Are we making small talk now? Do you come here often? You like the weather we’ve been having? I think the Nats are going to take the pennant this year – what do you think?
This was never the suggestion, but at this point, I leave it to the fossil record to decide.
Speaking of small talk, Bricker, you had a walk-on in a dream I had last night. It had nothing to do with baby dicks, the SDMB, or anything controversial at all. But sure enough, there you were.
I guess someone else posted these points then:
To my mind, this is not a “suggestion” that using the term circumcision is “sanitizing” the act, “abstracting away from the graphic act”, and a “euphemism”; moreover, that using that term is ‘defin[ing] the language, defin[ing] the debate’.
It is outright stating it.
Did I look like Erik Estrada? Cause that would be spooky.
In that, in real life, I don’t look like Erik Estrada.
I don’t know why you keep trying to take this interpretation away from what I am saying. So I’m going to try this another way and perhaps be a bit clearer.
I think there is a distinction between circumcision and the ultra-orthodox practice here. Circumcision is a generally-agreed word. There is no generally agreed word for oral suction in super-traditional circumcision.
Circumcision is conventional. It is a nice, sanitary, medical Latinate word. The morpheme itself does not really suggest the defining quality of what it signifies. The word “colonoscopy,” on the other hand, does.
But that’s ok. It’s a euphemism of a past era. Probably no one anymore hears the word “circumcision” and thinks “cutting around.” In this case, it’s not a huge terminological retreat to use a commonly-agreed word. I thought it was a banal observation that if you are going to advocate some practice, you just need to own up to what it really is. Circumcision is pretty contested (not by a hypothetical lunatic) and is not just a sterile medical procedure. All it takes is a little honestly not to pretend otherwise.
Maybe if the word for it really were babydickectomy, some people who never question it might. I don’t know.
But then there’s “oral suction.” We don’t really have a generally-agreed word. We have a technical rabbinic term that hasn’t entered the lexicon. It’s not exactly “bar mitzvah” or “mazel tov.” Then there’s the translation on wikipedia, “oral suction.” People clearly find the practice repugnant and likely dangerous. It’s not even something most serious Jews do. So you can obfuscate the issue entirely and frame it as a matter of observance of religious law, using an obscure Hebrew word that means nothing to pretty much anyone. This has the questionable advantage of not impugning the motivations of the rabbis. But we can’t verify their motivations, and anyway, the only thing that matters is that they are doing this thing and are refusing to comply with a consent law. We don’t owe them anything.
And then we have people saying that it’s just “juvenile” to use graphic and suggestive language. Well, who the fuck cares? Maybe people would rather trade off a little maturity to call a spade a spade. But either way, it’s a pointless hijack. Is anyone’s sensibilities genuinely offended here?
Probably closer to Salma Hayek than Erik Estrada.
Once again, I fundamentally disagree that the word “circumcision” is a “euphemism of a past era”. Or that using the term is some sort of failure to “to own up to what it really is” or is in any way pretending anything. No-one who hears the word is in the slightest mislead at to its meaning.
I have nothing against sniggering at the ultra-Orthodox practitioners over this. It’s a little juvie but who cares. I think those seriously wondering whether those doing it are doing it because they are pervs are simply wrong. I agree that the only issue of importance is that the ultra-Orthodox are wrong to be doing it.
You are trying to push my argument farther than I am. I don’t really want to keep repeating myself or get further tangled up in un-distorting what I have said plainly. So you disagree, that’s fine.
I did do a quick lookup of the use of the word circumcision over time. It is much older than I thought. Its root, circumcidi, appears at least as early as Jerome and is a direct translation of peritemno, found in Herodotus. It is not a euphemism, sadly for me. It’s the same word it’s pretty much always been. I don’t read Hebrew so I can’t check that, but neither did Herodotus.
Derleth:
The original quote did indeed come from this context, but the POINT of the quote wasn’t limited to concentration camps; the POINT of the quote was to say that when people sit back and see something wrong done to others and say nothing because they see it as not applying to them, they will eventually regret their earlier inaction. This applied quite well, in my opinion, to the comment by Inner Stickler to which I was responding:
If the reason for an attitude that they should “get over themselves” rather than that they should think first of maintaining their religion is because they are a very small proportion of the rabbinical population, but we think that logic wouldn’t apply to larger groups or more popular practices, then the paraphrased quote applies perfectly.
