CIRCUMCISION (A sensible discussion)

B. Circumcision violates human rights. Infant circumcision, however, is
more than just the usual form of quack medicine. Circumcision does not just
defraud the person who is persuaded by misleading information to consent to
the procedure for him or herself. The patient, in this case, has no say at
all. The amputation is forced upon a completely non-consenting individual.
No one has the right to unnecessarily alter an infant's physical integrity.

 

Support for point A: Circumcision is Quack Medicine:

Support for A1–Circumcision is harmful, not beneficial: "care" based on inadequate evidence:

Published studies, considering all the known so-called physiological and cost benefits, show no positive balance of actual benefit can be determined, even when these studies ignore the negative weight of psychological damage and human rights violations.Note 4

For example, in an article in Family Medicine, “Circumcision: A Decision Analysis of its Medical Value,” Oct-Dec 1991, Dr. Lawler writes, “We conclude there is no medical indication for or against circumcision. The decision may most reasonably be made on non-medical factors such as parent preference.”

We would like to suggest that the child’s preference is the only one that counts.

In another article in Medical Decision Making, Oct-Dec 1991, Dr. Ganiats states: “Circumcision has essentially no effect on either dollar costs or health. For this reason, personal factors could justly be brought into the decision process.”

Even though those doing these studies have not faced the human rights issue, nor long-term psychological or sexual effects, they make clear, that circumcision is not a procedure to be justified on medical grounds.

Thomas Wiswell’s urinary tract infection studies is a typical example of those who take “a bit of scientific fact and then extrapolate to incredible proportions to justify the use of their therapy.” He even claims God made a mistake providing men with this erotic and protective tissue. One has to circumcise 99 infants to prevent one UTI, even if Wiswell’s retrospective study on military babies is accurate, which other researchers question because catherization was used to gather urine samples and may have contaminated them, and because of invalid statistical analyses. Girls are four times as prone to UTIs as boys in any case.

100,000 infants must be circumcised to prevent one penile cancer. Who explains to parents that more infants die of circumcision complications in the U.S. than older men are saved from penile cancer (about 200)? We still hear about the cervical cancer study––proved invalid decades ago. This is just some of the persistent misleading information the quacks dispense or fail to correct. Their approach allows them to hood-wink a trusting public into a procedure with “very real toxic potential.”

In fact, all national and international healthcare and medical organizations, including the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the American Academy of Pediatrics, say these amputations are not medically necessary. How can they, therefore, be defined as “preventive medicine” when imposed upon a non-consenting person? They are unnecessary surgeries, and as such must be censored by Board action pursuant to NDCC 43-17.1-07 (Sec. 4).

Surgical amputation of normal tissue can only be called “mutilation.” Perhaps we do have a right to mutilate ourselves, but not others. As Ron Miller, MD, Fargo, says, “What risk is acceptable when one is tampering with something that is normal?” The following is a list of a few more North Dakota people and organizations that have recognized the non-necessary nature of routine infant circumcision:Note

 

Support for A3–Financially self-serving at amputee’s expense:

Journals providing medical statistics use the quarter billion dollar figure. It does not include the multi-million dollar law suits arising out of “botched jobs” nor the reconstructive costs to the 1 in 500 which are seriously botched, according the American Academy of Pediatrics.Note 6 Of course, any unnecessary amputation is a “botched job,” as so well put by the obstetric nursing staff at St. Vincent Hospital, Sante Fe, NM, who refuse to participate in the procedure. Their conscientious objector status has just been negotiated into a legally binding agreement.

Support for point A4–Embarrassment prevents exposure:

Discussion of genitals is taboo in our society. Acquiring and dispensing accurate information on any taboo subject is difficult. Circumcisers, and all quacks, profit from lack of exposure. The media has a hard time providing information from fear of offending the public. Once someone has been circumcised, has allowed it or done it, the ritualization of the act often keeps one from publicly admitting a wrong. Passing an act on to the next generation is often easier than admitting the act was wrongfully done to oneself.

 

Support for Accusation that Circumcision Violates Human Rights.

Parental rights do not extend to unnecessary genital amputations. Now, it is true that “Parents, guardians, and custodians are authorized to consent to healthcare on behalf of children” (NDCC Sec. 23-11-13, emphasis added), but routine infant circumcision is not a healthcare issue. No study with its “bit of scientific fact” (Booth) offered to support the purported positive effects of prepuce amputation, has ever been able to establish that the negative physiological effects are not more significant, not to mention other physiological and psychological effects that result from functioning with a violated body.

Historically, medical rationalizations are a recent approach used by quacks. Except for the last hundred years in the U.S., circumcision has never been done for health reasons. The appeal to scientific evidence to justify it as a healthcare issue is major healthcare fraud.Note 7 Since most men in the developed and underdeveloped countries of the world are intact and do not have the dire problems circumcisers threaten will occur, the procedure in the U.S. is obviously a non-medical ritual. This is understood by many North Dakota physicians.

