Circumcized men 70% less likely to contract HIV

[Dis]

the real question is whether you would have a circumcision for you kid (boy) if and when you have one.

Despite some advantages of being cut, and the fact they look better. I probably wouldn't have it done on my kid because any risk is too much risk. That's the most important organ on a mans body, no need to be messing around with it for no good reason. I'd just make damn sure to educate my child about the risks of hiv and have him use condoms.

[notyoueither]

Maybe this is Diss.

http://www.universalway.org/circtruth.html

ched circumcision horror stories are multitudinous and easily uncovered upon even cursory research, resulting in complications that cause a myriad of problems for numerous babies, children, and mature adults, every year. is a fact that every year throughout the world, babies are losing their entire penis to botched circumcisions, end up having transgender sexual surgery performed upon them, and are subsequently given female hormones and raised as girls. Often, these children have no idea what has happened to them, grow up with an innate confusion about their true identity, and are never told about what originally happened to them, this because their parents are apparently more concerned with protecting their leaders and their rituals than they are concerned with the well-being of their children. These children most often are quite odd-looking in appearance (essentially like the character "Pat" played by Julia Sweeney of Saturday Night Live television fame: what is described as a "butch" female by some people), and are often ostracized and continually insulted and taunted by society for their appearance, which is obviously wholly not of their own fault.

[Dis]

I don't believe that link.

From what I heard, that was only tried once in Canada. To turn a boy into a girl. It failed miserable. No reputable doctor would do that to a kid.

btw that guy in Canada eventually killed himself.

[Asher]

The growing consensus against circumcision

National Post, Jackie Smith

Just 30 years ago, male circumcision was all the rage; as many as 90% of boys in the United States, 70% of those in Australia, 48% in Canada and 24% in the United Kingdom were circumcised (often without any anesthesia).

I remember the war that waged in my own mind when my son was born in the 1980s.

I had no religious reasons for choosing circumcision; I wasn't trying to guard against "unhealthy masturbation," as early proponents of circumcision were. I didn't care if he looked like dad, as some parents do. I wanted to know only one thing: What would be best for him -- medically.

If he wasn't circumcised, would I be responsible for increasing his chances of urinary tract infections and sexually transmitted disease, as some physicians had suggested? Would it mean he might need the operation later in life, when circumcision is more uncomfortable, not to mention unpleasant?

What if he had the operation and got an infection? What if the knife slipped? How would I live with myself?

More important, how would he live with himself?

It's the nature of parenting to always think, "What could I have done better?" So once I made a decision I worried over whether it was the right one. Like all parents, I tried to act in the best interests of my child.

When the Canadian Pediatric Society (CPS) reviewed the medical literature and came out against routine circumcision in 1996, I thought the matter was settled. The CPS looked at the effects of newborn circumcision on the rate of urinary tract infections, sexually transmitted diseases, cancer of the penis, penile problems, and decided the practice was inadvisable. This was in line with a recommendation made earlier by its Fetus and Newborn Committee and with 1971 and 1975 recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Nevertheless, debates about the ethics of circumcision remain unresolved because of its connection to religion and culture -- because medical studies sometimes turn up different results, and because parents do think their kids should look like dad.

Still, I believe a consensus against circumcision is steadily emerging. In this new era of patient rights, circumcision has come to seem like an anachronism. Among doctors, there is a greater emphasis on informed decision-making, the limits on parents' rights to make decisions about their kids' health and the rights of children to be protected from parents who make wrong decisions. Even some adult men who were unnecessarily circumcised as children are asserting their rights to restitution. And since the balance of medical evidence suggests those who oppose circumcision have the facts on their side, doctors are increasingly refusing to perform circumcisions. Complications from bleeding, amputation, renal failure, sepsis and death are powerful incentives to stop.

With the death of an infant in B.C., possibly as a result of circumcision and currently under coroner's investigation, there will be more questions of circumcision's benefits and risks -- with a more pronounced focus on the latter.

Parents who opt for circumcision must, as a matter of both law and morals, make their decision based on the principle of respect for the rights and best interests of their child, according to the available information concerning risks and benefits. The death of the Kamloops baby may bring new awareness about the risks of circumcision (though the baby's death may ultimately turn out to have arisen from something far more complicated than a botched circumcision).

