Germany has now banned this...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Nothing "inappropriate" with the way I posted this.

No anti-semitism is involved in spite of what one PP tried to stir up.

I see that no one who defends penis mutilation cared to weigh in on my question regarding the hypothetical cult practicing the snipping of female babies' nipples. Is that not just as unnecessary yet equally abhorent?

I'm anti-circ, but OP, the analogy you're making isn't really a good one. Female nipples are needed for breastfeeding. They have a critical biological function. Foreskin is precious and all, but not actually needed for reproduction or anything else.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Nothing "inappropriate" with the way I posted this.

No anti-semitism is involved in spite of what one PP tried to stir up.

I see that no one who defends penis mutilation cared to weigh in on my question regarding the hypothetical cult practicing the snipping of female babies' nipples. Is that not just as unnecessary yet equally abhorent?

I'm anti-circ, but OP, the analogy you're making isn't really a good one. Female nipples are needed for breastfeeding. They have a critical biological function. Foreskin is precious and all, but not actually needed for reproduction or anything else. [/quote

Well by that logic let's just chop off all unnecessary body parts routinely at birth. You don't really need the tip of your nose, right? SNIP! How about the tips of your ears? Nope -- SNIP!

What the hell kind of mentality justifies chopping off a body part because you can easily live without it? If your thinking is that jacked up, fine, do it to yourself if you insist... But let your kid get old enough to decide for himself.

[Anonymous]

Well by that logic let's just chop off all unnecessary body parts routinely at birth. You don't really need the tip of your nose, right? SNIP! How about the tips of your ears? Nope -- SNIP!

What the hell kind of mentality justifies chopping off a body part because you can easily live without it? If your thinking is that jacked up, fine, do it to yourself if you insist... But let your kid get old enough to decide for himself.

You forgot about fingernails. All kinds of nasty junk accumulates under fingernails and they are a pain to clean.

We really need to routinely chop off fingertips at birth; that would solve the problem. AND honor my religious beliefs.

[Anonymous]

I'm anti-circ, but OP, the analogy you're making isn't really a good one. Female nipples are needed for breastfeeding. They have a critical biological function. Foreskin is precious and all, but not actually needed for reproduction or anything else.

But there is formula available so breastfeeding is unnecessary and it is my religious conviction, so keep out of it!

[Anonymous]

I think it is because some ethnic muslims circ the girls. So to force the ban it had to include males.
And also because they do not want to pay for it. I think you get free medical care and that would have included the cost of the circ. To make the op so that you have to charge for it separately is complex.
And with the welfare being to extensive as it is, some families would qualify for the payment to be waived. This way there is less work for the social welfare workers to manage. You see, births are down, not up. And you cannot just say to some people that you should not make more babies than what you can afford to circ, that is just not done

[Anonymous]

I think I would have liked to not have had the choice to circumcise or not. It would have been so much easier for it to just not be an issue, rather than to have the choice and live in a place with a 50/50 split (or whatever, depending on where you live in the US).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I KNOW this is a different issue, but female circumcision is seen as horrifying. Why is mutilating the genitals we are born with seen as OK for males when they are babies? If they reach age of consent and want to be circumcised, then fine. I may be in the minority here, but I think Germany is doing the right thing.

Well, since you KNOW I shouldn't have to point it out. Men who are circumcised seem happy with the way they are, and their sexual satisfaction scores are as high as uncircumcised men. This is untrue of female circumcision, where women find sex painful for a lifetime or in the happiest case, merely unpleasurable. Meanwhile there are reasonable health pro's and cons for male circumcision and none for female circumcision.

So they are totally different.

[Anonymous]

Humans have been altering their bodies since time immorial. As the PP indicated, male circumcision doesn't interfere with sexual pleasure as female circumcision does. It also significantly reduces the transmission of the HIV virus - by as much as 60% http://www.who.int/hiv/topics/malecircumcision/en/ . It also reduces the transmission of HPV and herpes simplex II http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20048246 . These studies came out after I had my DSs and I left the circumcision decision to my DH. I was indifferent. He chose to have them circumsized and I'm very happy that was his decision.