Medical ethics clearly requires physicians to decline to do follow a parent’s wish to alter a child surgically for non-medical reasons. The physician is even required to prevent others from doing so! (see NDCC 50-25.1-03–Persons required to report child abuse and neglect). No one in our society can morally (and we believe, legally) alter another surgically against his will for non-medical reasons, even if he is one’s own son. Property rights do not extend to one’s son or daughterNote 8.

Sexism is inherent in the present practice. The physician’s responsibility to protect a helpless patient is recognized when it comes to all other operations and for genital amputations on female childrenNote 9 (which has now been formalized in ND SB2454, 1995) along with NDCC 50-25.1-03.

 

Would you circumcise your son(s)?
If so, why? If not, why not?
no way it is a brutal old superstitious act - it is painful and dangerous beyond it's allegded 'health benefits'
no point dressin it in religous mumbo jumbo - what God made a mistake? "damn I forgot to cancel the foreskins now it 2 late!"
A kid aint got any choice in the decision & reduced sexual pleasure

healthy is rubbish considering risks - u could hack all sorts o bit of your kids in that case - y stop with there foreskin - cut the legs off - zero chance of ankle cancer then

mutating kids genitals smaks o a slightly perverted old school religious world view

remember
SEX IS BAD

 

sorry circumcisied this post
ouch! my baby-dicks bleeding

 

Yes im one of those IDIOTS.......When a baby boy’s normal intact penis is circumcised, this is what is lost -- forever:


*1. The foreskin, which comprises up to 50% (sometimes more) of the mobile skin system of the penis. If unfolded and spread out flat, the average adult foreskin would measure about 15 square inches (the size of a 3 x 5-inch index card). This highly specialized tissue normally covers the glans and protects it from abrasion, drying, callusing (keratinization), and contaminants of all kinds. The effect of glans keratinization on human sexuality has never been studied.

*2. The frenar band of soft ridges -- the primary erogenous zone of the male body. Loss of this delicate belt of densely innervated, sexually responsive tissue reduces the fullness and intensity of sexual response.

*3. The foreskin’s "gliding action" -- the hallmark mechanical feature of the normal, natural, intact penis. This non-abrasive gliding of the penis in and out of itself within the vagina facilitates smooth, comfortable, pleasurable intercourse for both partners. Without this gliding action, the corona of the circumcised penis can function as a one-way valve, scraping vaginal lubricants out into the drying air and making artificial lubricants essential for comfortable intercourse.

*4. Thousands of coiled fine-touch receptors called the Meissner’s corpuscles -- the most important sensory component of the foreskin. Also lost are branches of the dorsal nerve and between 10,000 and 20,000 specialized erotogenic nerve endings of several types, which can feel slight motion and stretch, subtle changes in temperature, and fine gradations in texture.

*5. The frenulum, the highly erogenous V-shaped web-like tethering structure on the underside of the glans; frequently amputated along with the foreskin, or severed, either of which destroys its function and potential for pleasure.

6. Approximately half of the temperature-sensitive smooth muscle sheath called the dartos fascia.

7. The immunological defense system of the soft mucosa, which produces plasma cells, which secrete immunoglobulin antibodies, and antibacterial and antiviral proteins such as the pathogen-killing enzyme lysozyme.

8. Lymphatic vessels, the loss of which reduces the lymph flow within that part of the body’s immune system.

9. Estrogen receptors -- the purpose of which is not yet fully understood and needs further study.

*10. The apocrine glands of the inner foreskin, which produce pheromones -- nature’s powerful, silent, invisible behavioral signals to potential sexual partners. The effect of their absence on human sexuality has never been studied.

*11. Sebaceous glands, which lubricate and moisturize the foreskin and glans, normally a protected internal organ -- like the tongue or vagina.

12. Specialized epithelial Langerhans cells, a component of the immune system in a whole penis.

13. The pink to red to dark purple natural coloration of the glans. The connective tissue which protectively fuses the foreskin and glans together while the penis develops is ripped apart during circumcision, wounding the glans and the foreskin remnant, leaving them raw and subject to infection, scarring, pitting, shrinkage, and eventual discoloration.

*14. Some of the penis length and penis circumference because its double-layered wrapping of loose and usually overhanging foreskin is now missing, making the circumcised penis truncated and thinner than a full-sized intact penis.

*15. Several feet of blood vessels, including the frenular artery and branches of the dorsal artery. The loss of this rich vascularization interrupts normal blood flow to the shaft and glans of the penis, damaging the natural function of the penis and altering its development.

16. Every year boys lose their entire penises from circumcision accidents and infections. They are then "sexually reassigned" by castration and "transgender surgery," and expected to live their lives as "females."

