Follow the bouncing weenie!

[Hasbinbad]

Conclusion I) Circumcision: a general overview
Male circumcision has various socio-cultural significances and it had been practiced by different human communities before the appearance of monotheistic religions (Hastings, 1980; Abu Sahlieh, 1999). It is a tradition based on Animist rites. However, many Muslim and Jewish clergy consider circumcision as a rite of their religions as well. At the level of social interpretation, infant male Jewish circumcision could be an alternative for human sacrifice of the first born son; while Arab, African, and Australian adolescent male circumcision could be a rite of passage from childhood to manhood.

...male circumcision is mentioned in neither Qur'an nor Gospels.

Unlike the Bible, male circumcision is mentioned in neither Qur'an nor Gospels. The obligatory requirement of male circumcision by Judaism could be explained by the fact that Judaism represents a closed tribal community with primary social organization that depends on mechanical solidarity. In such social organization similarity is mandatory, and any deviation from similarity is severely punished (Durkheim, 1893). This explains the Biblical threat to cut the soul of any uncircumcised male from his people On the other hand, Christianity and Islam represent more open social organizations, which are nearer to the Durkheiman model of organic solidarity, where differences are more tolerated. Moreover, the Deity in Islam and Christianity takes a more sublime image that does not require human blood sacrifice.
In modern times, some Jewish doctors could introduce male circumcision to the modern medical practice in Victorian England on the assumption that it can prevent masturbation. The practice spread from there to the medical institutions in other English-speaking countries and colonies (Wallerstein, 1980, Hodges 1995). Hence, male circumcision became part of the modern Egyptian medical study and practice. Moreover, modern medical sciences and some medieval medical practices coexist in Egypt. Some barbers are officially licensed to perform male circumcision, bloodletting, leeching, and other minor surgeries, which are known historically as Prophetic medicine (Al Tib Al Nabawy). Peter Gran argues that such practices originated initially in Jewish medicine (Gran 1979). Thus, both old traditional, and modern western beliefs cooperated to establish male circumcision as a surgery that is willingly demanded by people and supplied by surgeons.

This gliding movement is the natural mechanism
of sexual pleasure in human males.
Otherwise, sex is performed by a frictional movement,
which is less satisfactory to both partners.

The exact anatomy, histology, and physiological sexual function of the male prepuce were ignored till the 1990s, when they were studied and described by the Canadian doctor John Taylor (Taylor 1996). Unlike the widely prevalent belief among circumcision proponents that the prepuce is just a piece of skin, which is not as significant as the head of the penis, it was proved that it is a highly specialized tissue. It contains sensory receptors of light touch, which are lacking in the head of the penis. It was thought that the only function of the prepuce is its being a protective cover to the head of the penis. But more recent research argue that protection is a mutual function between the prepuce and the head of the penis, where the latter provides shape to the former, and facilitates its gliding movement during coitus (see appendix 3). This gliding movement is the natural mechanism of sexual pleasure in human males. It stimulates the specific sense receptors of the inner layer of the prepuce to generate a pleasurable sensation. Otherwise, sex is performed by a frictional movement, which is less satisfactory to both partners. The situation is made more difficult by the lack of the natural male lubricant, which is normally produced by specific glands in the prepuce (Taylor 1996, Bigelow 1992). There were also some earlier studies on the prepuce (Deibert, 1933; Wright, 1970). Such studies proved that the prepuce is an integral part of the normal male genitalia. Nevertheless, Egyptian medical texts do not mention any of its useful functions. Given the above-mentioned information, circumcision is a deliberate amputation of a healthy part of another non-consenting person’s body. It is an amputation that is performed on helpless children according to cultural pressures (Zoske 1998). According to Denniston (1997), mutilation is any injury that results in removal or alteration of the appearance or function of a body part. Thus, male circumcision, which has similar cultural, social, and biological bases as female circumcision, could be considered genital mutilation.
II) Circumcision: for whose interest?

...they circumcised them because they were afraid to obey reason
and challenge a conservative tradition.

