Even granting what you say, I see no point in “kicking my child in the junk” and risking side effects merely for cosmetic purposes.
Anyone know if these “rare” side effects are as rare as the penile cancer (or whatever) the circumcision is supposed to prevent?
As to those unlikely future medical problems, well, I will probably not remove my son’s appendix until and if it causes problems. I also intend to leave his tonsils in until and if they become a problem.
Circumcision That Didn’t Heal Kills Boy (NewsNet5 - Cleveland, OH, October 20, 1998) (Admittedly mirrored by a biased site.)
Other accounts of deaths of infants due to circumcision complications can reportedly be found in these documents:
Holt LE. Tuberculosis acquired through ritual circumcision. JAMA 1913;LXI(2):99-102.
Reuben MS. Tuberculosis from ritual circumcision. Proceedings of the New York Academy of Medicine 1916; (December 15): 333-334.
Gairdner D. The fate of the foreskin. A study of circumcision. BMJ 1949; 2: 1433-37.
Scurlock JM, Pemberton PJ. Neonatal meningitis and circumcision. Med J Aust 1977;1:332-334.
Cleary TG, Kohl S. Overwhelming infection with group B beta-hemolytic streptococcus associated with circumcision. Pediatrics, Vol 64, no 3, (September 1979), pp. 301-303.
Note: I haven’t read them myself. I found them at the Circumcision Information and Resource Pages.
Something about il Topo’s argument sounds vaguely familiar, but I cannot quite put my finger on it…
Anyway, a friend of mine had to get circ’ed at the age of 26 because of a medical condition. He said it didn’t hurt nearly as much as he thought it would, which would only make sense. After all, there’s a lot more sensation in the glans than in the shaft, and local anethesia can do wonders.
He won’t be six years old forever…
Personally, I’m against circumcision simply because I don’t think someone should be allowed to perform cosmetic surgery on someone against their will. And that would include tattooing and piercings (Though at least piercings will naturally revert, right?).
Personally, I like a quote I saw in an earlier debate on the subject: “I’m uncircumsized, and can’t imagine why anyone would want to say to any newborn boy: welcome to the world, now let’s make you bleed from your penis!” (Forget who said it…)
“Although hemorrhage and sepsis are the main cause of morbidity, the variety of complications is enormous. The literature abounds with reports of morbidity and even death as a result of circumcision.” – Williams, N. and Kapila, L. Complications of Circumcision. British Journal of Surgery, vol. 80, pp. 1231-1236, October 1993.
A list of serious complications of circumcision may be found here: CIRP: Complications of Circumcision [WARNING: Graphic Medical Photos at this site.]
“The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) states, ‘The exact incidence of postoperative complications is unknown.’ One must question: Why is the incidence of complications not recorded? The AAP estimates, however, that this incidence is 0.2%, an extraordinarily low figure. Even applying this low incidence to the number of estimated circumcisions during the above period, over 131,726 males are living with these complications.” Estimated U.S. Incidence of Neonatal Circumcision Complications (physical only) Affecting Males Born between 1940 and 1990, NOHARMM Web Site
**
Whether or not you want you kid circimsized is no business of mine. I have no strong feelings one way or the other in regards to circumcision. I don’t believe it provides many medical benefits and the risk associated with it are so low that it doesn’t bother me.
Marc
I realise I don’t come from a cultural or religious background where circumcision is “normal”, but doesn’t anyone think it should be the child’s decision rather than the parents’?
Someone needs to pay the hamsters (was this place down for the last 14 hours?)
Il Topo, after looking at your cites you’re really not provinding any real proof. NOHARMM(sp?) is an anti-circumcision site and their “estimated” numbers don’t seem right (for north america). I can understand there are plenty of deaths in Africa from circumcision but I doubt it’s that wide spread here.
I did find a link that I cannot yet confirm 100% that details the death of a child in BC:
I’m skeptical because if babies were dying left and right I’m sure there would be more outrage than a few online groups.
Unless anyone can debunk the cancer numbers, I’ll probably still press for circumcision (I’m with MGibson thought. It’s your choice).
I am amused at how fixated the anti circ folks get on a flap of skin. Dress it up all you want, that’s all it is. Big deal.
I am equally amused at how fixated we are in a modern society to routinely cut off a flap of skin which is a normal part of the human body. That is truly very odd.
Are you equally amused at all the other silly things people in modern society do to the normal parts of their bodies? Or do you just get worked up about foreskins?
{Waits patiently for Jack Dean Tyler’s sock to show up.}
Esprix
Please inform me of other silly things we routinely do to baby body parts (such as remove them).
You would be incorrect to extrapolate my viewpoint to a condemnation of what people choose to do to their own bodies. I may think someone is silly to put a metal bar through their tongue, but that’s freedom, baby, and I support their right to do that 100%. Now, if they started running around putting studs in other people’s tongues without their consent, I’d throw them in the slammer. If they started doing it to their newborn children, I would certainly begin to wonder about them, and I would argue on this message board that doctors shouldn’t routinely do it.
