Nordic countries may finally ban circumcision.

[ddt]

Yes, circumcision is only legal because the Jew-gy Man hiding under your bead wants it to be.

I detect that you're being sarcastic, but I'm lost as to the point you're trying to make. Just for me, because I'm a bit slow, could you be more explicit?

No, mijo is perfectly serious. In the previous thread, he also accused several posters of being antisemitic. I advice you to keep that in mind when reading any post by him on this issue.

FWIW, I don't see why my statement would even be critical of Jews, let alone antisemitic. It's just a statement of observed fact that the Jewish response to the verdict of the Cologne court. For instance, within a week there was a reaction from the chief rabbi in the UK.

 

[colander]

People choose to compromise their "bodily integrity" all the time. It's imposing it on unknowing infants - for the sake of nothing more substantial than my belief in the Flying Spaghetti Monster - that often rankles.

What if I truly believed that the small left toe of every baby should be removed and tossed in the sea to assuage the wrath of the sharks that threaten the FSM's 'chosen people', The Pirates? Would my contract with the FSM justify this trivial minor surgery on babies?

I'm going to turn that question around on you and ask: Do you think the magnitude of the harm done by circumcision is so great that it justifies criminalizing the free practice of an entire religion?

If so, then please explain to me why the demographic makeup of the people pushing for the practice's criminalization is proportionately nearly bereft of the members of the group that you think is actually suffering harm?

**** -Llet's just get out of the stone age eh? Abraham had no covenant with god. If he actually said that stuff then he just made it up to impress people. Or for some other reason, like he was stoned from smoking carob seeds or something.

He.did.not.actually.do.a.deal.with.god.

Okay. So?

 

[Rolfe]

If circumcision was a highly effective form of protection against HIV, some of the above may have some validity, though it's still debatable whether it's justifiable to perform such surgery on a neonate to protect him against his presumed promiscuity with ill-advised partners when he's an adult.

The fact is, though, that circumcision only provides a statistical "protection" against HIV. The rate of infection is (or may be) appreciably lower among circumcised men. It is not zero, or anywhere close to it.

As far as HIV protection is concerned, advertising circumcision for this purpose is downright dangerous. Men don't like wearing condoms, we all know that. So, you tell them that circumcision is protective, how many circumcised men are going to go on wearing them?

It's bonkers. This is a procedure looking for a reason to exist. Once it was masturbation, now it's HIV. Or cystitis.

Declaring that you intend to have your child circumcised purely for religious or cultural reasons is at least honest. Dredging up spurious "health reasons" is not.

Rolfe.

 

[LukeB]

If so, then please explain to me why the demographic makeup of the people pushing for the practice's criminalization is proportionately nearly bereft of the members of the group that you think is actually suffering harm?

Newborns find it difficult to join political movements I suppose.

 

[ABC10]

I'm going to turn that question around on you and ask: Do you think the magnitude of the harm done by circumcision is so great that it justifies criminalizing the free practice of an entire religion?

If so, then please explain to me why the demographic makeup of the people pushing for the practice's criminalization is proportionately nearly bereft of the members of the group that you think is actually suffering harm?



Okay. So?

While true these Nordic Countries are nearly bereft of Jews (circumcision helped the Nazi and their collaborators identify Jews), they do have huge Muslim population they invited into their countries do practice circumcision of males and frequently practice female genital mutilation.

 

[ABC10]

If circumcision was a highly effective form of protection against HIV, some of the above may have some validity, though it's still debatable whether it's justifiable to perform such surgery on a neonate to protect him against his presumed promiscuity with ill-advised partners when he's an adult.

The fact is, though, that circumcision only provides a statistical "protection" against HIV. The rate of infection is (or may be) appreciably lower among circumcised men. It is not zero, or anywhere close to it.

As far as HIV protection is concerned, advertising circumcision for this purpose is downright dangerous. Men don't like wearing condoms, we all know that. So, you tell them that circumcision is protective, how many circumcised men are going to go on wearing them?

It's bonkers. This is a procedure looking for a reason to exist. Once it was masturbation, now it's HIV. Or cystitis.

Declaring that you intend to have your child circumcised purely for religious or cultural reasons is at least honest. Dredging up spurious "health reasons" is not.