Respondents who are parents of male children did not think that they gain any personal benefit by circumcising their sons. They suffered because of their children’s sufferings. However, they circumcised them because they were afraid to obey reason and challenge a conservative tradition. Acting like this, these intellectual respondents who used to lecture against FGM on "rational basis" behaved exactly like grassroots people who circumcise their daughters. Analysis of the respondents’ experience with their own and sons’ circumcision revealed that it is not in the child’s best interest. They reported memories of bleeding, stress, pain, urinary tract infection, and behavioral changes after male circumcision. Even the only respondent who could trespass the shock of his circumcision because he got a lot of psychological support and social compensation during and after his ritual circumcision ceremony said that other boys who were circumcised along with him were really shocked in spite of the supporting ceremony. Some of his peers resisted, tried to escape, and expressed verbal and non-verbal protest against circumcision.

Male and female circumcision do not serve men, women, or children
as social categories. It rather serves the persistence of
patriarchal gender power balance...

So, male and female circumcision do not serve men, women, or children as social categories. It rather serves the persistence of patriarchal gender power balance that presupposes a peculiar symbolic formation of the body to establish a clear gender differentiation. Accordingly, circumcision removes the delicate, protective, and sensitive (all feminine characteristics) part from the male genitalia; and the strong, hard, active (all masculine characteristics) part from the female genitalia. Because circumcision results into useless unnecessary pain and harm for the individual, it is not a health procedure. It is a practice with symbolic and political nature. Its hygienic justifications are nothing but a tool to put such social body politics into action.
In addition to its role in gender power politics, circumcision establishes hierarchical power relationships at different levels of social organization. It encourages conformity to old traditions for no other reason apart from their antiquity, discourages taking any initiative towards change, and requires repression of any sympathy with individual sufferings if such sympathy challenges a tradition. Thus, continuation of circumcision establishes a model of behavior characterized by absolute submission to the orders of seniors and an inclination to keep the status quo. This model is publicly known as "abd el ma’mour", i.e. the slave of the major. This model conflicts with some key social roles of the intellectuals. Intellectuals have to use updated knowledge for ongoing revision and development of theories and practice in order to develop a better future for their communities. The intellectual respondents whom I interviewed stated that they act against FGM because modern medical and social sciences told them that it hinders women’s development, and consequently social development. This attitude is correct. However, to be consistent, the same approach should be adopted in all social issues. Nevertheless, intellectuals are not a homogeneous entity, neither are they separate from all other social groups.

The same approach is needed to break the silence
around male circumcision.

So, as part of the community, intellectuals are aware of the predominant social biases. I think that they need wide discussion of their own biases before they can really assimilate new knowledge instead of their older beliefs. This process took place in the issue of FGM in Egypt. The barrier of silence was broken by persistent social interaction about the issue. Men and women were encouraged to exchange experiences and points of views on FGM. Researchers contributed in the process by their field studies and situation analyses. The same approach is needed to break the silence around male circumcision. Men need to be encouraged to express their experiences, biases and feelings, with all due respect to whatever they express. The data given by men need to be analyzed, so that they can be provided by different interpretations for their biases. When this happens, it will enhance the adoption of a consistent intellectual and humane attitude towards MGM, exactly as it happened with FGM. Moreover, it will enhance the settlement of a comprehensive vision for gender issues. Social construction of femininity and masculinity is the focus of gender politics. Moving towards more egalitarian gender power politics will improve the social conditions of men and women. This will be impossible with addressing social construction of femininity alone.
III) Medical doctors and male circumcision
Physicians consider the sexual and excretory organs as dirty body parts. Such medical bias plays a role in the continuation of MGM. Society considers medical doctors as knowledgeable people who give health care. Moreover, getting doctors’ services requires a sort of financial ability. Wealth and education are positive social attributes. Thus, community members who seek medical doctors’ services and obey their instructions (or rather their biases) are considered well-to-do and educated persons. On the other hand, retention of the prepuce is considered as a mark of ignorance, negligence, and poverty; because medical doctors disdain it. Nevertheless, other body parts, like the mouth, are known to be dirty according to objective bacteriological criteria. Even one of my medical professors used to tell us that the mouth is dirtier than the anus. However, no doctor will rush to cut parts of the mouth or extract teeth as a "preventive" measure. In these two examples (the mouth and the male genitalia) medical doctors behave according to their social biases not to their scientific knowledge. Analysis of the body parts that are either excised by doctors for "prevention" of diseases, or are thought by some of them as "useless" (like Dr. Afkar’s beliefs towards the toes) reveal a relationship between the doctors’ and the traditional cultural biases towards the same body parts. For example, a social researcher in North Africa found bias against the uvula (the projecting tissue between the tonsils), and that barbers used to excise it from children’s throats as a traditional ritual surgery (Prual 1994). The modern medical analogue to this practice is "preventive tonsillectomy" that prevailed in medical practice for a long time, till studies proved the relevance of the tonsils as part of the immune system. Dr. Afkar’s thoughts about the toes could be a theoretical analogue to the tradition of foot binding which was practiced in China on girl children. The practice ended when the Chinese people broke the silence around it. There is even a study that found a link between Chinese foot binding and African infibulation (Mackie 1996).
The fact that medical doctors still perform male circumcision indicates the need for more elaborate social studies about the relationship between the traditional cultural biases and the professional medical practices. In the chapter that describes the respondents’ experience with male circumcision, we find many indicators that signify that medical doctors handle circumcision as a traditional ritual wounding rather than as a scientific surgery. Contemporary society assumes that doctors should provide people with healing and preventive services that are based on the most updated medical science. In this respect, taking science as a reference serves the community’s best interests. That is why doctors should not take traditions as their point of reference when they conflict with physical integrity and psychological welfare. Hence, they should stop performing circumcision. When circumcision is tested according to the criteria of modern science, we find that it is a surgery in search of a justification. For the last one and half centuries, medical doctors changed their justification for male and female circumcision from treatment to prevention. Similarly, they always changed its indication to fit the most feared disease of the time. So, they first recommended circumcision to treat and prevent masturbation, then venereal diseases, then cancer, to end with AIDS.
Prevention and treatment of masturbation was the first justification to be invalidated by research. Accordingly, medical doctors stopped performing FGM. Although venereal diseases, cancer, and AIDS were equally invalidated by medical research as justifications for male circumcision, doctors continued to perform MGM, and justify it by the need to conform to the dominant social traditions.