I have 2 sons, and neither of them were circumcised. I think circumcism is almost always unnecessary and painful to the baby.
However, this lawsuit is silly. I have a son that is exactly the same age as the child of the plaintiffs. There was plenty of information available at the time about the disadvantages of routine circumcism.
If the plaintiffs didn’t know about the disadvantages, it’s because they chose not to do their research. Before you have a proceedure done on your child (or yourself) it is your duty to inform yourself. If they did not do so, then that is their fault, not the doctor’s.
Agreed. The parents messed up. They should take full responsibility for their own failure.
Again, agreed.
HOWEVER, as I mentioned, I just had a son, and the default was circumcision…so much so, that they had to label my sons rolling crib with a sticker so that he wasn’t circumcised by mistake; no sticker meant circumcision. Even after they labeled it, it was covered by a baby blanket, and I was asked again if I wanted circumcision. They made it seem like an important issue. If I hadn’t informed myself, I would have begun to wonder. When I said “No”, one of the nurses showed visible relief, and congratulated us for our decision. All in all, it was quite strange.
I can see a set of parents, uninformed, perhaps without the inclination, education, free time and/or financial means to surf the web or go to the library for medical answers, with circumcision being pushed by a bunch of people with post-graduate degrees dressed in white coats…I can see such parents agreeing to circumcision. Full, informed consent? Perhaps, but I can see how they would now be pissed about it.
BUT, I agree with you. Ultimately, it is the parents’ fault for agreeing to the procedure. Throw the case out; it wastes tax payer money. The courtroom should not be soap box. That’s why I come here!
I’ll assume that is a moral argument, because the law is quite the opposite. Before somebody can agree to a procedure, they give informed consent for that procedure. I’ll agree that before somebody allows their child’s penis to be cut, they should bear some responsibility for finding out all relevant information, but legally, they need to be fully informed by the doctor or staff.
Your analysis is 100% correct, Hamlet. I am somewhat incredulous at someone allowing someone else to cut on their child’s genitals without giving it a second thought, and I also have a vague feeling that people sometimes are too quick to resort to the courts for their own failings. But, it is entirely possible in this case that the doctor did not inform them, thereby resulting in a legitimate assault/battery claim since they did not consent to the type of “touching” which actually occured.
I presume that the damages of “diminished sexual sensation injury” are pleaded for increased damages, since the damages for mere lack of cosent (in other words, “assault” or “battery”) are probably statutory and therefore very small and not at all punitive in nature.
But I’m not a criminal lawyer.
I think Cecil’s article has it just about right - physically it is no big deal, one way or the other.
However, it is a big deal for some cultures, such as Jews, for whom circumcision is a major ritual.
Not to cast aspersions on anyones’ motives, but purely as a side note - I once knew a fellow who was fixated on this issue. It turned out that his major motivation was to steer the debate into a strange “Jews are genital mutilators” - type argument … the idea was, that commonplace NA circumcision was all part of a big conspiracy … blech.
As for myself, I am circumcised, but who knows whether it would be better or worse not to be? If I ever had kids, I probably would not do the procedure. But I don’t feel very strongly one way or the other about it.
Here is the $64K question. how many people posting here have had sex with a man with a foreskin and one without? Well I have had many opportunities and I can, without any doubt, tell you that an intact man feels things we cut men can only dream about. I am 55 and I have observed a dramatically reduced sensation over the last 20 years. The foreskin covering the sensitive areas should protect this from happening.
Keep in mind that toys with moving parts are more fun to play with.
Circumcision removes the most important sensory component of the foreskin - thousands of coiled fine-touch receptors called Meissner’s corpuscles. Also lost are branches of the dorsal nerve, and between 10,000 and 20,000 specialized erotogenic nerve endings of several types. Together these detect subtle changes in motion and temperature, as well as fine gradations in texture.
And hopefully all those cut nerve endings and capillaries line up correctly after being severed, not to mention so many removed. I would like to sue my dr. but she is no longer living. If I had any legal recourse I would do it.
I was entitled to a complete body (i.e. not circumcised) as is every person whether they are a Jew, Muslim, Christian, Agnostic or Atheist. If the tradition is bad and causes trauma and is inhumane, then it is wrong, period! Stop this barbaric practice. Allowing someone to take a razor sharp knife to your baby’s penis forever altering his sexual organ on his first day of life? Really? Does this just sound categorically wrong to anyone else?
Doctors should have a responsibility to not perform or recommend medically unnecessary, irreversible, and damaging surgeries. It is their duty. They should talk the parents out of wanting to do this to a defensless baby.
If you must know why the circumcise babies, it is because they can!