« Giant-Killer and One-Eyed Wonder
Signs Donald Trump Has Seriously Damaged His Brand: Poll Numbers and Ratings Drop »
This Post Is About Penises
Not just any penises, mind you, but an effort by the nanny staters of San Francisco to ban male circumcision.
These activists call circumcision “male genital mutilation.” They point out that it is extremely painful, although I can’t personally speak to that because it has been over 64 years since I was snipped. They also believe that circumcision is a breach of human rights and violates something called “body integrity.”
The activists are collecting signature for a ballot measure on a law that would make it “unlawful to circumcise, excise, cut, or mutilate the whole or any part of the foreskin, testicles, or penis” of anyone 17 or younger in San Francisco. Under the proposal, a person who violates the proposed ban could be jailed for not more than one year or fined not more than $1,000. Exemptions for religious reasons would not be allowed.
The sharper pencils among you will ask what’s the difference between male circumcision and female genital mutilation as practiced in Northwest Africa, the Near East and Southeast Asia, although not in San Francisco or elsewhere in the so-called civilized world.
Good question.
The best answer that I can offer is that Jews and Muslims circumcise males shortly after birth as a rite of passage (yes, just like cultures who remove the external genitalia of young girls), while the prevailing medical view is that the health advantages of circumcision outweigh the risks. From available evidence, it has no substantial effect on sexual infection and has extremely low complication rate.
My own bottom line is simple: In what instances does a city, or for that matter a state or the feds, have the right to tell us what we can and cannot do?
A good example are laws requiring motorcyclists to wear helmets for the stated reason that traumatic head injuries from motorcycle crashes put an outsized and unnecessary burden on the health-care system, as well as the unstated reason that some people are too stupid or vain to wear helmets.
Another good example are smoking laws because it is well established that second-hand smoke, whether in a restaurant or wherever, is toxic. You wanna blow out your lungs and destroy your heart? Fine, but do it in private.
Circumcision would seem to be different. It puts no burden on the health-care system and you can’t die from it, but by my lights San Francisco or anyplace else, for that matter, doesn’t have the right to tell parents that they can’t get little Abe or Johnny sliced.
As it is, my son is not circumcised, a decision that his mother and I made, were not forced to make and would have deeply resented being told what we had to do or not do.
15 Responses to “This Post Is About Penises”
If female circumcision only involved the removal of the inner labia, this might be an apt comparison. However, female circumcision usually involves the whole or partial removal of the clitoris and sometimes vagina is actually sewn shut. The reasons for female circumcision are far different from those for male circumcision. Mainly the cultural need to control women and their sexual drive and pleasure.
Thank you for pointing out this very important difference,. It makes the anti-male circumcision seem even nuttier.
“My own bottom line is simple: In what instances does a city, or for that matter a state or the feds, have the right to tell us what we can and cannot do?”
I think the argument is that it can, in situations where there is perception that an individual’s health, welfare or rights ascribed to being a human member of the community comes into play, where that member would otherwise not be given adequate representation if the procedure in question was not related directly to his/her health or welfare.
I guess one could argue that circumcision, in some instances, would be good for their welfare because they’d “look like Dad.” But the medical arguments are weak, the religious arguments are just that, religious and have more to do with covenants with the gods than even cosmetics. The rest of the discussion is probably just related to what we want our sons to look like.
The procedure is not risk-free. There is frequent need for re-do, as the cosmetics aren’t acceptable or there is complication.
As a pediatrician who has done literally thousands of them, all at the sole request of the parents, I welcome the argument.
OK, Jeff, what about this……
Recently, however, several large studies revealed a 60% decrease in HIV transmission in circumcised males compared to uncircumcised males. This may ultimately influence some changes in recommendations in the near future.
http://www.medicinenet.com/circumcision_the_medical_pros_and_cons/article.htm
casualobserver,
You are correct, there are studies that support it. When I was early in my practice, the arguments at that point had to do more with (HIV wasn’t even understood) the advantage that circumcised males have over uncircumcised regarding the frequency of neonatal UTIs. That reduced frequency is still relevant, but only within the first 6 months of life, still very rare, and then it equilibrates after 6 months of life.
The AAP’s stance on circumstance continues to be:
“Circumcision is a surgical procedure in which the skin covering the end of the penis is removed. Scientific studies show some medical benefits of circumcision. However, these benefits are not sufficient for the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) to recommend that all infant boys be circumcised. Parents may want their sons circumcised for religious, social, or cultural reasons.
Because circumcision is not essential to a child’s health, parents should choose what is best for their child…”
..and thus I have to agree with them that it becomes just another parental decision, like many others that parents make for or about their kids, and possibly open for debate as it relates to a surgical procedure that is not without risk.
Among Pediatric Infectious Disease physicians, Pediatric Urologists and Pediatric Nephrologists–none have endorsed (so far as I know) the procedure as a medical necessity in order to avoid potential HIV transmission, thus far.