Medical practice in the third millennium should follow
more updated scientific and ethical models.

It is time for the medical profession to trespass the last centuries’ models of handling the human body, which are described by Foucault in his book The Birth of the Clinic (Foucault 1975). Medical practice in the third millennium should follow more updated scientific and ethical models. I think that breaking the barrier of silence around MGM will raise a wide debate among medical doctors about this issue, exactly as it happened with FGM. Such a debate would attract the most enlightened and scientific minded doctors to the new model, which would encourage them to stick to the first principle of the medical ethics "first, do no harm." Surgery should be the last resort in any medical plan for treatment of sick persons, and it should never be performed on healthy persons. Ethically and scientifically speaking, there is nothing called "preventive surgery." Doctors will change their attitude towards MGM when they start to recognize that it is not appropriate to repeat the ideas of a minority of Victorian doctors, who ignored that circumcision removes the most sensitive part of the penis, and interferes with the natural mechanism of sexual satisfaction (see appendix 3). The Victorian doctors’ ideas pre-dated the British occupation of Egypt. Now, with Egypt’s liberation, is it not high time for the minds of Egyptian doctors to be liberated too?
Revision of the medical institution’s attitude should include medical education as well as medical practice; because it is important to disseminate the most updated information to medical students and young doctors, as well as to the public. Moreover, criticism of the traditional cultural biases, bearing in mind the modern information should be encouraged, with the health interests of the children in focus. This criticism should take place through ongoing medical education. With the great evolution of scientific discoveries in our time, education is no more a close-ended process "khatm el ilm." Doctors should not consider what they studied to fulfill the requirements of their degrees as a perpetual given. All of the medical tools, whether they are pills or scalpels, are double-edged weapons. Various users use weapons differently. Criminals use weapons to serve their personal interests; executors use weapons to serve legal sentences; and medical doctors use weapons to heal people’s sicknesses. Thus, it is doctors’ duty to use their tools according to the most updated medical knowledge, not to their own cultural biases.
The medical institution is also responsible for translation of medical knowledge and making it available to the public. Scientific writings are not similar to artistic ones. For example, novels, paintings, or symphonies will always have the same significance to the audience. This is not the case with theories of science, because unlike products of art, they develop and change with time. That is why scientific writings should not be translated once and for all. The latest edition of any medical text should be consulted before publishing a new edition of its translated version. Without this necessary precaution, re-printing of old medical theories will turn into a tool for deceiving the public instead of enlightening and upgrading their awareness.
IV) Feminist intellectuals and MGM

Feminism...is for building new and fairer social politics
for both genders, especially children.