Against, of course. I’m not against REAL reasons for restricting religious practice. I dare you to find where in this thread I have expressed opposition to restricting the particular practice that this thread speaks of. My point was that the fact that only a few Rabbis insist on it is not, in itself, a reason to be casual about restricting it.
And I have acknowledged, earlier in the thread, and parenthetically in the very message you replied this to, that I was not speaking to the issue of the potential infection, which is a genuine concern, but to the notion that personal distaste (as expressed through sexually-charged language) should be one’s yardstick for acceptability of a practice.
Robb:
Absolutely, and I have stressed earlier that I am not opposed to this law. My objection was to the way certain others in this thread have tried to frame the practice.
In addition, I was not trying to say that the fact that the practice was done for the baby’s health is a reason to ignore modern medical evidence, in fact, quite the contrary. I was responding on this point to Trinopus, who was very tolerantly saying “let them have their metaphor” as if this practice was done for inexplicable spiritual reasons. While this is a fine attitude to have toward religious practices, it was worth noting that this act is NOT meant to be spiritual or metaphorical or symbolic, but for a practical reason. If in fact that practical reason can be better served by other means, then certainly it should be.
Thank you for the explanation.
To straighten out the record – you never made clear what “nice try” meant above. Do you concede that my usage was correct? Do you claim I was incorrect, and your recollections of you Orthodox yeshiva are sufficient to support the claim that use of the article is incorrect?
cmkeller, perhaps I could ask you to weigh in?
LavenderBlue:
For what it’s worth, I have heard the term “pilpul” used both ways - without the article to mean that mode of logic, and with the article to mean a lecture or discussion which uses that mode of logic.
And the POINT of my statements about kissing baby dicks wasn’t to accuse anyone of pedophilia, not that anyone’s listening now because OMG PEDOPHILIA ACCUSATIONS, we MUST DEFEND the people who KILL INFANTS.
Casual? Two babies have died and two are permanently brain damaged and you think we want be casual about this? No. We want to come down on those baby-killers with the full force of the law. Morally, they should burn; legally, they should remain in prison and away from anyone they might feel the urge to cut into.
Derleth:
No one is defending people who kill infants. However, the opening words of the post, the ones which anchor the link to ABC News, very much implies that you believe these mohels are interested in perverted sexual behavior. Since this procedure has been performed for thousands of years, well before there were any demonstrated cases of disease contracted in this manner, the phrasing implies a sinister intent behind the procedure itself beyond the malfeasance of modern practitioners who are burying their heads in the sand over the quite recently-demonstrated dangers. This is wrong.
No, I do not think that the health concerns are casual. Have you at all been paying attention to my posts? I repeatedly said that the health issues are relevant. I think that the hand-waving of “oh, it’s only a few rabbis who think that way,” which was stated in the specific post that I had replied to using the “first they came…” paraphrase, indicated a casual attitude.
FWIW, I agree with all of this, and, in fact, with nearly everything else you said, which I snipped (snigger?) only for brevity.
I feel I ought, however, to complain (using foul language!) at your introducing reason, logic, and sense to a thread that doesn’t seem to value it. Stop being so reasonable; this is the pit.
(Is there a SDMB equivalent of “Take it to the Pit,” i.e., “Take it OUT of the Pit!” for posts that make too much sense?)
And the opening words of your post addressed at me accused me of wanting to re-enact the Holocaust. Which you continue to deny now, of course. Exact same concept you’re trying to turn around and use against me.
This is completely irrelevant, unless you think it shouldn’t be banned at all.
Derleth:
First of all, my post wasn’t addressed at you, it was addressed at Inner Stickler, and was very clearly attached to a specific quote in his post. Second of all, it was not to accuse anyone of wanting to re-enact the Holocaust, it was a statement about the consequences of inaction in the face of things done to groups one considers irrelevant to one’s self. Just because a statement originated in the context of the Holocaust does not mean that the point it makes cannot be related to less genocidal circumstances.
No it’s not. I can argue a point of logic without disagreeing with the conclusion.
A little gusty.
Putting one’s mouth on someone else’s bleeding wound is about hygiene and medicine ? I hate to have to dispel your misconceptions about doctors (and also porn), but… 