17. Every year many boys lose their lives from the complications of circumcision, a fact the profiteering billion-dollar-a-year circumcision industry in the U.S. obscures and ignores.

18. Delayed and diminished bonding with the mother and loss of innate sense of trust in human contact.

(*19. Although not yet proven scientifically, anecdotal evidence suggests that a penis without its foreskin lacks the capacity for the subtle "cross communication" that occurs only during contact between mucous membranes and that contributes to the experience of sexual pleasure. In other words, amputating a male's multi-functional foreskin is a neurological castration, which diminishes the intensity of the entire sexual experience for both the victimized male and his partner.) * Loss of each of these items reduces sexual pleasure, gratification, and fulfillment.

 

what about the kids options? ....oh wait they are sub humans.

 

this is just to the intenseheat guy, now like i said before i'm not exactly for circumsizing babys or anything, but all that info that you been putting is making it seem like a circumsized penis is so much worse then being uncircumsized, and me being someone who was not circumsized for more then half my life and now am, i just kinda have to laugh because theres almost no differnce besides the look. Like i said i'm not for circumision really, but now that i am my penis is still VERY sensative just like it was before, i cant feel any differnce actually. Theres actually things that i like better about being circumsized. sure when reading it loosing 20,000 nerve endings or whatever that stuff says sounds really bad but in reality you cant even tell, it feels the same. And the surgury for adults at least isnt bad at all theres no pain, i guess there probly is for the babys as they probly dont use the same anesthetics but getting it as an adult is almost painless. I'm sure u'll fight me about this but unless u were circumsized when u were older you really cant. and like i said, i'm not for circumsizing babys i'm just pointing out that some of that stuff is wrong.

 

oh yea, life as an American boy is sooooo tough

 

blah blah how the fuck you know about something you never had.

 

i have known 7 years as circumcised and 14 years uncircumsized so i think i am the best person to respond to this.

do NOT get your children circumsized. the no pain thisn is BULLSHIT
BULLSHIT
BULLSHIT, it doesnt matter if its a kid or not, as if htey havnet developed pain receptors. children are extra sensitive to pain not numb to it. its barbaric and i will never let my child be circumsized for any reason beside medical complications with the forskin.

 

Intenseheat what do u mean how do i know something i never had i was circumsized when i was 14. And the dude above me who said he was also circumsized when he was 14, i agree with ya about not getting babys circumsized, but when i got my surgury there was almost no pain, i was asleep while it was happening and afterwards they gave me pain killers that did the job great.

 

UNDER GENERAL . i could open you like a pig you would not feel anything . so whats your point?

 

Dont tell me i got it backward right?

 

Yes, but sometimes I wish I wasn't. As you may know, this was an extermely common practice in the USA during the 1950s, '60s and '70s when about ninety-percent of baby boys had this procedure done. You started to see a reversal in this trend beginning in the '70s or '80s and now only about sixty to seventy percent of American-born boys go through this procedure.

I was 'cut' at birth so I wouldn't have known different. The more that I have read and understand, I've often wondered if having an intact penis would've been preferable as it might have provided more sensitivity and enjoyment. The only thing is that during my early teens-by which time I'd reached puberty, I was neglecting my personal hygeine and think that should I have been left intact, I might have experienced problems then.

I likely would not unless his mother had violent objections. However, I would hope to get involved with a woman who was more enlightened. I feel that my son-should I ever have one-should be able to make his own decisions about matters like this. I would, however, make damned sure that I (and perhaps his mother) would show him how to take care of himself.

 

No, I wouldn't get it done to my son. I'd make it his choice later in life. Why force a decision like that on a defenceless infant? They've shown that it only makes baby boys 4% cleaner anyway. Proper care of the penis is all you need to be clean, so saying it's for hygenic purposes is a cop-out.

 

You make sound like a life threat . Dont forget mamals survive millions of years with out a bath. do think early american settles even up to the 1930s took a shower every day? . your over reacting a bit.

 

wow...after readin all this....I am very pissed off at my parents for letting some doctor snip away at my body because of tradition and society's rules of normal.....my dad is, but why should I be like him? My mom actualy told me once that it was because I could have gotten some sort of infection of something but I really don't believe that....
It is a disgusting practice in my eyes and completely unnecessary to me too....but I'm screwed now, so I guess thats all, and there aint nuthin to do about it....I actually do belive the stuff about needin lube and stuff, I have never had sex but with myself and trust me I need somehting or it aint happenin, which I hate. But yeah, I would most definitley NEVER get my kid cut like that, it should be his choice when he is old enough to make it

I was actually watching tv the other night and saw something about how they had created a surgery to replace the hyman wall or something in females thus making them phisically virgins again (sounds stupid to me), and now I'm thinking: Why don't they do something like that for guys who want a foreskin back on their bodies somehow?

 

If you've been curcumcized and feel you've been missing out, read my new thread about foreskin restoration!