Rolfe.

In the game of HIV, anything that will help with any protection will do. Clearly, with the millions of deaths from AIDS, men don't care about condom prevention while getting themselves and any partner infected.

 

[colander]

Considering that it is only 150 years ago that we abolished slavery and only 50 years ago that Jim Crow laws were repealed, much bigger infractions on basic human rights, I think the word "suddenly" is quite a misnomer.


It doesn't help your case if you make such overblown statements. 6,000 years ago, there were no people called "Jews". To be generous, there were Hebrews 3,000 years ago, who may have practiced circumcision.

And it's also not as if the practice has been unchanged during that period. Before the Graeco-Roman period, only the tip of the foreskin was cut off. The Greeks and the Romans found circumcision barbaric and tried to ban it. Many Hellenized Jews tried to hide or mask their circumcision or even tried to repair it. In response, the rabbis modified the procedure to have the whole foreskin cut off.

So religious practices can change.

There are numerous cases throughout history of countries outlawing the Jewish practice of circumcision. Can you think of any that actually led Jews to expunge the requirement from their religion?

If outlawing circumcision has never made Jews stop doing it before, what makes you think it will this time? The only thing that it will succeed in doing is making the Jews leave your country. Who benefits from that?

 

[Rat]

If so, then please explain to me why the demographic makeup of the people pushing for the practice's criminalization is proportionately nearly bereft of the members of the group that you think is actually suffering harm?

Proportionately, perhaps; I don't know. I certainly don't have any numbers. But there are certainly men who were circumcised (some culturally Jewish, many not) who do indeed push for it. Try Googling "jewish people against circumcision" (without quotes), and either there is a significant number of people, or a small number of people doing a good impression of a significant number.

 

[Rat]

There are numerous cases throughout history of countries outlawing the Jewish practice of circumcision. Can you think of any that actually led Jews to expunge the requirement from their religion?

If outlawing circumcision has never made Jews stop doing it before, what makes you think it will this time?

The aim is not to stop Jews doing it. The aim is to stop its being done. That it would disproportionately affect Jews and Muslims is almost certainly the reason that it's rarely successful, but that it would affect them is not the motive behind it.

 

[ddt]

Muhammad, you mean? Those pesky facts.

And we're discussing here primarily the Western world, where Islam is a minority religion. And in those European countries where the topic has come up, Jewish organizations have been most vocal.

Muhammad is Allah. No cap on the discussion as being European countries only.

No, "There is no god but Allah, and Muhammad is his prophet".

And why did you change my "Western" to "European"?

 

[ABC10]

No, "There is no god but Allah, and Muhammad is his prophet".

And why did you change my "Western" to "European"?

The title is "Nordic Countries" not "Western". Muslims treat Muhammad as G-d.

 

[Rat]

As far as HIV protection is concerned, advertising circumcision for this purpose is downright dangerous. Men don't like wearing condoms, we all know that. So, you tell them that circumcision is protective, how many circumcised men are going to go on wearing them?

In an admittedly small sample size, nearly 40% of women don't like them either, but I agree with the general point.

 

[Rat]

The title is "Nordic Countries" not "Western". Muslims treat Muhammad as G-d.

No, Muslims treat Muhammad as the messenger (or prophet, if you prefer) of god. It really isn't the same thing.

 

[ddt]

The title is "Nordic Countries" not "Western". Muslims treat Muhammad as G-d.

And you really think anyone will treat any of your posts seriously when you post such nonsense? I even gave you a wiki-link to read up and wise up.

 

[mijopaalmc]

People choose to compromise their "bodily integrity" all the time. It's imposing it on unknowing infants - for the sake of nothing more substantial than my belief in the Flying Spaghetti Monster - that often rankles.

What if I truly believed that the small left toe of every baby should be removed and tossed in the sea to assuage the wrath of the sharks that threaten the FSM's 'chosen people', The Pirates? Would my contract with the FSM justify this trivial minor surgery on babies?

**** - let's just get out of the stone age eh? Abraham had no covenant with god. If he actually said that stuff then he just made it up to impress people. Or for some other reason, like he was stoned from smoking carob seeds or something.

He.did.not.actually.do.a.deal.with.god.