After she knew the new information about anatomy and physiology of the male prepuce, Dr. Salma stated that she felt like bursting into tears, and that such information should not be concealed from men, who have every right to know it. This is a consistent feminist attitude. Women suffered for a long time from patriarchal social obstacles that hindered their acquisition of knowledge, which may help them to improve their status (Smith 1987). Women will not gain more benefits or empowerment by playing the same unfair role with the assumption that men are the primary beneficiaries from the new information about their bodies’ anatomy and physiology. Feminism is not for women only. It is for building new and fairer social politics for both genders, especially children. Now, with the defeat of the false hygienic justifications for male circumcision, its ugly and unfair face is revealed: a blood and flesh sacrifice presented to the patriarchal society.

Women will also benefit from defending male children’s rights.

The results of the study show that women intellectuals are currently more ready than men intellectuals to launch the issue of MGM. They are more ready to accept change and stop circumcising their own sons, or advising others against male circumcision. Women will also benefit from defending male children’s rights. When women acknowledge that gender issues include men’s rights as well, more open-minded men will support women’s rights.

(W)omen are recommended to take the initiative to encourage men
to break the barrier of silence about MGM, to support them,
and be understandable when some of them show resistance or denial.

Of course, that does not mean that women should dominate the advocacy against MGM. It rather means that women are recommended to take the initiative to encourage men to break the barrier of silence about MGM, to support them, and be understandable when some of them show resistance or denial. Bringing an end to the silence that surrounded such a taboo issue for thousands of years needs patience and persistent efforts to move MGM from the arena of political and ideological conflict to that of the right of bodily integrity for all as a basic human right.
Women’s defense of men’s right to bodily integrity and their work against MGM will not have a negative impact on their struggle against FGM. On the contrary, work against MGM will defeat the argument that is used by some doctors that they can perform a sort of FGM analogous to male circumcision, on the assumption that the later is a simple "beautification" and non-harmful procedure.
When women revise their attitude from the issues of other weak social categories they will win a lot. First, they will win the direct personal benefit of protecting their own children from a useless, hazardous, and maybe fatal injury. Second, they will get a general benefit, because their new attitude will prove that the women’s rights movement is useful to women, men, and the society as a whole.

[azeth]

Originally Posted by Hasbinbad [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Conclusion I) Circumcision: a general overview
Male circumcision has various socio-cultural significances and it had been practiced by different human communities before the appearance of monotheistic religions (Hastings, 1980; Abu Sahlieh, 1999). It is a tradition based on Animist rites. However, many Muslim and Jewish clergy consider circumcision as a rite of their religions as well. At the level of social interpretation, infant male Jewish circumcision could be an alternative for human sacrifice of the first born son; while Arab, African, and Australian adolescent male circumcision could be a rite of passage from childhood to manhood.

...male circumcision is mentioned in neither Qur'an nor Gospels.

Unlike the Bible, male circumcision is mentioned in neither Qur'an nor Gospels. The obligatory requirement of male circumcision by Judaism could be explained by the fact that Judaism represents a closed tribal community with primary social organization that depends on mechanical solidarity. In such social organization similarity is mandatory, and any deviation from similarity is severely punished (Durkheim, 1893). This explains the Biblical threat to cut the soul of any uncircumcised male from his people On the other hand, Christianity and Islam represent more open social organizations, which are nearer to the Durkheiman model of organic solidarity, where differences are more tolerated. Moreover, the Deity in Islam and Christianity takes a more sublime image that does not require human blood sacrifice.
In modern times, some Jewish doctors could introduce male circumcision to the modern medical practice in Victorian England on the assumption that it can prevent masturbation. The practice spread from there to the medical institutions in other English-speaking countries and colonies (Wallerstein, 1980, Hodges 1995). Hence, male circumcision became part of the modern Egyptian medical study and practice. Moreover, modern medical sciences and some medieval medical practices coexist in Egypt. Some barbers are officially licensed to perform male circumcision, bloodletting, leeching, and other minor surgeries, which are known historically as Prophetic medicine (Al Tib Al Nabawy). Peter Gran argues that such practices originated initially in Jewish medicine (Gran 1979). Thus, both old traditional, and modern western beliefs cooperated to establish male circumcision as a surgery that is willingly demanded by people and supplied by surgeons.

