Speaking of ethnic and cultural ignorance while thinking about the audacity of dope among so-called “birthers” who imagine that President Obama would be uncircumcised if he had secretly been born to Muslim parents in Kenya, Indonesia, or for that matter Hawaii I started wondering if the statistics being used by the CDC to recommend universal circumcision demonstrated real biological differences or only cultural/religious behavioral ones.
Because while it might be great if the mechanical act of being circumcised reduced one’s risk of acquiring HIV from unprotected sex. It would be kind of… unfortunate if being culturally and religiously Jewish, Muslim, Protestant Christian, or one of the much smaller subcultures worldwide that emphasize circumcision and… a lot of other hygiene, monogamy or fidelity-related, and discouraged use of alcohol and injection drugs.
I don’t know. But I’d probably want to find out before I endorsed or bitterly mocked proposals of universal circumcision to prevent contracting HIV. Or, for that matter before I endorsed or mocked proposals for universal adoption of Judeo/Christian/Islamic conventions.
Or said “who needs condoms if I’m already circumcised.” Which I suspect is what vast numbers of men are likely to say should the recommendation come down.
(Just to be clear I don’t know if social correlations have been made. But do I want to know.)
Submitted by 3157 (not verified) on Wed, 2009-08-26 06:06.
There's some analysis of HIV studies statistics in this page: http://circumcision.org/hiv.htm
Granted, it's an anti-circumcision site so it's biased from the beginning, but I agree with them about how these studies are biased on the opposite direction based on the fact that HIV positive numbers aren't devastatingly bigger in, for example, European countries where people live relatively the same way as in USA, but don't circumcise enfants as a rule. (I feel like I'm writing badly today but I hope the meaning is comprehensible under the bad grammar and not knowing the right words in english *needs breakfast*)
Submitted by 3157 (not verified) on Wed, 2009-08-26 08:13.
Performing surgery on non-consenting infants to maybe possibly sort of reduce the risk of a disease that has risks that can be much better mitigated by other means is disturbing to me. Especially in the U.S., where HIV infection is not at epidemic levels. If the research is compelling (so far it's not), adults may decide for themselves to cut off their own body parts- but something tells me not many will!
Submitted by 3157 (not verified) on Wed, 2009-08-26 09:29.
It seems like even if there is an effect, it's a drop in the bucket compared to consistent barrier use. Having unprotected promiscuous sex circumcised is like wearing a helmet while driving drunk on the wrong side of the road--maybe it's better than nothing, but it's not your main problem.
I'm not a fan of circumcision. It's an operation for which different justifications are constantly being made, none of them compelling. It seems like if circumcision had just been invented and people heard half-assed rationales like "well, he won't have to go to all the trouble of washing under a foreskin" or "don't let him be the only boy in the locker room without one!", there's no way anyone would do it.
I don't think it's devastating, I know plenty of circumcised men who seem to have pretty good times, but I'd need a hell of a lot more than possible evidence of maybe slight correlation to do it to any son of mine.
Submitted by 3157 (not verified) on Wed, 2009-08-26 10:04.
This is one issue that gets me fired up. With my whole being I feel and believe that no baby should be circumcised. Should he choose this operation later in life, fine. The difference is choice. Babies have no choice. I can only imagine the uproar we'd be hearing if any health organization was widely advocating the circumcision/cutting of women/girls for any reason. Why, then, are we sitting quietly while cutting perfectly healthy baby boys is advocated? Boys are born perfect and whole - there is ABSOLUTELY no need or medical reason to unquestioningly cut off their foreskin. (I'm not going to get into the religious reasons for circumcision.)
I think your other intelligent commenters have said it well: there's not a big enough benefit in the possible reduction of HIV infection rates to be calling for the widespread circumcision of baby boys.
Submitted by 3157 (not verified) on Wed, 2009-08-26 15:49.
I just really want to second colorlessblue's point about the fact that circumcision in the Western nations seems to be mainly a US thing, and there are no obvious health benefits when compared against other Western nations. We in Britain seem to do pretty well without involuntary and largely cosmetic surgery to sensitive body parts. As other commenters have said, it's not a patch on proper use of barrier contraception!
I guess I've never understood how come circumcision got so popular in the US, especially since (as commented on the earlier thread) there are explicit New Testament teachings against it!
[More Americans do it than anyone else who's not religiously obliged to, but it at least used to be popular in many Anglo-hyphen societies. It's modern (ok, now almost 200 years old) origins are based in semen conservation and the early-18th-Century belief that it would discourage masturbation. Which I think explains a lot. (As I've mentioned elsewhere, the health food, physical fitness, as well as scouting and the YMCA arose for the same purpose of conserving semen, i.e. "precious bodily fluids," and avoiding "self-pollution.") But yes, it's otherwise very odd that such a Protestant country would have adopted it. Thanks, SE. --fl]
Submitted by 3157 (not verified) on Sun, 2009-08-30 19:55.
I had often thought that circumcision made it difficult to tell the Jews from the gentiles, considering the consequences of extreme antisemitism. Of course now the antisemitic zealots, if in power could use Mitochondrial DNA.
It is also interesting that quite a few African tribes used circumcision as a rite of manhood until the Christians came along.