Summations Only

Yes, you are defending the circumcision of babies. People will only defend the right to actions if they find the actions defensible. If, for example, you find FGM indefensible, then you won't defend the parent's right to do it.You could have considered it a grey area from your perspective, as in "I'm not sure whether there should be a right of parents to infant circumcision or not. I don't know enough about it to decide." That would mean that you can't decide whether the specific action is defensible or not.You, jar and I have not taken that neutral position. I've come down on the side of the right of the penis owner to have a healthy organ left intact, and you've come down on the side of the right of parents to interfere with it in a way which is irreversible (don't suggest that surgery can reverse the process again without checking out the science of what a real foreskin actually is).

It's important to remember, when talking about pros and cons, that when doctors are faced with a perfectly healthy organ, the default position is that you don't interfere with it surgically. It requires a very good positive reason to do so. I mention this because when circumcision has entered into a culture, the point can often be lost, and some people wrongly expect a strong "con" case. They are not neutral on the "rights" issue (penis owner versus others). If they are neutral on whether or not circumcisions do more harm than good, then they should learn what the default position of surgery on a healthy organ is, especially when you can't gain the consent of its owner.

It occurred to me while discussing circumcision and foreskins on this thread, that some people were putting forward very determined opinions on the topic without actually knowing or bothering to find out what these things really are.Comments about removing moles or unwanted flaps of skin and about trivial processes were telling. I got the impression that what was being visualized was the snipping off of an extra useless little bit of skin in a way that was pretty painless, would heal quickly and completely, and would have no measurable lasting effect on an infant.That's not circumcision.I think we should have another thread on it, and perhaps bring in a bit more science. What the foreskin actually is, for example, and what is (and isn't yet) known about it. We're cutting something off millions of people without even fully understanding its complex functions. It's not a neutral or vestigial feature, and its simple appearance is deceptive.A small percentage of circumcisions are done for genuine medical reasons in all countries. But the mass circumcisions seem to come about from the kind of strange cults that we humans seem to build up without ourselves understanding them. One of the driving forces behind circumcision cults seems to be a desire for control over sexuality. While that's obvious in female genital mutilation, it's less easy to see in the male version. But those who read the paper I posted earlier in the thread will have seen the role that sexuality played in the beginnings of the modern American movement, and I think that the undercurrent's always there.Many doctors still think that the mass circumcisions are carried out for medical reasons, and we keep reading on this thread about parents and their doctor making "medical decisions" on behalf of the child. But they're really cultural decisions, and, some studies show, largely social decisions these days (doing the done thing).Interestingly, two people on this thread have said things that fit descriptions I've read from psychologists of reactions that circumcised Americans frequently have to the subject.There are lots of mysteries in the history and psychology of circumcision. A few years ago, before I happened across a good article about it, it would never have occurred to me that it was such an interesting and important subject, and that it does and always has played such an important part in the world.As a species, we're weird.