Indeed, the media coverage of the incident may speed circumcision for non-religious reasons into the dustbin of medical practice -- alongside many other once-popular procedures, such as the removal of the ovaries for hysteria, tonsillectomy for a sore throat, lobotomy for mental retardation, etc. In a few years, looking like dad or wanting to keep a boy "clean" may no longer be legally legitimate rationales for circumcision. It's about time they weren't. Parents who have had their kids circumcised can't be faulted for doing what they thought was right. But it is unethical to continue a practice that is no longer medically defensible and could harm our kids.

[Dis]

what's the deal with looking like dad. Who cites this as a reason?

What are these men taking baths with their children? Isn't that sexual abuse?

I have never seen my father's penis, and I'm perfectly happy I haven't. And I don't think he's ever seen my penis either.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

As a person, I'm really quite fond of you, Dissident- but on just about all vaguely sexual issues you're really out there on a strange planet of your own.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Dissident

What are these men taking baths with their children? Isn't that sexual abuse?

Only if they abuse them sexually.
I find washing hygienic, but not usually a prelude to my parents fiddling with my sex organs.


Naturist families (and indeed quite a lot of Europeans) seem to manage with seeing the genitalia of their parents without collapsing in a heap or rushing off to get a lawyer so they can claim huge amounts of damages for seeing another person's penis.

My partner and his brother and sister used to like taking baths with their father when they were all very young- and none of them has any hang-ups about their parents or their sexuality.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Dissident
what's the deal with looking like dad. Who cites this as a reason?

What are these men taking baths with their children? Isn't that sexual abuse?

I have never seen my father's penis, and I'm perfectly happy I haven't. And I don't think he's ever seen my penis either.

Diss, nudity and sex are something different from each other. Nudity is a natural state for the human body, and there's nothing wrong with nudity within the family, especially when the child is young and must be cared for.

Maybe you'd be sexually less awkward if you had seen your dad's penis more often

[Drake Tungsten]

I wonder how long it will be until Canada bans circumcision...

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
I've heard stories like that in the US. There was one on 20/20 a few years back.

One of the OB residents in the hospital I did residency at badly botched a circumcision. He took off virtually the entire glans. One further sad thing about the incident is that he shouldn't have had to do the procedure. He had just finished an all night call. Generally OB residents were exempt from doing the morning circumcisions after being on call, but his senior resident, with whom he had had a history of personal conflicts with, ordered him to do it. The interpersonal animosity was further inflamed by racial tension, he being Jewish and the senior resident being black. In the end his career in medicine was utterly ruined, the senior resident was so afraid of secret retaliation from the Jewish medical community in town that he went to work in Saudi Arabia after finishing up, and who knows whether plastic surgery sufficiently undid the damage to the kid.

[Dis]

Originally posted by Lazarus and the Gimp
As a person, I'm really quite fond of you, Dissident- but on just about all vaguely sexual issues you're really out there on a strange planet of your own.

that may be. My family wasn't normal when it came to affection and stuff.

We never took baths with each other. So I'm not sure what is considered normal.

[Dis]

Originally posted by Spiffor



Diss, nudity and sex are something different from each other. Nudity is a natural state for the human body, and there's nothing wrong with nudity within the family, especially when the child is young and must be cared for.

Maybe you'd be sexually less awkward if you had seen your dad's penis more often

why is it if I expose my penis to a little kid, I will be arrested then for sexual indecency?

indecency isn't the right term. But I know you'll get charged for more than indecent exposure. There's a few weird laws out there.

In Mississippi it was illegal for a man to walk around with an erect penis. Even if he has clothing on.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Dissident


why is it if I expose my penis to a little kid, I will be arrested then for sexual indecency?

indecency isn't the right term. But I know you'll get charged for more than indecent exposure. There's a few weird laws out there.

In Mississippi it was illegal for a man to walk around with an erect penis. Even if he has clothing on.

Well wait a minute, maybe that's not such a bad law. Think about it. Do you want a bunch of white Mississippian men walking around you with their flags flying proudly in their pants? I mean we're talking about Mississippi here. There's no telling what that would mean. It would probably be a prelude to some sort of obscene lynching thing. You know, some sort of perverted fusion between sex and violence. You know, kinda like Deliverance but with ropes.

[Alexander's Horse]

thats a horrific story doc - my boys had it done with a device which prevents that risk - or so I was told by the surgeon

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by Alexander's Horse
thats a horrific story doc - my boys had it done with a device which prevents that risk - or so I was told by the surgeon

Not quite. The resident was using that device when he operated. He was so tired that he didn't apply it properly.