Also, I find it very difficult to believe that there's not some anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim sentiment behind this recent law. How many of those parlimentarians are Jewish or Muslim? Few, if any, I would imagine. Germany also has quite a history of anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim activities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Humans have been altering their bodies since time immorial. As the PP indicated, male circumcision doesn't interfere with sexual pleasure as female circumcision does. It also significantly reduces the transmission of the HIV virus - by as much as 60% http://www.who.int/hiv/topics/malecircumcision/en/ . It also reduces the transmission of HPV and herpes simplex II http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20048246 . These studies came out after I had my DSs and I left the circumcision decision to my DH. I was indifferent. He chose to have them circumsized and I'm very happy that was his decision.

Also, I find it very difficult to believe that there's not some anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim sentiment behind this recent law. How many of those parlimentarians are Jewish or Muslim? Few, if any, I would imagine. Germany also has quite a history of anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim activities.

How do you know that it doesn't interfere with sexual pleasure?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I KNOW this is a different issue, but female circumcision is seen as horrifying. Why is mutilating the genitals we are born with seen as OK for males when they are babies? If they reach age of consent and want to be circumcised, then fine. I may be in the minority here, but I think Germany is doing the right thing.

Well, since you KNOW I shouldn't have to point it out. Men who are circumcised seem happy with the way they are, and their sexual satisfaction scores are as high as uncircumcised men. This is untrue of female circumcision, where women find sex painful for a lifetime or in the happiest case, merely unpleasurable. Meanwhile there are reasonable health pro's and cons for male circumcision and none for female circumcision.

So they are totally different.

You don't seem well informed. There are plenty of online resources on circ men who are not at all happy about it. Just do a quick google search and check out the documentary
Mom, Why Did You Circumcise Me? http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/mom-why-did-you-circumcise-me/

As for female genital mutilation (call it what it is) - there is large variety of procedures between the four types. In some cases, only only the prepuce (the fold of skin surrounding the clitoris) is removed, the clitoris is left intact - so it's basically the equivalent to the operation in boys. Still, no one in the Western world would consider that variation of Type I acceptable. http://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/topics/fgm/overview/en/index.html

I say good for Germany. They didn't outlaw circumcision for medical reasons, or for consenting older boys, just the "routine" for helpless infants who are too young to give consent. Makes perfect sense. I don't understand why parents are in such a rush to circumcise citing all these studies for STD prevention (there are plenty of threads that discussed how faulty the studies are anyway), which wouldn't be relevant to your boy at least for his first decade of life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is newborn genital amputation protected under the guise of "religious freedom"?

This makes no sense to me. How about if I start a cult that believes in cutting off the nipples of newborn girls? Should that "right" be protected, too?

Germany has now banned this practice... it's about time. Keep your knives away from babies' genitalia.

Amen! Ament! I'm so fucking sick of people crying anti-semitism on this. On another thread someone LITERALLY compared this to the holocaust. Holy shit! I have plenty of Jewish friends, am absolutely NOT not not not not anti-semitic. This is not religious freedom. This is your child's freedom not to have part of penis lopped off.

Yeah, there are religions that require female circumcision and in some cases U.S. gives those people safe harbor and refugee status; we find it so abhorrent. NO on circ. No more. I wish the U.S. would ban it too. I'd gladly fight for that.

You are an ass who knows NOTHING. circumcision is not cutting off the penis. READ UP and learn JERK. oh, and just b/c you have Jewish friends does not make you an expert on the religion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I KNOW this is a different issue, but female circumcision is seen as horrifying. Why is mutilating the genitals we are born with seen as OK for males when they are babies? If they reach age of consent and want to be circumcised, then fine. I may be in the minority here, but I think Germany is doing the right thing.

