What's your opinion on circumcision?

Great Debates
141

[QUOTE=Jophiel]
However, the physician shouldn’t be making the moral decision on the behalf of the parents. So, from that aspect, it’s 50/50.

And, once again, completely uncomparable to female circumcision unless you can show that physicians make the same statements about such. Attempts to compare the two are blunted by the fact that the medical “benefits” from female circumcision are a straight negative.

Which was my point for most of this thread, anyway.
[/QUOTE]

Not doctors, I agree; however, society renders verdicts on moral issues all the time, sometimes as laws, sometimes as agreed-upon bad behavior. My main point in starting this thread is that it’s very strange that circumcision, something that seems to violate the fundamental value of bodily integrity that this society values, is yet so largely accepted.

142

[QUOTE=levdrakon]
but the more skin we lop off the less cancer you might get.
[/QUOTE]
You mean aside from that being false?

Studies have shown the incidence of cancer of the penis in circumcised males is effectively nil. Removing more skin wouldn’t lower it further. So what was your point in sticking pins through there again?

143

[QUOTE=Jophiel]
You mean aside from that being false?

Studies have shown the incidence of cancer of the penis in circumcised males is effectively nil. Removing more skin wouldn’t lower it further. So what was your point in sticking pins through there again?
[/QUOTE]
For one thing, your foreskin has nerve endings in it and the effect of slicing all that sensitive skin off isn’t nil.

144

[QUOTE=Jophiel]
You mean aside from that being false?

Studies have shown the incidence of cancer of the penis in circumcised males is effectively nil. Removing more skin wouldn’t lower it further. So what was your point in sticking pins through there again?
[/QUOTE]
Oh, and provide a cite for your statement about penis cancer in circumcised males being nil because in the cite I provided earlier about penis cancer rates they said that penis cancer was already rare, but rarer in circumcised males. But still occurs.

So now I have to call into question your assertion that cancer of the penis in circumcised males is nil. Just how nil does something have to be for you before mutilation is no longer worth it?

145

[QUOTE=levdrakon]
What I find a little annoying and tiring is how we “anti-circ” folks (isn’t that cute? anti-circ. Sounds so harmless) always feel a certain way. You don’t understand why we feel that way.
[/QUOTE]

There was no ‘we’ being discussed in what I said. That was obviously a response to a particular person who had made clear what he specifically felt about the topic.

146

[QUOTE=levdrakon]
Oh, and provide a cite for your statement about penis cancer in circumcised males being nil because in the cite I provided earlier about penis cancer rates they said that penis cancer was already rare, but rarer in circumcised males.
[/QUOTE]
The risk of penile cancer can be virtually eliminated by neonatal circumcision. Delayed circumcision offers only slight protection against the subsequent development of penile carcinoma. – University of Chicago

Here’s once from someone who identifies himself as “chairman of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Task Force on Circumcision and a reviewer on the topic for the American Cancer Society”:
As Kochen and McCurdy pointed out, the low incidence of penile cancer in the United States is misleading because it has been calculated by combining circumcised men (in whom the incidence is essentially zero) with uncircumcised men (in whom it is 2.2/100 000). – Letter

You’ll note that I said “effectively nil”. And, for the -nth time, saying “You can cut off the entire penis and then you won’t get cancer!” ignores the fact that, without a foreskin, one can still do everything with their penis that the penis is made to do. Cutting off the penis makes that considerably harder.

I’m not sure why this is such a difficult concept but it seems to keep coming up over and over and over. To repeat: Cutting off penis = Not being able to use penis. Cutting off breasts = Not being able to use breasts. Cutting off vulva = Considerable loss of function to female genitals. Cutting off foreskin = No considerable change to function of penis.

If you want to compare male circumcision to removing some other portion of the body which doesn’t affect its overall function, have at it. But these attempts to link it to hacking off random body parts are seemingly increasingly desperate.

147

But it is an absolute fact that if you remove the breast buds of an infant girl, she will never get breast cancer.

You’ve recoiled in horror at that suggestion, despite the fact that breast cancer kills at a much, much higher rate than penile cancer.

Your daughter’s got a far higher chance of dying from breast cancer than your son has of (without being cut up) ever contracting penile cancer at all.

Breast cancer isn’t silly, and isn’t comparable to head lice. It’s actally much worse than penile cancer in that there will be more cases of it, and more deaths from it, every year.

Because circumcision comes a distant second as far as potentially saving a life in the race between those two.

Also, the incidence of penile cancer (around 400 cases a year in the UK, almost entirely in men over 60) is pretty damn rare. You’re not talking about reducing the chances of your son getting something that’s common. It’s like trying to protect him from being attacked by an alligator in Alaska.