And I don’t look on the debate as another “governmental control” issue, but I think about it as some dialogue in the direction of 1) Why is this primarily a US phenomenon, 2) How did it evolve from initially being a method of reducing infectious diseases (that was shown not to work so well for GC and chlamydia) in the US to some parental “right” that the government is trying to take away from us? to 3) should we have some discussion of whether this really needs to routinely happen?
Interesting juxtaposition of headlines about penises and one-eyed wonders.
But this is often done as part of a religious ceremony and beliefs.
Given the long history and tradition of circumcision in those religions, I cannot see how this law could possibly pass Constitutional muster on First Amendment grounds.
casualobserver,
I responded but it is in the “awaiting moderation” phase. Thanks for your input and your point is valid, although I hope my reply posts and I can share my thoughts about it.
OK, Jeff, you are probably using a forbidden word in your post which has hung it up in the holding tank.
It won’t pass. It’s trendy among certain sets in the city, but not among the vast majority of people.
As for whether or not a city can/should be able to tell its residents what it “can or cannot do”, I think there’s a pretty big difference between the “can” and the “cannot”. SF tends to do both, depending on the situation, sometimes with incredible results, sometimes not so much.
I think it’s pretty clear that government has the right to restrict us from causing pain and injury to others. Even a strict libertarian would not argue with that.
I don’t consider myself an anti-circumcision activist, but I am having trouble justifying to myself why is shouldn’t be illegal, just like any other act where significant pain and injury is inflicted involuntarily for questionable medical purpose. The supposed medical benefits seems to me to be cherry-picking. If circumcision had never existed as a religious procedure, the medical community would never have come up with it on their own as a valid medical procedure in the interest of health. Pretty much any superficial body modification that you can imagine is likely to have *some* benefit, if enough resources were directed to study it. As for the HIV study, there are much more effective, less painful, non-permanent methods to prevent HIV transmission, so that doesn’t seem like enough of a justification in my book.
I’m not blind to the fact that it is an established custom, and a religious requirement for some. However, I think it would be difficult to argue that a law forbidden parents from inflicting pain and injury on their infants should be overturned on religious grounds. The precedent seems dangerous.
If this passes, I do not think it will survive, if for no other reason than that there are no exemptions for religious purposes.
While African female genital cutting is indeed barbaric, that of Malaysia and Indonesia is surgical, much milder and more comparable to male circumcision. Yet ALL female genital cutting is outlawed in the USA (and most developed countries) without regard to the parents’ religion or culture. In some jurisdictions, including mine, not even an adult women’s consent is sufficient, apparently as a hedge against coercion. Female “circumcision” was legal in the US until 1996, and in 1959 a Dr Rathman invented a gadget to do it, with a shield to spare the clitoris (see http://www.circumstitions.com/methods.html#rathman NSFW) Last year the AAP flirted with allowing a token, ritual nick to girls “much less extensive than male genital cutting” but it was howled down. So why the double standard?
Infant circumcision violates HIS freedom to choose his own religion as an adult without having had one pre-emptively “marked in his flesh”.
@Casualobserver: isn’t it curious that circumcision has been touted for over a century as being good for one disease after another, always the most feared disease of the day: TB and epilepsy when masturbation was supposed to cause them, STIs when they were dangerous and incurable, cancer – and now HIV? And a new one came along just when the old one was being discredited.
The famous claim of “60% reduction” (only in female-to-male transmission, a small proportion of US transmission) amounts to 73 men who didn’t get HIV less than two years after 5,400 were circumcised, while 64 were infected and 237 left the trials, their HIV status unknown. (73 is the difference from the non-circumcised control group.)
In at least seven African countries, more of the circumcised men have HIV than the non-circumcised, according to USAID. A trial in Uganda started to find that circumcised men were more likely to give HIV to their partners, but it was cut short.
Circumcision is a “cure” looking for a disease, an imposition in search of a justification.
To be clear this is propagated by a group of citizens trying to collect enough signatures to put it on the ballot. I do not think anyone on the Board of Supervisors (or anyone else in city government) supports this.
The way it’s presented in the press, “San Francisco to ban circumcision” leads one to believe that the CITY (and city government) supports this. In fact it’s just a gang of people who happen to live in the area.
It’s like saying “Texas supports practices of Branch Davidians” when in fact it is just a group of people looking for recruits to join in their sect. Of course in SF the group is trying to get their beliefs on the ballot. But the point is the same. It’s not the city of SF supporting this. Just a small group of people who live there.
“Circumcision would seem to be different. It puts no burden on the health-care system and you can’t die from it.”
The author ignores the recent death of the boy in New York from his circumcision. Circumcision is surgery and carries risks, sometimes fatal. Circumcision is elective surgery that is outdated. If parents will not protect their children, then the government often must step in to do so. No one minds that girls are protected from genital cutting. It is time we protect boys from genital cutting.