Sri Lumpa said:
Fixed that for you. So, you claim that if a kid chooses to be circumcised later in life then it is no different than if his parents had arrogated themselves the decision; on the other hand if the kid decides otherwise than his parents then it is VERY different than what the kid would have done by themselves. The logical conclusion is to leave the decision to the kid as like you said, at worst there is no difference and at best there is a huge difference.
What if the situation was reversed and the infant had a disease that could cripple him or kill him but the parents's faith was that they should not seek medical help but put their faith in their god to heal their child? Those parents are doing what they think is best for their kid so should we let them take that decision for him/her or should we act on the basis that their action (or inaction) is harmful to the child and that the child should be protected from it? Now, most of the time circumcision is not such a dire situation but the question of whether parents should enforce their religious belief on a child that is too young to have religious beliefs of his own remains. As for medical benefits, can you name any medical benefit that comes with circumcising at 1 week old versus circumcising at 18 years old, or at least at puberty, when they are old enough to make the choice themselves? From what i could find the three main positives of circumcision are that: 1. You have a lower risk of UTI, especially in the first year of life. 2. It can help lower the risk of getting infected with an STD. 3. You have a slightly lower risk of penile cancer later in life. So let's examine them in that order and see if there is a preponderant medical benefit that outweigh cutting somebody without their permission: 1. Natural boys have about 9-10 times as much risk of developing UTI in their first year (the year with the most risk of it) than circumcised boys. So it is a good start for the pro-circumcision folks as you could potentially reduce the risk of UTI from 100% to 10-11%. I mean natural penises are dirty unhygienic things that are hard to clean properly according to those folks so the rate of UTI in natural boys has got to be close to 100%... or not. It seems that those dirty unhygienic penises only get UTI in about 1.5-2% of cases. So natural penises appear to be about 1.8% more dirty in a meaning ful way (the way that leads to diseases) than circumcised boys. In other word, to prevent less than two kids from having a UTI you need to operated on 98 kids needlessly (or at least needlessly early). And that's for the one thing that might remotely justify not waiting for the kid to grow up and choose himself. 2. By the time a kid is old enough to think about becoming sexually active he also is old enough to talk and think and generally be able to give his consent to the procedure (though at that age it should be both him and his parents giving their consent, at least until he reaches majority) so there is zero reason to perform routine prepubescent circumcision for this possible benefit. 3. Circumcision might reduce your risk of penile cancer. The reason for the "might" being that penile cancer is so bloody rare that some studies find some incidence while other don't. So how rare is it? In the heavily circumcised United states, about 0.001% of men develop penile cancer, but of course in heavily natural countries like Japan , Norway and Sweden the rate is a much higher 0.001% oops. While the rate is almost certainly not exactly the same, the difference is statistically insignificant; bragging that circumcision is better than the lack of it for penile cancer would be like bragging that the PS3 was more powerful than the 360 if the PS3 was 0.001% more powerful. Maybe technically true but totally stupid. So for lowering penile cancer rate in older men one older man we would have to perform surgery on 99,999 non-consenting infants.
In conclusion, are there potential benefits to circumcision? Yes! Are those benefit significant enough to justify the routine surgery of millions of people every year without their consent? Not even remotely.
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"Parents, who are religious, want it for their kids and that`s something that should be at least respected since what they are doing to their kids is no different than it would be done by themselves"
With themselves, i meant the kids. As in the result would be the same. I didn`t say the decision should be left to the kids. All i said is that i don`t see a problem in having the parents decide that.
"What if the situation was reversed and the infant had a disease that could cripple him or kill him but the parents's faith was that they should not seek medical help but put their faith in their god to heal their child? Those parents are doing what they think is best for their kid so should we let them take that decision for him/her or should we act on the basis that their action (or inaction) is harmful to the child and that the child should be protected from it?"
It`s not really a reversed situation. It`s a different one. No one`s life is in danger and no body is in danger of being crippled.
You know, not only religious people enforce a vision of the world, as they aren`t the only ones to put their kids through surgery.
Second, i honestly don`t think seeing statistics is the best way to evaluate the idea of having the operation or not. If you know that there is a risk, no matter how small it is, you either decide to do or not, based solely on the existence of such risk and consequences. Leaving it to chance might not be the best option.
You say enforce religion, like other don`t "share" with their kids - whatever is the issue - their vision of the world. Everytime a parent raises a kid he is "enforcing" his ways onto the son. Being religious just gives you another mindset, if you will, for the same practice.
