# Orthodox Shitheads Defy Law In Order To Endanger Children **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 4, 2012, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606 "2012-09-04T02:35:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 18
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/341 "2014-08-17T19:57:36Z")
> [@zoid](#): > > You assume there is no component. You cannot know if some of the practitioners don’t find it so. This is your opinion, not a fact. Argument from ignorance. “We don’t know, therefore it might be true.” Is there any evidence to suggest this is anything beyond a non-sexual religious practice? ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/342 "2014-08-17T20:20:42Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Argument from ignorance. “We don’t know, therefore it might be true.” > > Is there any evidence to suggest this is anything beyond a non-sexual religious practice? What sort of evidence would you accept? Penile plethysmography on the mohel as he’s servicing the baby? A porn website that specializes in rabbi-infant fellatio? (God, please don’t let that exist…) ---
**Author:** ![zoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zoid/32/336_2.png) [@zoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoid)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/343 "2014-08-17T20:54:08Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Argument from ignorance. “We don’t know, therefore it might be true.” > > Is there any evidence to suggest this is anything beyond a non-sexual religious practice? The exact same thing could be said of your position. ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/344 "2014-08-17T21:45:50Z")
Does female genital mutilation have a sexual component to it? I don’t think practitioners of it get turned on by the procedure itself, but if it doesn’t involve sex I’m a monkey’s uncle. ---
**Author:** ![zoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zoid/32/336_2.png) [@zoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoid)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/345 "2014-08-17T21:49:19Z")
To get back to the topic at hand, is there any religious reason they can’t just use Handi-wipes? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/346 "2014-08-17T22:06:38Z")
> [@VinylTurnip](#): > > What sort of evidence would you accept? Penile plethysmography on the mohel as he’s servicing the baby? A porn website that specializes in rabbi-infant fellatio? (God, please don’t let that exist…) Yes. The practice itself involves very brief suction and seems unlikely to satisfy a deviant sexual desire on its own, so I’d accept any evidence of these mohels being involved in pedophilaic practices apart from a very public and very brief religious ritual. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/347 "2014-08-17T22:08:39Z")
> [@zoid](#): > > The exact same thing could be said of your position. No, it cannot. Because my position isn’t making an outlandish claim. It’s making a negative claim – that a proposition is NOT true. In general, the person advancing the positive claim must provide proof. ---
**Author:** ![zoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zoid/32/336_2.png) [@zoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoid)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/348 "2014-08-17T22:10:18Z")
I never claimed anything. I simply pointed out that what you claim is not a proven, it’s your opinion. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/349 "2014-08-17T22:10:22Z")
I love the SDMB, the home of fighting ignorance (as long as such ignorance does not assist our preferred policy positions). Why am I the only person in this thread defending this practice against accusations of pedophilia? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 10:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/350 "2014-08-17T22:17:11Z")
> [@zoid](#): > > I never claimed anything. I simply pointed out that what you claim is not a proven, it’s your opinion. The phrase “You can’t prove a negative,” while not literally true in all circumstances, exists to address this kind of nonsense. My argument is via [url=“[Inductive reasoning - Wikipedia](http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inductive_reasoning)”]. If we assume the truth of the opposite, we would expect to see other evidence of pedophiliac practices among mohels. We do not. It is not accurate to relegate this to simple a matter of opinion. ---
**Author:** ![zoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zoid/32/336_2.png) [@zoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoid)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/351 "2014-08-17T22:23:05Z")
The fact remains that it’s your opinion, nothing more. I’m not even arguing that mohels are pedophiles but you can’t know that some subset are not. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/352 "2014-08-17T22:27:34Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I love the SDMB, the home of fighting ignorance … > > Why am I the only person in this thread defending this practice against accusations of pedophilia? Answered your own question before you even asked it, dintcha? ---
**Author:** ![zoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zoid/32/336_2.png) [@zoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoid)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/353 "2014-08-17T22:29:58Z")
Getting back to the topic… Is there a religious necessity for the use of the mouth or can the procedure be updated to use a sanitary wipe without violating any religious law? ---