148

In Spain it’s not usually done on babies. One of my brothers had to have it at age 11 (fimosis); I have a very vivid memory of walking into his room in the clinic and he’s holding up the tented bedsheet and staring at his penis looking like this :eek:

He said “it looks like a PIMIENTO!” and we assured him it would go back to normal. Poor thing spent the whole five hours I was there staring at it, waiting for the swelling to go down…

Since there’s no medical reasons favoring one or the other for babies, my take is “whatever works for the parents’ culture and under medical control”.

149

[QUOTE=catsix]
You’ve recoiled in horror at that suggestion, despite the fact that breast cancer kills at a much, much higher rate than penile cancer.
[/QUOTE]

And, at this point, I’m going to assume that the whole cost/benefit thing is beyond you. I can’t think of any more ways to explain it and yet you continue to make these comparisons and pretend that they’re valid.

In any event, by the time a woman is at risk for breast cancer, she is capable of making the decision to remove the breasts herself. That can’t be said for penile cancer and circumcision.

Comes in a waaaayyyy distant second on practical effect on the person’s life, too. But admitting that would ruin all of the “It’s just like female circumcision and you’re against THAT, right??” arguments.

150

I’m gonna regret leaping in here, I know it, but…

Why are there so many arguments made so strenuously in support of circumcision on the basis that it prevents this or that disease, when these aren’t generally the reasons that people choose to have it done to their sons?

I know my anti-circumcision bias may be tinting my view here, but the pro-circumcision side really does come across (to me) as:
-Desperately trying to prove the merit of circumcision.
-A bit too vociferous in denying that it makes any difference, or that they are in some way… diminished by it; I just can’t escape the nagging suspicion that it’s themselves that they’re really trying to convince.

I will, of course, admit that the anti-circumcision side seems prone to fits of exaggeration, as well as often appearing to be motivated by visceral fear of emasculation.

151

[QUOTE=Mangetout]
Why are there so many arguments made so strenuously in support of circumcision on the basis that it prevents this or that disease, when these aren’t generally the reasons that people choose to have it done to their sons?
[/QUOTE]
Beats me. In fact, I’m not even arguing “in support” of it in that I could completely understand why parents may elect not to do it. It’s not the same as if I was arguing “in support” of gun control or Bush’s actions in Iraq.

That’s all. I could see why you’d elect to have it done and I can see why you’d elect not to. I can see where there are bona fide benefits to be gained from having it performed. I can see where one might say “Sure, but they’re not worth it”. What I don’t get are the disingenuous attempts to compare a procedure which leaves the penis functionally completely intact but cosmetically different (and even preferable to some) with lopping off breasts and vulvas and hands and whatever else.

As far as your concerns that I’m trying to convince myself, I’m not sure what to tell you excapt that you’re wrong. I can’t prove it and you can’t get inside my head, so you’ll have to take my word on it.

152

Fair enough; actually, I don’t think your approach is all that typical of debaters on this topic.

153

Mangetout, Hey I already regret have leapt in here … by now I should know better … but a minor point of clarification: there is no pro-circ side here. No one here is saying that all boys should be circ’ed. It is sort of pro-choice thing. The medical arguments are unimpressive to me but a reasonable person could decide otherwise and as the person entrusted to make these sorts of decisions for the child a parent deserves respect for making a good faith choice.

The arguments come down to a group that believes that children should be protected from these abusive parents and believe that society at large should limit these primitive and barbaric religious practices that are fundamental to a faith in this particular case.

The choice side merely says that most of us do not consider this a maiming, that the choice is not an absurd one, that it is well within the range of decisions that society entrusts parents to make on children’s behalfs, and that their willfully ignorant disrespect of a religious/cultural tradition is insuffiicient cause to limit its expression.

154

Bloody hell, why does everyone have to go and get all reasonable just as soon as I try to label them as otherwise?

155

Wow. Just… wow.

catsix, it seems to me - as an observer who is fairly well undecided on the subject of circumcision - that you are completely refusing to address Jophiel’s point, which is a good one. You keep repeating the same comparison, over and over and over and over, and refuse to address his answer, which seems a bit dishonest.

And not only dishonest, but damaging to your position. He is making sense, and actually responding to the things you say, and you’re not addressing his point at all. Can you not see the difference between: (1) a procedure / removal that has a potential benefit but has no practical or functional impact; and (2) a procedure / removal that would drastically alter the child’s life from a practical / functional standpoint? If you do see a difference between those things, than arguing for their equivalence doesn’t seem quite rational.

To me, Jophiel’s argument may be summarized as:

  1. Circumcision has no (or negligible) negative practical effects (as would female circumcision or breast removal).

  2. Circumcision may have beneficial long-term health benefits (and, to take into account other common arguments from the “pro-choice” crowd, as it were, social benefits of various sorts).

  3. Given #1 and #2, it is perfectly reasonable that a parent may make a decision on behalf of his or her minor child to determine whether this ultimately harmless (if temporally painful) procedure will be beneficial in the long-term - in the same way that parent must decide whether and to what extent to provide vaccinations, for example.