Well, since you KNOW I shouldn't have to point it out. Men who are circumcised seem happy with the way they are, and their sexual satisfaction scores are as high as uncircumcised men. This is untrue of female circumcision, where women find sex painful for a lifetime or in the happiest case, merely unpleasurable. Meanwhile there are reasonable health pro's and cons for male circumcision and none for female circumcision.

So they are totally different.

You don't seem well informed. There are plenty of online resources on circ men who are not at all happy about it. Just do a quick google search and check out the documentary
Mom, Why Did You Circumcise Me? http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/mom-why-did-you-circumcise-me/

As for female genital mutilation (call it what it is) - there is large variety of procedures between the four types. In some cases, only only the prepuce (the fold of skin surrounding the clitoris) is removed, the clitoris is left intact - so it's basically the equivalent to the operation in boys. Still, no one in the Western world would consider that variation of Type I acceptable. http://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/topics/fgm/overview/en/index.html

I say good for Germany. They didn't outlaw circumcision for medical reasons, or for consenting older boys, just the "routine" for helpless infants who are too young to give consent. Makes perfect sense. I don't understand why parents are in such a rush to circumcise citing all these studies for STD prevention (there are plenty of threads that discussed how faulty the studies are anyway), which wouldn't be relevant to your boy at least for his first decade of life.

Yeah there are people who jump into a subway and then sue when the train stops and they live. So finding a handful of Guys grieving about their lost foreskins isnt enough to win the argument. There is plenty of data on male sexual satisfaction circumcised and uncircumcised. However of you want to play the anecdote game we can trot out the examples of infections for uncircumcised males, at which point you will complain that they are anecdotes, underscoring the hypocrisy of your earlier point.

If you really want the truth go to the forum on intact babies at mothering.com. You can read the many posts from moms trying to figure out what to do about foreskin problems.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is newborn genital amputation protected under the guise of "religious freedom"?

This makes no sense to me. How about if I start a cult that believes in cutting off the nipples of newborn girls? Should that "right" be protected, too?

Germany has now banned this practice... it's about time. Keep your knives away from babies' genitalia.

Amen! Ament! I'm so fucking sick of people crying anti-semitism on this. On another thread someone LITERALLY compared this to the holocaust. Holy shit! I have plenty of Jewish friends, am absolutely NOT not not not not anti-semitic. This is not religious freedom. This is your child's freedom not to have part of penis lopped off.

Yeah, there are religions that require female circumcision and in some cases U.S. gives those people safe harbor and refugee status; we find it so abhorrent. NO on circ. No more. I wish the U.S. would ban it too. I'd gladly fight for that.

You are an ass who knows NOTHING. circumcision is not cutting off the penis. READ UP and learn JERK. oh, and just b/c you have Jewish friends does not make you an expert on the religion.

Not that PP, but s/he definitely said "part of the penis." Never said or implied the whole thing.

[Anonymous]

You don't seem well informed. There are plenty of online resources on circ men who are not at all happy about it. Just do a quick google search and check out the documentary
Mom, Why Did You Circumcise Me? http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/mom-why-did-you-circumcise-me/

There are also plenty of men who don't enjoy sex regardless of the condition of their foreskin. If you're a man who's been circumsised and don't enjoy sex because of it, I can understand you not circumcising your sons. If you're a man who's been circumcised and it doesn't diminish sexual pleasure, I can understand why you don't oppose circumcision. Given the male condition, if it significantly interefered with male pleasure, I can imagine the practice would have died out thousands of years ago.

I've noted that no one has yet to dispute the documented reduction of disease transmission. I imagine anyone saying that we don't have to worry about those diseases in this country are the same people who don't think we need to be vaccinated.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

I've noted that no one has yet to dispute the documented reduction of disease transmission. I imagine anyone saying that we don't have to worry about those diseases in this country are the same people who don't think we need to be vaccinated.

Oh please. Now circumcision = vaccination?

We need an honest-debating referee on this thread.