So why is it acceptable to carry out ritualised mutilation on a boy child, I thought we were suppose to be reaching for equality? Both sexes should be given legal protection to grow up whole and healthy.
Just a thought though.
If the ban did go through, leaving aside the issues of religious freedom: wouldn’t that criminalise the act it and potentially drive it underground.
While I don’t support circumcision it is it not better to have it placed in a medical sphere where the proceedure is safer. I like the previous posters ideas of putting an age restriction the practice so the children/adults themselves can have a say .

I’m no dick-chopper-ologist, but I’ve not heard of people dying in droves because they had their foreskin chopped. With all surgeries like that sure there’s a chance for infection, but it’s not like there’s ninja dinosaurs hiding somewhere to eat people JUST because they get a bit of skin off. I’ll totally be keeping an eye out if this makes it to the polls. I’d love to see political commercials about dicks. Actual ones, not ones running for president.

I don’t understand why it is so difficult for people to realize that one’s parent’s religious views are not the same as the child’s religious views. Circumcision is painful, but most of all.. it is a permanent removal of healthy, sensitive, functional, erogenous genital tissue.

When you circumcise a baby, you circumcise him forever.. he’s circumcised as a teenager, as an adult, and as a senior citizen. So, to say that he should have no say in the matter is a little shortsighted.

If a man understands the risks and losses of circumcision, I completely support his right to make choices for his body, especially if he feels he needs to do so for his personal convictions (including religious beliefs). But, I don’t even follow the religion of my parents, and I certainly don’t share their taste in fashion and aesthetics. Why should the government afford them the right to make such a decision without MY consent, when female genitals are completely protected by law, as are all of our other healthy, sensitive, normal body parts.

This law is not about making the foreskin an exception under the law.. it’s about finally including the foreskin with every other body part in it’s class – to give baby boys the same protection already afforded to girls (which, is a protection we greatly celebrate in our culture).

If you don’t believe in individual rights.. then you’ve got to throw out the entire Constitution.

>Also, your comparison to slaughtering people is ludicrous and makes you sound >more like Glen Beck than like someone I should pay attention to.

Perhaps you should read my statement more carefully: “Do those two things have anything to do with each other? Yeah, about as much as whether men who are circumcised “live productive lives” and whether it was right, wrong, or a matter of perspective to have circumcised them in the first place. They are irrelevant to each other.”

Eskenazi opened the door; I merely waltzed through it.

btw it was normally done in places that were sandy and had limited access to running water (like israrel etc, and australia) as sand caught under the foreskin would cause insane swelling and long term, ery painful problems. in our modern days of showers, baths and general good hygiene, its now drastically outdated.
time to put this antiquated practice where it belongs, in the history books :/

it is a brutal, archaic, unnecessary practice… I don’t care what your supposed invisible-man-in-the-sky says.

More evidence for its cost-ineffectiveness is that the UK National Health Service stopped paying for routine circumcisions more than fifty years ago, believing the procedure to be a waste of time.

Why is the road to eliminating it through education? Is that the road to stopping child scarification or ritual genital mutilation? We legislate against those things. Education is important too, but these things unquestionably ought to be illegal.

Before anyone says it: it’s nothing like vaccination, which is a vital medical practice and has saved millions of lives worldwide. That cost-benefit analysis stands up to scrutiny.

http://www.channel4embarrassingillnesses.com/episodes/episode-guides/embarrassing-bodies-series-4/episode-4–wakestock/circumcision/

Dr. Christian Jessen (and Dr. Pixie McKenna) explained the antibacterial enzymes that remain intact within the foreskin of uncircumcised males and how this helps protect against STIs. I would like to see more educating about this in America, where as seen in the Weekly article, there is a lot of shame and phobia around even talking about what might be healthy about uncut cocks.

From a secular standpoint, I don’t like permanently modifying a child’s body without a good medical reason. It should probably follow the same rules as tattooing and body piercing, which most states restrict for people under age 18.

I haven’t done enough reading to dismiss the medical argument. It looks like some studies support claims of lower risk of STIs and some do not. Does anybody have information on flaws in the pro-circumcision studies?

I would like to see a lot fewer infant circumcisions being done for bullshit “health” or “hygiene” reasons, but the road to that place is education, not law.

I speak as a happily enforeskinned man.

Is taking away a foreskin harming the development of the kid? I don’t think so. I manage to have frequent and enjoyable sex, both alone and with others, without a foreskin. I’ve also read that circumcised men are less likely to contract some STIs including HIV. I think that’s a nice feature.

Also, your comparison to slaughtering people is ludicrous and makes you sound more like Glen Beck than like someone I should pay attention to.