When Politicos Talk About Circumcision

There is the strangest little discussion about circumcision over at Tapped today: Dana Goldstein came out of nowhere with a post in favor, rather bluntly stating, "Get 'em while they're young and you can give them the anatomical benefits of circumcision alongside the lessons about protection and contraception." Ezra Klein responds that this is "[e]asy for her to say," linking to this post by Andrew Sullivan, who happens to be pretty adamently against the circumcision of boys in infancy, given their obvious inability to consent (see also: here, here, and elsewhere on his blog).

I'm really not sure where the issue of male circumcision ties into liberal and progressive politics. On a personal level, I suppose I'm torn, but not in a way that makes me especially give a damn. Some random, stray libertarian impulse makes me say it's the parents' decision to make, but Klein is pretty much right when he asserts, "It's the sort of practice that, were we not already doing it and accustomed to it, we'd think a wacky and indefensible invasion of personal rights." True enough.

Any thoughts, my three readers?

Comments

[englishman]

The point is that it is not the parents' decision to make - it is the individual's. This unnecessary violation should not be performed on infants who are in no position to make informed consent.
Circumcision has been an unthinking traditional ritual in the US for too long. It is an assault on the genital integrity of the newborn and should be banned in any civilised society. If as an adult you want to have it done - then fine - but you won't find healthy uncut adult males queueing up to have this procedure performed! It is totally unnecessary and is a fetishistic hangover from more prurient times when it was sought as an aid to curb masturbation. Genital integrity is a natural right and should be recognised as such.

[Acksiom]

The crux of the matter is that a unique and singular status of presumptive disposability has been commonly assigned to the male prepuce -- in the complete and utter absence of any authoritative reference justifying it being denied the standard default value assigned to all normal, healthy, functional, and non-replaceable human body parts.

In short, everybody just assumes that somebody, somewhere, at some point in time, proved that it was okay to treat the male prepuce differently from every other part of the body.

The problem is, that never happened. Just plain didn't. There is no paper, no research, no article, no literature, nothing whatsoever, which even attempts to establish a rational basis for treating the male prepuce as inherently disposable -- uniquely and singularly unlike all other amputatable body parts.

The basic pretext necessary in terms of just common sense, let alone professional ethics and legal standing, simply does not exist.

As to why it should be taken seriously, well; the closest parallel of the damages done, in terms of female genitalia, that we can presently draw, based upon our current knowledge, would be:

the amputation of the female prepuce (the clitoral hood),

the amputation of most to all of the inner labia,

the stripping out of a circumferential inch-wide+ ring of the frontmost inner vaginal skin,

and the compression of the two resulting raw inner vaginal skin edges against each other under thousands of pounds of pressure until they roughly and randomly "seal" together.

So I don't think it's really meaningfully reducible to a matter of liberal or progressive or libertarian or pretty much any other political identity.

It's too big for that. Because it's more like a matter of institutionalized sociopathic child abuse on a massive scale, since there are over a million victims in the usa alone annually; that is, on average, about two per minute.

Essentially, in the time it's taken you to read this, between two to six little boys have had their foreskins forcibly torn back from their attachment to their penile glans, and then crushed, cut, and degloved.

And another two will have it done to them in the next minute after that.

And another two more in the next minute after that.

And yet another two more in the next minute after that.

And so on.

And so on.

And so on.

120 more every hour upon hour, 2,880 more every day upon day, just like some kind of psychotic, nightmarish vivisection disassembly line.

By this time next week, 20,160 little boys in the usa will have been violated in this fashion.

And several times that many will have suffered it worldwide.

I do understand the desire to frame the topic in some comprehensible way based upon your politics.

It's just that some issues are simply too big and too serious for political alignment to be meaningfully and usefully applied to them.

[Rich Kendara]

I suppose I'm on the apathetic side of this debate, mostly due to my own experience as a circumcised male (no problems that I can attest to...) and the fact that I've actually watched a contemporary circumcision in the hospital, which seemed to consist of some local anesthesia and less than 2 minutes of a deft scalpel cut, with the youngster mostly indifferent.

[Patricia Robinett]

Steven says, "Some random, stray libertarian impulse makes me say it's the parents' decision to make."

I ask, "You are for parents' rights to harm children? Not for children's rights to have whole, healthy bodies?"

I wish my parents had NOT chosen to have me circumcised. But when money is god, religion is superstition, medicine is a business, and doctors are kings... what chance does a child have against those odds?

[Colin]

Regarding Riches comment about the infant he saw being indifferent to the procedure:

Even if the young male seems indifferent while the procedure is done, it really should be his choice. The medical benefits are not that substantial, and really is more of a cosmetic procedure. We don't tatoo children, why do we allow this to happen. He can make the choice for himself when he grows up.

[stringph]

'On a personal level, I suppose I'm torn' ... Sounds painful!

[E Sorum]

Perhaps "people" would have less of an apathetic opinion about male circumcision if they were being shown all the facts.

The corporate media sure goes out of its way to publish "studies," that glamorize male circumcision, no matter how methodologically pathetic while also making a point NOT to publish studies that show the irreversible harm of circumcision. As one of our founding fathers states, "half truths are often incredible lies."(1)

For example, there are studies that have found that circumcised men are MORE likely to contract HIV(2) and other STD's than intact males(3,4). Why aren't those being published in the Corporate Media. Clearly the Corporate Media does NOT want the people to have accurate information about circumcision. Their behavior could really be viewed as malicious intent with the specific objective to mislead.

Those who control the corporate media clearly act in the interest of those who promote involuntary male circumcision. This behavior is a disgrace to all that the founding fathers tried to ensure. Life, LIBERTY, and the pursuit of happiness.(5) Civil LIBERTIES extend only in so far as they do not violate the rights of other people.(6)

The purpose of freedom of speech and freedom of the press is to ensure that voices can be heard(7), not so that the totalitarian corporate media machines can brain-wash, i.e. condition the public into the general acceptance of violating other people's civil liberties. I shouldn't have to tell you that involuntary circumcision violates at least one civil liberty.

As for now, the Corporate Media will continue to sicken me and I want no part of their Corporate Media Lies. One entertaining southerner stated "If the media wants your opinion, they will give it to you."(8) I want the facts to form my own opinions. Parents of potential circumcision victims should certainly want the same.

1. Founding Fathers Series: Quotes of Thomas Jefferson or Quotes of Benjamin Franklin
2. For easy referencing, search CIRP-library
3. Van Howe, Cutting through the Hyperbole (there are more studies to be found that the reader can acquire on their own. This is an informal posting).
4. What Your Doctor May Not Tell You About Circumcision

5. The Declaration of Independence/Constitution of the United States
6. The American Heritage Dictionary, Civil Liberties
7. Quotes of Thomas Jefferson (different book from reference 1)
8. The Southern Book of Quotes

[max johnson]

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