ten fingertips. "
"I've always been very anti-circumcision, so it is with heavy heart that I had to take my little boy, who was 5 at the time, to be circumcised for medical reasons."
What were those reasons for a needed circumcision?
Since the rate of necessary circumcision is"
First of all, for a man who was not circumcised as an infant the chances of him having to get circumcised as a adult are extremely rare. In fact it's only 6 in 100,000. (0.006%)
Health officials of each Scandanavian country were queried about adult circumcision.. None of the health officials could provide precise data, because the numbers were so small that they weren't worth compiling. Each official stressed that foreskin problems were present but said they were largely treated medically-surgical solutions were extremly rare.
"in Oslo, Norway, over a 26-year period in which 20,000 male babies were cared for, 3 circumcisions were performed-a frequency rate of 0.02%.
In Denmark. 1968 children up to the age of 17 were examined over a period of several years. In this group, 3 circumcisions were performed-a frequency of 0.15%. In this study, in retrospect, the physicians believed that all three operations might have been avoided. Both of these studies related to the infrequency of circumcision and puberty, they did not deal with the issue in adulthood.
Wallerstein, Edward, Circumcision: An American Health Fallacy. pg 128
In Finland -- a non-circumcising country -- the operative rate is only a tiny fraction of this percentage. A male's risk of being circumcised for any reason during his entire lifespan is less than one in 16,000.
http://www.fathermag.com/health/circ/circumcision/circumcision4.shtml
The Finnish National Board of Health provided national case records for the year 1970 for both phimosis and paraphimosis. A total of 409 cases was reported for males 15 years and older,which represents only 2/100ths of 1% (0.023%) of the total male population in that age group. This means that 99.97% did NOT develop a problem. Moreover, according to Finnish authorities, only a fraction of the reported cases required surgery– a number too small to reliably estimate.
Wallerstein, Edward, CIRCUMCISION: AN AMERICAN HEALTH FALLACY p.128
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=269
I have to wonder IF it was really necessary, or this is just another example of ignorance on the part of American doctors.
IF the diagnosis was phimosis, then it certainly was ignorance--and malpractice by your doctor.
Cutting normal healthy body parts out or off of other people without the fully informed adult written permission of the proposed amputee is a crime against humanity called "human vivisection" by the court at Nuremburg, the same crime licensed German doctors were convicted and jailed shortly after World War II of committing against Jews, Gypsies, and others during the war. Jail the mutilators. All of them. No excuse is valid. This is not medicine. This is not culture. This is not parents' rights. This is criminal activity, regardless of the sex of the child, the religion of the parents, the quality of medical care or opinion. Enforce the law, equally, in every case. Put the mutilators where they belong, in jail with the Nazi doctors. Let them cut EACH OTHER up.
^^ if we're going to attack one first, it should be the females that get our attention. ^^
94% of the world's population already lives under laws banning FGM with no religious exemption. A male is more than 5 times as likely as a female to be missing sexual parts due to non-therapeutic genital cutting.
End ALL genital cutting.
This Amy chick is one of those cranky pro-vaxxxers, I guess.
Well now. It does seem likely that since Amy is not at risk for genital mutilation she might be a touch biased. Further, the argument about the detrimental effects of female circ would argue for a reduction of the damage from the procedure if religion or culture were sufficient for genital reduction surgery. If it is a human rights issue, as the UN and Amnesty International claim, then it is for boys too. Unless Amy buys into the argument men are less human than women. An argument slave holders would have understood in 19th century America, tho there it would have skin color not gender.
The scientific arguments are well established but the epidemiology is not. In English speaking countries the circumcision rate is very well correlated with the HIV rate. And not in a good way. My numbers show a 95% correlation between increased cutting and increased HIV infections. This is a strong argument that as a prevention it has not worked. Further, in Europe many heterosexuals with HIV are from countries where HIV is endemic so the rates are even lower in Canada and England. The US does not allow immigration of HIV+ individuals so our epidemic is ours alone.
