Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[moocowmoo]

I'm sorry that you find yourself sexually unsatisfied, but your anecdotal evidence hardly stands since for everyone that agrees with you there are plenty that have not experienced what you have.

And no, false equality aside, those are not limbs or important body parts.

I assume you are not intact yourself, or if you are, then you would not object to the removal of your foreskin. That would be fine, because it is unimportant to you and it is your decision. But try to force that decision on an intact man who does believe his foreskin is important, and he would probably defend himself with violence before letting you have your way. Do it to a child, and they cannot fight back. I understand if it is easier for you to disbelieve me.

[GlyphGryph]

But surely you agree there are degrees of importance?

[Neonivek]

Plus don't forget that any surgery carries a degree of risk

It is why people don't remove your apendix

[moocowmoo]

But surely you agree there are degrees of importance?

Importance is subjective, and shouldn't be grounds for justifying unnecessary surgery or belittling the damage caused by it. You cannot say "at this level of importance, it is wrong to remove this body part; if it is below the importance threshold it is fair game". It is wrong period, male or female.

But fuck it, let's say I was way out of line using the word mutilation. Since you want to talk about connotations of words, let's examine the connotation of the word "circumcision". It brings to mind maybe "a little snip", "removal of a little piece of skin". It doesn't remotely suggest barbarity of the actual procedure. Watch a video of it being done if you want to argue with me now about the word "barbaric" to describe it. It is absolutely horrifying. "Circumcision" takes all the nastiness out of it. If you're going to accuse me of twisting words for propaganda, then at least acknowledge that that is precisely how circumcision continues to go on unchecked, despite the human rights violation that it is.

[Willfor]

The amount I want to make a tone argument, and an argument against the severe emotional position this is coming from are two very driving forces within my mind at the moment. I'm trying my very best not to make them. I am failing, I think.

[Neonivek]

"Circumcision" takes all the nastiness out of it.

Ahh a lot like the term Collateral damage. Which is a term made to make "People were killed/murdered in this attack" seem acceptible.

[Cthulhu]

Lot of pathos flying around.

It is a clinical procedure and a clinical term is the appropriate term to use.  Calling it "mutilation" gives it an implied barbarity without any supporting evidence, and has no business in a proper debate.

Parents make pretty much every decision for a child, even decisions with permanent consequences, many much riskier than circumcision.  If you want it banned, you need to prove serious inherent risks and disprove benefits (And likewise if you want it to be compulsory you need to prove serious inherent benefits and disprove risks).  Circumcision is reversible and its benefits and drawbacks haven't been satisfactorily proven.  If you don't want your kid circumcised, by all means don't do it, but if I believe that a minor, reversible cosmetic surgery will improve my child's life, then the onus is on you to prove otherwise.

Pseudo-edit:  It's a very charged argument.  I used to dismiss it as "People vehemently arguing about something their parents chose for them" but I'm trying to get away from stuff like that.

[Frumple]

Just to sanity check myself, and somewhat unrelated to the general discussion, you are fully aware that we've got much worse human rights violations to deal with, too, right moo (or everyone, really)? Even just in the USA.

This isn't an attempt to discredit the position against circumcision or downplay the effects, it's just a subject that seems to get disproportionate fervor to me, especially when the solution seems to be running through a pretty simple consent law. I see the discussion and my reaction is -- well, yes, but we've got much bigger fish to fry, right? Let's fry those first and maybe get this one along the way.

Which isn't to say we couldn't fry the issues concurrently or anything, of course. That's appropriate, so long as the issue isn't drowning out or distracting from bigger ones.

[Fenrir]

Even if they did discard this matter for larger things, the exact same amount of nothing would be done, and the debate would wane into tattered memory as they all do, so I see little difference whether they argue about circumcision or not.

There is little sense in talking about which fish to fry when no one has any intention of starting a fire.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

As we have addressed on the forums before, "We have bigger problems!" is a fallacious argument. Human society is capable of multitasking.

[Frumple]

Which is why I didn't say that, and was specifically asking to make sure the multitasking was actually going on

That's why it's a sanity check for me, y'know?

[Bauglir]

As of the information I had last time I looked into this (years ago, and not terrifically deeply; didn't read any actual papers, just summaries), the conclusion I came to was that it's a surgical procedure with negligible risks and benefits, and permanent aesthetic consequences, with the exception of the possibility of infection or error that is inherent to all surgical procedures (which is certainly a variable worth considering). So my opinion is that this should evoke the same degree of outrage as tatooing an infant's chest, possibly as part of a religious tradition that mandates such practice. Considering that to be wrong is certainly defensible, so I'm not going to argue against it, but I think that when weighed against religious freedom, it becomes far from a simple issue (which is why I'm also not going to put forth much argument in its defense, either).

The more extreme forms of surgical genital modification (to either gender) without the subject's consent are, in my opinion, unequivocally wrong because they have extremely harmful and unquestionable consequences, typically by design.

[Fenrir]

Which is why I didn't say that, and was specifically asking to make sure the multitasking was actually going on

That's why it's a sanity check for me, y'know?

This is an Internet argument. No one is multitasking. No one is even singletasking. This is the polar opposite of any and all kinds of tasking.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Considering that to be wrong is certainly defensible, so I'm not going to argue against it, but I think that when weighed against religious freedom, it becomes far from a simple issue (which is why I'm also not going to put forth much argument in its defense, either).

At least in the US, the Supreme Court ruled a long time ago that the government can regulate religious actions if they interfere with secular law, originally when a representative of the Mormon church filed suit to challenge anti-polygamy laws.

You can believe that God wants you to do something and say so all you like, but that doesn't do anything to make it legal.

[Bauglir]

Agreed, but I'm saying that it complicates matters and I'm not sure that the consequences are sufficiently dire to mandate a law in the first place. Not that religious organizations should be granted the freedom to do whatever. I do know I don't intend to circumcize any children I might find myself raising one day, but that's a bit of a different thing.