It is a persuasive argument, and so far the folks in this thread who disagree with it have never actually addressed this argument, so much as they’ve addressed an argument that no one has actually made.

156

Mangetout, I know that you are just trying to be slightly funny with that, but re-read the thread sans your bias. The op was his presentation of his unsolicited butting into a female coworkers decision regarding a circ decision for her son made primarily on religious/cultural grounds and arguing with her, heatedly, about it. He, by his own admission, has no interest in knowing the history of why circs are so commonly performed in this country and has no interest in understanding why this may be a traditiion of so much significance to Jews that even a secular non-conformist like his co-worker respects it. It is just barbaric and should not be done. Period.

In short, it is none of his effing business.

157

[QUOTE=storyteller0910]
Wow. Just… wow.

catsix, it seems to me - as an observer who is fairly well undecided on the subject of circumcision - that you are completely refusing to address Jophiel’s point, which is a good one. You keep repeating the same comparison, over and over and over and over, and refuse to address his answer, which seems a bit dishonest.
[/QUOTE]
Yes, I have to say that in this case, I don’t think anyone has come up with quite the right analogy. Breast buds are not the same, because the removal of them causes the breasts to not develop at all. If circumcision caused the penis to stay in the same state it is at birth, I seriously doubt it would have become a custom. If there was, for example, a minor procedure that would cut a piece of skin off of the breasts, not significantly diminish their ability to mature or function normally (for breastfeeding or sexual pleasure), and would seriously limit the risk of breast cancer, I’ll bet a lot of parents would opt for it. Removing them entirely is a far more radical procedure than circumcision.

Men are susceptible to breast cancer, incidentally, so the breast-removal procedure would also be relevant for them, anyway.

158

I should add that I don’t necessarily think that medical considerations are the only valid reasons to circumcise. The breast example I gave would be the same if there was a thousand-year old tradition to do it, and it had become so common that no one would think it was an odd disfiguration.

159

[QUOTE=Mangetout]
I’m gonna regret leaping in here, I know it, but…

Why are there so many arguments made so strenuously in support of circumcision on the basis that it prevents this or that disease, when these aren’t generally the reasons that people choose to have it done to their sons?

I know my anti-circumcision bias may be tinting my view here, but the pro-circumcision side really does come across (to me) as:
-Desperately trying to prove the merit of circumcision.
-A bit too vociferous in denying that it makes any difference, or that they are in some way… diminished by it; I just can’t escape the nagging suspicion that it’s themselves that they’re really trying to convince.

I will, of course, admit that the anti-circumcision side seems prone to fits of exaggeration, as well as often appearing to be motivated by visceral fear of emasculation.
[/QUOTE]

I honestly don’t feel that being circ’d has made any difference in my life or diminished me at all. How is a person diminished over a little piece of skin that most people aren’t even going to see anyway? The only difference I feel it has made is that when I saw an uncut one the first time, I thought mine looked better. :wink:

I really wouldn’t have even gotten in this conversation if it weren’t for the anti-circ side telling me that I am just a piece of property whose parents don’t love me because if they did they wouldn’t have done such a horrible, barbaric thing to me. I’ve just been explaining why I think that is a bunch of crap.

160

[QUOTE=DSeid]
Mangetout, I know that you are just trying to be slightly funny with that, but re-read the thread sans your bias. The op was his presentation of his unsolicited butting into a female coworkers decision regarding a circ decision for her son made primarily on religious/cultural grounds and arguing with her, heatedly, about it. He, by his own admission, has no interest in knowing the history of why circs are so commonly performed in this country and has no interest in understanding why this may be a traditiion of so much significance to Jews that even a secular non-conformist like his co-worker respects it. It is just barbaric and should not be done. Period.

In short, it is none of his effing business.
[/QUOTE]

Ok, my turn to rebut your characterization of my position.

I probably haven’t been totally consistent in this thread, but yes, I am primarily interested in why it’s so commonly performed given the irrefutable facts that it’s not beneficial in any measurable way, is extremely painful, and very likely has a detrimental effect on function, however small; and, most importantly, the fact that it is a violation of the baby’s right to control his own body (a right which, except for medical necessity, is one of the most deeply-respected rights in this society; it’s precisely why sexualizing children is viewed so severely).

What I cannot abide is any defense that takes the form ‘it’s what we do and it’s none of your business’. There are plenty of cultural/historical practices that are prohibited or at least highly frowned upon in this society. Given the facts I cite above, it’s just bizarre to me that circumcision is such a glaring exception.

And it’s true that I don’t really give a crap what justification Judiasm provides for it. I have no interest in arguments that aren’t based on facts or logical principles. That your ancestors and family members believe the same as you, or that a set of scripture supports the practice, has no bearing on the argument. Either explain why it’s ok in light of the strong logical and factual arguments against it, or find some way to deal with my disapproval and my attempts to sway you and others toward my point of view.

When someone’s rights are violated, it’s everyone’s business.