If FSMism had

1. a history of being a minority religion is a place where the majority religion(s) actively persecuted FSMism
2. modernity had made overt anti-FSMism socially unacceptable
3. attacking FSMism was still possible by asserting that the practices FSMists had used to set themselves apart from other religions and therefore formed an integral part of the FSMist identity

you might actually have a valid point with respect to statutorily proscribing circumcision. However, you're blithely ignoring the historical context of European (and European-derived) Christian persecution of Judaism and Islam--and how that may be legally effected now that overt anti-Semitism and Islamophobia are no longer socially acceptable--to make a extremely superficial rhetorical point. FSMism is a "religion" that was expressly established by its proponents to parody fundamentalist Christianity, and trying to make analogies between hypothetical (and undocumented) FSMist practices and real (and documented) Jewish and Muslim practices is profoundly ahistorical and utterly dishonest. FSMism is neither a religious belief system nor an ethno-cultural identity; it is a trope expressly promulgated by atheists to mock religion, making any practice claimed a central to FSMism highly suspect as expression of religiosity.

Why not actually consider the persecution real, historical religions and legal method used to effect it legally, instead of relying on the hypothetical of a farce "religion" created expressly for demonstrating the absurdity of religion itself?

 

[Rolfe]

In the game of HIV, anything that will help with any protection will do. Clearly, with the millions of deaths from AIDS, men don't care about condom prevention while getting themselves and any partner infected.

It doesn't help, though. First, it's debatable whether there really is a significant protective effect. But secondly, the practical outcome is counter-productive. Men who might be persuaded to wear a condom become carefree and imbued with a false sense of security due to all this crap hyping up what is at best a statistical effect, and joyfully throw the condoms away.

This is pure post-hoc rationalisation dreamed up by a lobby desperate to find some rationale, however spurious and counter-intuitive, to keep on interfering with the bodily integrity of babies too young to consent or to defend themselves.

Rolfe.

 

[Tsukasa Buddha]

I'm going to turn that question around on you and ask: Do you think the magnitude of the harm done by circumcision is so great that it justifies criminalizing the free practice of an entire religion?

Do you have some threshold for what rights a person can violate in the name of religion?

 

[spin0]

While true these Nordic Countries are nearly bereft of Jews, they do have huge Muslim population who practice circumcision of males and sometimes females.

Circumcision of girls is already totes illegal in the Nordic countries but boys not yet. And the practice of male circumcision varies a lot between Muslims regarding procedure, form, severity, and age as Islamic sources do not give a particular fixed time for circumcision.

Additionally, also some Christians have traditions of circumcising infants or children. In fact in the current court case in Finland (see this post) the father facing a possible prison sentence for aggravated assault is a Christian from Nigeria.

Also: Care to finally explain how circumcision would protect infants and children from STDs and AIDS in the Nordic countries?
(or by extension in the northern Europe or the EU)

 

[gumboot]

Being a female RN, I have seen thousands of penises and truth be told if one has been seen then all have been seen but uncircumcised are unappealing.

Surely the only penis that would interest anyone sexually is an erect penis, in which case circumcised or not makes no difference.

 

[ddt]

I'm going to turn that question around on you and ask: Do you think the magnitude of the harm done by circumcision is so great that it justifies criminalizing the free practice of an entire religion?

What's it with the hyperbole? The synagogues are burning, the Holocaust has returned, that kind of thing. It's not outlawing a whole religion, it's outlawing one practice of it. And it's not even directed at that religion - or rather those religions - that practice it, that is a side-effect of applying an, IMHO, basic human right.

Religious practice does not trump secular law. You may not perform human sacrifice, or animal sacrifice, or perform polygamy (ask the FLDS) in the name of religion. Or smoke peyote as part of a religious ritual. So why should you be allowed to mutilate an infant?

As far as I can see, religions have always adapt their views and their rules as to society, not the other way around. Female priests are part and parcel now, that was unthinkable 150 years ago. 50 years ago, all Christian churches were solidly anti-homosexuality; now there are several that perform gay weddings.

Sorry if I don't have an appreciation why circumcision would be so central to being Jewish. The whole concept that a bodily mutilation would be central to your religion sounds bizarre to me. And it says there first in Genesis, "God created mankind in his own image", but then he decided it was not good enough?