Posted on 05/26/2011 2:26:24 AM PDT by Kaslin
ON THE BALLOT in San Francisco this fall will be a proposal making it a crime to circumcise male children. If the measure passes, anyone convicted of circumcising a baby boy could be fined up to $1,000 and sentenced to a year in prison. Even for San Francisco, this is madness.
The circumcising of newborn boys is perhaps the most familiar type of surgery in the United States. According to the federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, US hospitals perform the procedure more than 1.2 million times each year. While there are wide variations by ethnicity and region, and while circumcision rates have declined in recent years, the great majority of American men are circumcised. And in nearly every case, the decision was made for them in their infancy by their parents -- just like the decision to breastfeed or bottle-feed, or to use cloth or disposable diapers. Even in the most childless major city in America, it's hard to see voters approving what would be an egregious infringement on parental rights.
The health benefits of circumcision are clear, if modest. The Mayo Clinic website reflects the medical consensus, noting that circumcised men and boys generally have a lower risk of urinary tract infections, penile cancer, and sexually transmitted diseases; and that circumcision makes genital hygiene easier. At the same time, Mayo endorses the view of the American Academy of Pediatrics, which doesn't consider the advantages of circumcision compelling enough to recommend that infant boys be circumcised as a matter of routine. The academy's bottom line is commonsensical: "Because circumcision is not essential to a child's health, parents should choose what is best for their child by looking at the benefits and risks."
In short, circumcision is something about which reasonable people can and do disagree. But there is nothing reasonable about the fanatics trying to make it a crime.
The ballot campaign in San Francisco is being spearheaded by a group of self-described "intactivists," political crusaders obsessed with the preservation of foreskins. Their mania might be laughable if not for two things: (1) they hijack terminology used to describe a dreadful type of violence against girls and women, and (2) they are attempting to criminalize a fundamental rite of Judaism.
Promoters of the San Fancisco initiative call it the "MGM bill." The initials stand for "male genital mutilation," a dishonest phrase meant to link the safe and medically unobjectionable procedure of male circumcision with the frightful cruelty of female genital mutilation.
The two are not remotely comparable. "Female genital mutilation has no known health benefits," the World Health Organization and nine other international organizations stressed in a 2008 report on the scourge, which persists in much of Africa and the Middle East. "On the contrary, it is known to be harmful to girls and women in many ways." It is painful and traumatic; it makes childbearing "significantly" more risky; and it leads to higher rates of post-partum hemorrhaging and infant death. Long-term consequences of female genital mutilation "include chronic pain, infections, decreased sexual enjoyment, and psychological consequences, such as post-traumatic stress disorder."
By contrast, the WHO report emphasizes, "male circumcision has significant health benefits that outweigh the very low risk of complications." Of particular importance in regions ravaged by AIDS, "circumcision has been shown to lower men's risk for HIV acquisition by about 60 percent." Precisely because circumcision is so benign, WHO and the other agencies are at pains to distinguish it from female mutilation, which is always dangerous.
Dangerous in quite a different way is the San Francisco initiative's assault on Jewish religious liberty. Circumcision is the oldest practice of the world's oldest religion. Irrespective of any medical value, it is the sign in the flesh that for nearly 4,000 years has marked Jewish males as heirs to the ancient pact between Abraham and God. Many Muslims also circumcise their sons for religious reasons.
But the law proposed by the "intactivists" radiates hostility to traditional religious belief: "No account shall be taken of the effect on the person on whom the operation is to be performed of any belief on the part of that or any other person that the operation is required as a matter of custom or ritual."
The campaign to enact a law banning the most enduring obligation in Jewish experience amounts to what the American Jewish Committee calls a "direct assault on Jewish religious practice in the United States. . . . unprecedented in American Jewish life."
Fortunately, even in California most ballot issues are rejected. When San Franciscans vote this fall, the disgraceful anti-circumcision initiative deserves a decisive defeat.
Putting a medical choice up for a vote? How strange.
Well they are the exception dontcha know it?
This crosses into so many areas, but the biggest are religious freedom and parental rights.
Now, if you’re referring to abortion as a “medical choice”, then we’re going to part ways. Foreskin doesn’t have the intent of becoming a human being.
Circumcision decreases the spread of HIV in homosexual males and is diametrically opposite of the intent and wishes of the homosexual community of San Francisco.
no they are putting an “age of consent” to it.
So the queers in SF like an uncircumcised weiner up their rear. They are trying to effectively ban Judaism and Islam. Where is the national media? Where are the people who wanted to prove our virtue by having the Ground Zero Mosque?
Get serious! It's about protecting the rights of a defenseless individual to keep his normal body intact and prevent permanent changes not called for by medical necessity.
The circumcision camp don't respect individual rights and treats kids like property.
The overwhelming majority of circumcisions are not for religious reasons.
A little self conscious about that ugly foreskin your parents didn't have the good sense to take care of?
There’s no restriction against states protecting their citizens from mutilation.
Thus the prevalence of Flow-vees in the early nineties. ;) Likewise the banning of Jarts, many a moon ago.
The legislation here has a barely unstated intent of impinging on a religious practice thousands of years old. In SF, I sincerely doubt that hygiene in foremost in the minds of those creating the law-to-be.
Furthermore, within the bill, and in the spin, an attempt is made to equate circumcision of men with female genital mutilation, wherein many far worse things occur. I am not in any way saying that everyone should or shouldn’t be circumcised. I am saying that this is a bill directed at long-standing religious practice in a country where such practices are ordinarily protected under law, as part of the ability to freely practice one’s religion.
Yeah, Islam practices a lot of barbaric things from long ago, violating the rights of others. Doesn’t make them right.
Kids are not “property” per se, but parents are entrusted, by God, with the responsibility and AUTHORITY to make decisions for them until they are able to make decisions for themselves.
God thought circumcision was alright, so I don’t see a problem with it if it is for religious reasons or not, because my wisdom is not above His.
However, it is VERY TELLING that this law specifically states that there are no exclusions for religious reasons.
Yes, interesting that abortions will still be legal in SF. I note that one cannot mutilate the foreskin of the baby boy’s penis under this proposed law, but you can still mutilate the Whole baby boy with no problem.
It would seem that there would be ways to get around this.
Oh, he said, I use them to make the most magical wallets!
What's so special about the wallets, he was asked.
Well, when you rub them, they turn into brief cases.
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