**Author:** ![AnaMen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dfb087/32.png) [@AnaMen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AnaMen)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/354 "2014-08-17T22:42:31Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > See what I mean? > > It shouldn’t, because there is no remotely sexual gratification component to the practice. > > But because of the willingness of dishonest debaters to frame the issue this way, this kind of question gets asked. Molesting a child and not enjoying it does not make it okay. In fact, it seems even more ridiculous if that’s even possible. What about the baby? Do you think he has a clue why this bizarre thing is happening? If you found out your babysitter was sucking your infant’s penis daily, would that only matter if they were getting off on it? Maybe it’s part of a research project they are conducting. Maybe they ran out of wet wipes. Do you assume the child is unharmed as long as the fellater has non-sexual motives? This isn’t a “framing” of the issue, it’s a factual description of what is happening. The fact that some of the fellaters are infecting the babies with a potentially fatal virus is the icing on the cake. How anyone think sucking baby dicks is a privilege worth preserving is beyond me. This kind of “reasoning” is NAMBLA all the way. If I hired a Catholic priest to suck my kid’s dick, would you defend that too? ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/355 "2014-08-17T22:51:52Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Why am I the only person in this thread defending this practice against accusations of pedophilia? Because you show not the slightest bit of willingness to understand that “stop sucking baby dicks” is a rhetorical device and is not meant in any way as an accusation of pedophelia. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/356 "2014-08-17T23:52:56Z")
> [@zoid](#): > > The fact remains that it’s your opinion, nothing more. > I’m not even arguing that mohels are pedophiles but you can’t know that some subset are not. Undoubtedly some subset is. I certainly don’t argue that no mohel in the history of Orthodox Judaism has been a pedophile. That, too, would be an extraordinary claim on my part. I argue that the practice at issue here, as a general principle, is not motivated by pedophilia, and any argument against the practice which suggests that the practice is motivated by pedophilia is wrong. This is not a claim that there are no pedophile mohels. It’s a claim that the general practice is not an expression of pedophiliac desires. ---
**Author:** ![zoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zoid/32/336_2.png) [@zoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoid)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/357 "2014-08-17T23:58:30Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Undoubtedly some subset is. I certainly don’t argue that no mohel in the history of Orthodox Judaism has been a pedophile. That, too, would be an extraordinary claim on my part. > > I argue that the practice at issue here, as a general principle, is not motivated by pedophilia, and any argument against the practice which suggests that the practice is motivated by pedophilia is wrong. This is not a claim that there are no pedophile mohels. It’s a claim that the general practice is not an expression of pedophiliac desires. I agree with you on this position. That said I’m still wondering if the practice can be updated to avoid potential injury. Is there some religious dogma that specifically requires the use of the mouth as opposed to a sanitary anti-bacterial wipe? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2014, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/358 "2014-08-17T23:59:09Z")
> [@AnaMen](#): > > Molesting a child and not enjoying it does not make it okay. In fact, it seems even more ridiculous if that’s even possible. What about the baby? Do you think he has a clue why this bizarre thing is happening? If you found out your babysitter was sucking your infant’s penis daily, would that only matter if they were getting off on it? Maybe it’s part of a research project they are conducting. Maybe they ran out of wet wipes. Do you assume the child is unharmed as long as the fellater has non-sexual motives? > > This isn’t a “framing” of the issue, it’s a factual description of what is happening. The fact that some of the fellaters are infecting the babies with a potentially fatal virus is the icing on the cake. How anyone think sucking baby dicks is a privilege worth preserving is beyond me. This kind of “reasoning” is NAMBLA all the way. If I hired a Catholic priest to suck my kid’s dick, would you defend that too? It’s factual to describe them as “fellaters?” No, it’s not. It’s deceptive. It’s inaccurate. > [@](#): > > : the act of stimulating a man’s penis with the mouth for sexual pleasure [Cite.](http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fellatio) Well? ---
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2014, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/359 "2014-08-18T00:02:29Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Undoubtedly some subset is. I certainly don’t argue that no mohel in the history of Orthodox Judaism has been a pedophile. That, too, would be an extraordinary claim on my part. > > I argue that the practice at issue here, as a general principle, is not motivated by pedophilia, and any argument against the practice which suggests that the practice is motivated by pedophilia is wrong. This is not a claim that there are no pedophile mohels. It’s a claim that the general practice is not an expression of pedophiliac desires. But isn’t the fact that some may be pedophiles (and that the practice may even attract some to the profession) sufficient reason to consider banning the practice, considering that there is no good medical reason for it? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 18, 2014, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606/360 "2014-08-18T00:16:17Z")
> [@davidm](#): > > But isn’t the fact that some may be pedophiles (and that the practice may even attract some to the profession) sufficient reason to consider banning the practice, considering that there is no good medical reason for it? No. I agree with the proposed law – requiring informed consent from the parents – but not with a total ban. Considering the extreme brevity of the contact, and the public nature of the event, it’s hard to see how it could be harmful (beyond the transmission of disease, which is not implicated by the pedophilia angle at all.) We would not ban a doctor from performing hernia checks by holding testicles and eliciting a cough, even though there are undoubtedly pedophile doctors in the land. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606.md?page=17) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/orthodox-shitheads-defy-law-in-order-to-endanger-children/633606.md?page=19)