This gliding movement is the natural mechanism
of sexual pleasure in human males.
Otherwise, sex is performed by a frictional movement,
which is less satisfactory to both partners.

The exact anatomy, histology, and physiological sexual function of the male prepuce were ignored till the 1990s, when they were studied and described by the Canadian doctor John Taylor (Taylor 1996). Unlike the widely prevalent belief among circumcision proponents that the prepuce is just a piece of skin, which is not as significant as the head of the penis, it was proved that it is a highly specialized tissue. It contains sensory receptors of light touch, which are lacking in the head of the penis. It was thought that the only function of the prepuce is its being a protective cover to the head of the penis. But more recent research argue that protection is a mutual function between the prepuce and the head of the penis, where the latter provides shape to the former, and facilitates its gliding movement during coitus (see appendix 3). This gliding movement is the natural mechanism of sexual pleasure in human males. It stimulates the specific sense receptors of the inner layer of the prepuce to generate a pleasurable sensation. Otherwise, sex is performed by a frictional movement, which is less satisfactory to both partners. The situation is made more difficult by the lack of the natural male lubricant, which is normally produced by specific glands in the prepuce (Taylor 1996, Bigelow 1992). There were also some earlier studies on the prepuce (Deibert, 1933; Wright, 1970). Such studies proved that the prepuce is an integral part of the normal male genitalia. Nevertheless, Egyptian medical texts do not mention any of its useful functions. Given the above-mentioned information, circumcision is a deliberate amputation of a healthy part of another non-consenting person’s body. It is an amputation that is performed on helpless children according to cultural pressures (Zoske 1998). According to Denniston (1997), mutilation is any injury that results in removal or alteration of the appearance or function of a body part. Thus, male circumcision, which has similar cultural, social, and biological bases as female circumcision, could be considered genital mutilation.
II) Circumcision: for whose interest?

...they circumcised them because they were afraid to obey reason
and challenge a conservative tradition.

Respondents who are parents of male children did not think that they gain any personal benefit by circumcising their sons. They suffered because of their children’s sufferings. However, they circumcised them because they were afraid to obey reason and challenge a conservative tradition. Acting like this, these intellectual respondents who used to lecture against FGM on "rational basis" behaved exactly like grassroots people who circumcise their daughters. Analysis of the respondents’ experience with their own and sons’ circumcision revealed that it is not in the child’s best interest. They reported memories of bleeding, stress, pain, urinary tract infection, and behavioral changes after male circumcision. Even the only respondent who could trespass the shock of his circumcision because he got a lot of psychological support and social compensation during and after his ritual circumcision ceremony said that other boys who were circumcised along with him were really shocked in spite of the supporting ceremony. Some of his peers resisted, tried to escape, and expressed verbal and non-verbal protest against circumcision.

Male and female circumcision do not serve men, women, or children
as social categories. It rather serves the persistence of
patriarchal gender power balance...

So, male and female circumcision do not serve men, women, or children as social categories. It rather serves the persistence of patriarchal gender power balance that presupposes a peculiar symbolic formation of the body to establish a clear gender differentiation. Accordingly, circumcision removes the delicate, protective, and sensitive (all feminine characteristics) part from the male genitalia; and the strong, hard, active (all masculine characteristics) part from the female genitalia. Because circumcision results into useless unnecessary pain and harm for the individual, it is not a health procedure. It is a practice with symbolic and political nature. Its hygienic justifications are nothing but a tool to put such social body politics into action.
In addition to its role in gender power politics, circumcision establishes hierarchical power relationships at different levels of social organization. It encourages conformity to old traditions for no other reason apart from their antiquity, discourages taking any initiative towards change, and requires repression of any sympathy with individual sufferings if such sympathy challenges a tradition. Thus, continuation of circumcision establishes a model of behavior characterized by absolute submission to the orders of seniors and an inclination to keep the status quo. This model is publicly known as "abd el ma’mour", i.e. the slave of the major. This model conflicts with some key social roles of the intellectuals. Intellectuals have to use updated knowledge for ongoing revision and development of theories and practice in order to develop a better future for their communities. The intellectual respondents whom I interviewed stated that they act against FGM because modern medical and social sciences told them that it hinders women’s development, and consequently social development. This attitude is correct. However, to be consistent, the same approach should be adopted in all social issues. Nevertheless, intellectuals are not a homogeneous entity, neither are they separate from all other social groups.