Also no one ahs mentioned that the data from UNAIDS, AVERT and the CDC show a VERY low infection rate for children and young adults younger than 20. In fact, the highest rate is for adults between the ages of 24 and 35. Plenty of time for a guy to establish his pattern and assess the risks and advantages for himself. A neonate is not in this position and the medical establishment thinks a) all boys will be profligate sex fiends and b) if it still works ie he can impregnate a woman, there is no damage. Psychology, physiology, ontology, ethics, autonomy mean nothing. If they had data about female circ, they would recommend that too as they did in the early 20th century. Lets face it, female circ does not prevent a woman from becoming pregnant so it is not really harmful, just unnecessary. Unless, of course, you buy into that human rights thing.
It is a medical fetish and obsession. That is why Australia and British Columbia both condemn circ even with the data from Africa. Check it out, only American doctors and a few whackos in the rest of the world say it is good for children. But then they have been doing it for a long time and they probably do not want to admit they are wrong - doctors hate being wrong. They likely hate admitting they themselves were harmed by their own profession even more.
@Robert - I don't really feel comfortable discussing details of the medical problems of my family in open forum; I am sure you understand.
Suffice it to say that we consulted an expert in the field and followed his advice. (My son is, BTW, now fine.)
We are also not in the US. We live in the UK where circumcision is relatively rare outside Jewish and Muslim communities, and the default position is not to operate unless clinically necessary.
Sean, I understand. The reason I asked is because of the tremendous ignorance about the normal penis and how to treat minor problems--even in the UK.
There are studies that even there many times circumcision is not really necessary and are still performed for minor problems even by so-called experts...phimosis being the most common.
Suffice to say, in countries that have no history of infant circumcision, and where that are more educated about the normal penis the rates of necessary circumcision are so low, that they really don't even show up on the radar.
First of all, for a man who was not circumcised as an infant the chances of him having to get circumcised as a adult are extremely rare. In fact it's only 6 in 100,000. (0.006%)
Health officials of each Scandinavian country were queried about adult circumcision.. None of the health officials could provide precise data, because the numbers were so small that they weren't worth compiling. Each official stressed that foreskin problems were present but said they were largely treated medically-surgical solutions were extremly rare.
"in Oslo, Norway, over a 26-year period in which 20,000 male babies were cared for, 3 circumcisions were performed-a frequency rate of 0.02%.
In Denmark. 1968 children up to the age of 17 were examined over a period of several years. In this group, 3 circumcisions were performed-a frequency of 0.15%. In this study, in retrospect, the physicians believed that all three operations might have been avoided. Both of these studies related to the infrequency of circumcision and puberty, they did not deal with the issue in adulthood.
Wallerstein, Edward, Circumcision: An American Health Fallacy. pg 128
In Finland -- a non-circumcising country -- the operative rate is only a tiny fraction of this percentage. A male's risk of being circumcised for any reason during his entire lifespan is less than one in 16,000.
http://www.fathermag.com/health/circ/circumcision/circumcision4.shtml
The Finnish National Board of Health provided national case records for the year 1970 for both phimosis and paraphimosis. A total of 409 cases was reported for males 15 years and older,which represents only
2/100ths of 1% (0.023%) of the total male population in that age group. This means that 99.97% did NOT develop a problem. Moreover, according to Finnish authorities, only a fraction of the reported cases required surgery– a number too small to reliably estimate.
Wallerstein, Edward, CIRCUMCISION: AN AMERICAN HEALTH FALLACY p.128
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=269
As for your beliefthat now your son is fine, please excuse me for stating the obvious--he is still missing a normal, functioning part of his genitals, and that hardly qualifies as fine.
this thread hurts just reading it.
I agree with Ian and I think it should be banned.
It's crazy. It should be a decision made by the person. online casino
Samuel.
I think Dr. Amy enjoyed every circumcision she did on screaming, unconsenting, helpless infant males, because she is a sexist manhating bitch. No wonder so many women are victims of domestic violence. They allow it and even demand it on their male children, who then grow up to beat women. These women's karma brings violence BACK to them!
So if the parents consent to sodomizing their child it's OK then?
Child abuse is child abuse, for whatever reason.
Cutting off bits of a person without their consent is immoral.
Allow that person (Yes an infant IS a person.) to decide for themselves what is best for them.
What next, justifying tattooing an infant?