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• On the article To Circumcise or Not to Circumcise: Health Issue or Matter of Esthetics?

  

  Kyle

  5:30 pm on Thursday, March 24, 2011

  Jakew: "If circumcision caused such damage, then surely it would be obvious in studies of adult circumcision patients?"

  Many studies show that there is a risk of damage. In the Fink study[1], 123 men were circumcised, the vast majority of them for medical reasons. 38% of the men reported harm, and only 62% were satisfied with having been circumcised. Circumcision was supposed to fix medical problems for most of these men, yet many of them reported harm

  Another example, the Kim and Pang study[2]. After circumcision, masturbatory pleasure decreased for 48% of the men, masturbatory difficulty increased for 63% of men, and 20% of men reported a worse sex life.

  In the Mastood study[3], where again most of the men were being circumcised for medical reasons, yet only 61% were satisfied.

  There are other studies showing higher levels of satisfaction, but there's always a risk of harm, and the studies above clearly show that.

  [1] http://www.jurology.com/article/S0022-5347(05)65098-7/abstract
  [2] http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1464-410X.2006.06646.x/full
  [3] http://www.cirp.org/library/sex_function/masood1/

• On the article To Circumcise or Not to Circumcise: Health Issue or Matter of Esthetics?

  

  Kyle

  5:29 pm on Thursday, March 24, 2011

  Jakew: "generally speaking there's no good reason not to, but that's not the issue here."

  Actually, it is a part of the issue here - this thread is about neonatal circumcision after all, and an individual's right to choose is an important consideration. Many men who were circumcised as infants wish that they'd been given a choice, and this does factor into their sexual satisfaction. Parents need to consider their child's right to choose what their bodies will look like, and leaving children intact at birth is the only way to preserve that choice.

• On the article To Circumcise or Not to Circumcise: Health Issue or Matter of Esthetics?

  

  Kyle

  5:28 pm on Thursday, March 24, 2011

  Jakew: "can you point to the relevant part of the original claim that stated that it applied only to irreversible removal of healthy tissue?"

  That's what neonatal circumcision is, and that's what this thread is about. If you disagree with this point as it applies to circumcision - "Infants have sovereign rights to do with their bodies what they choose to, just as adults do" - refute it as it applies to circumcision, not as it applies to vaccinations.

  Jakew: "There is some excellent data from the RCTs, for example, in which large numbers of healthy volunteers were circumcised."

  The circumcision researchers in Africa are trying to prove that circumcision is the answer to the AIDs crisis. To see what kind of research is being done by these teams, have a look at the Wawer study: http://tinyurl.com/mq3owu. 25 women were infected with HIV in an effort to prove that circumcising HIV-positive men would reduce the likelihood of infecting women. When the study started to show the opposite trend, it was terminated due to "futility," before the results reached statistical significance. Most, if not all all of these infections could have been prevented by providing condoms instead of circumcisions to study participants. The motivation and questionable ethics of these circumcision researchers makes it very difficult for me to take any of their studies seriously.

• On the article To Circumcise or Not to Circumcise: Health Issue or Matter of Esthetics?

  

  Kyle

  11:16 am on Thursday, March 24, 2011

  "It would mean that infants can legitimately refuse vaccinations, for example, which is a somewhat absurd claim."

  Straw man. Vaccinations are not the same as non-reversible amputation of healthy, sensitive tissue.

  "so much so that satisfaction rates are generally very high."

  It's true that adult men who CHOSE the operation, often for medical reasons that would have made sexual activity painful or uncomfortable, are often satisfied with the results. Choice is an important factor here, and I hope that people don't apply the study results of adults who chose the operation to infants who did not.

• On the article To Circumcise or Not to Circumcise: Health Issue or Matter of Esthetics?

  

  Kyle

  9:26 am on Thursday, March 24, 2011

  "there's only a finite amount of space, and the author(s) try to make best use of the available space to express the most important points." Finite amount of space, on a wiki article? I'm not sure that I understand what you mean here. It's not like you're going to run out of paper or overload disk capacity by using "60+ year old cadavers" instead of the word "males."

• On the article To Circumcise or Not to Circumcise: Health Issue or Matter of Esthetics?

  

  Kyle

  8:19 am on Thursday, March 24, 2011

  It's more than just disagreeing with the sources. By neglecting to mention that the Szabo and Short statistic was performed on 60+ year old cadavers, you are being deliberately misleading.

• On the article To Circumcise or Not to Circumcise: Health Issue or Matter of Esthetics?

  

  Kyle

  3:21 pm on Wednesday, March 23, 2011

  Jakew: If you want evidence of your bias on wikipedia, here are a couple instances. You try to discredit every instance of the Sorells study, using your own letter to the BJU, in which you attempt to repeat the mistakes of previous studies on the subject, by ignoring the datapoints involving the foreskin. You include the silly statistic from Szabo and Short (which you've also used on this thread) which states that "An examination of 7 circumcised and 6 uncircumcised males found no difference in keratinization of the glans penis."13 men is a laughably small sample size, Szabo and Short were not actually performing a study on keratinization, and the 13 "men" were actually 60+ year old cadavers - hardly representative of the general population. That's just off the top of my head.

• On the article Moms Talk Q&A: Circumcision

  

  Kyle

  11:08 am on Sunday, March 20, 2011

  Julieanne: You seem to be well-informed on the subject, so I'm hoping that you can answer something for me. I'm very interested to know how my foreskin can be so sensitive to fine-touch and stretching if it contains no nerve endings. Since you have done your research, and know your biology, please point me to a source that can explain that.

• On the article Moms Talk Q&A: Circumcision

  

  Kyle

  6:12 pm on Saturday, March 19, 2011

  The foreskin, ridged band, and frenulum have many functions: http://www.enotalone.com/article/3509.html

  Here's the most recent circumcision policy statement from a medical association: http://tinyurl.com/496ek8b

  Information for parents about circumcision: http://www.caringforkids.cps.ca/pregnancybabies/Circumcision.htm

  Collection of circumcision links for parents: http://www.bubhub.com.au/community/forums/showthread.php?t=4159

  Cirp.org - information for parents: http://www.cirp.org/pages/parents/

  50 reasons to leave "it" alone: http://tinyurl.com/4ajzjeo

  *Fair warning: there are some very emotionally charged stories in the last two links*

  Many mothers later regret circumcising their sons: http://tinyurl.com/4puzneq

  A growing number of men are angry about being circumcised as infants, and wish they'd be given a choice: http://tinyurl.com/4ogk2gq

• On the article Moms Talk Q&A: Circumcision

  

  Kyle

  6:10 pm on Saturday, March 19, 2011

  I think that your experience is similar to that of many well-intentioned mothers in the US. You really don't like the procedure, but it just seems like something that has to be done, right? You've probably grown up around men who are circumcised, your doctors were probably neutral or supportive on the issue, and you may not have ever had a need to question it. Sorry if I'm putting words in your mouth here - correct me if I'm wrong.

  In the case of neonatal circumcision, there's no immediate medical need for such surgery. It's basically non-reversible cosmetic surgery being performed on an infant, who of course didn't consent to it. As a society, I think we need to question this, and I'll provide some links for those looking to do so (nothing graphic, I promise).