The same approach is needed to break the silence
around male circumcision.

So, as part of the community, intellectuals are aware of the predominant social biases. I think that they need wide discussion of their own biases before they can really assimilate new knowledge instead of their older beliefs. This process took place in the issue of FGM in Egypt. The barrier of silence was broken by persistent social interaction about the issue. Men and women were encouraged to exchange experiences and points of views on FGM. Researchers contributed in the process by their field studies and situation analyses. The same approach is needed to break the silence around male circumcision. Men need to be encouraged to express their experiences, biases and feelings, with all due respect to whatever they express. The data given by men need to be analyzed, so that they can be provided by different interpretations for their biases. When this happens, it will enhance the adoption of a consistent intellectual and humane attitude towards MGM, exactly as it happened with FGM. Moreover, it will enhance the settlement of a comprehensive vision for gender issues. Social construction of femininity and masculinity is the focus of gender politics. Moving towards more egalitarian gender power politics will improve the social conditions of men and women. This will be impossible with addressing social construction of femininity alone.
III) Medical doctors and male circumcision
Physicians consider the sexual and excretory organs as dirty body parts. Such medical bias plays a role in the continuation of MGM. Society considers medical doctors as knowledgeable people who give health care. Moreover, getting doctors’ services requires a sort of financial ability. Wealth and education are positive social attributes. Thus, community members who seek medical doctors’ services and obey their instructions (or rather their biases) are considered well-to-do and educated persons. On the other hand, retention of the prepuce is considered as a mark of ignorance, negligence, and poverty; because medical doctors disdain it. Nevertheless, other body parts, like the mouth, are known to be dirty according to objective bacteriological criteria. Even one of my medical professors used to tell us that the mouth is dirtier than the anus. However, no doctor will rush to cut parts of the mouth or extract teeth as a "preventive" measure. In these two examples (the mouth and the male genitalia) medical doctors behave according to their social biases not to their scientific knowledge. Analysis of the body parts that are either excised by doctors for "prevention" of diseases, or are thought by some of them as "useless" (like Dr. Afkar’s beliefs towards the toes) reveal a relationship between the doctors’ and the traditional cultural biases towards the same body parts. For example, a social researcher in North Africa found bias against the uvula (the projecting tissue between the tonsils), and that barbers used to excise it from children’s throats as a traditional ritual surgery (Prual 1994). The modern medical analogue to this practice is "preventive tonsillectomy" that prevailed in medical practice for a long time, till studies proved the relevance of the tonsils as part of the immune system. Dr. Afkar’s thoughts about the toes could be a theoretical analogue to the tradition of foot binding which was practiced in China on girl children. The practice ended when the Chinese people broke the silence around it. There is even a study that found a link between Chinese foot binding and African infibulation (Mackie 1996).
The fact that medical doctors still perform male circumcision indicates the need for more elaborate social studies about the relationship between the traditional cultural biases and the professional medical practices. In the chapter that describes the respondents’ experience with male circumcision, we find many indicators that signify that medical doctors handle circumcision as a traditional ritual wounding rather than as a scientific surgery. Contemporary society assumes that doctors should provide people with healing and preventive services that are based on the most updated medical science. In this respect, taking science as a reference serves the community’s best interests. That is why doctors should not take traditions as their point of reference when they conflict with physical integrity and psychological welfare. Hence, they should stop performing circumcision. When circumcision is tested according to the criteria of modern science, we find that it is a surgery in search of a justification. For the last one and half centuries, medical doctors changed their justification for male and female circumcision from treatment to prevention. Similarly, they always changed its indication to fit the most feared disease of the time. So, they first recommended circumcision to treat and prevent masturbation, then venereal diseases, then cancer, to end with AIDS.
Prevention and treatment of masturbation was the first justification to be invalidated by research. Accordingly, medical doctors stopped performing FGM. Although venereal diseases, cancer, and AIDS were equally invalidated by medical research as justifications for male circumcision, doctors continued to perform MGM, and justify it by the need to conform to the dominant social traditions.

Medical practice in the third millennium should follow
more updated scientific and ethical models.

It is time for the medical profession to trespass the last centuries’ models of handling the human body, which are described by Foucault in his book The Birth of the Clinic (Foucault 1975). Medical practice in the third millennium should follow more updated scientific and ethical models. I think that breaking the barrier of silence around MGM will raise a wide debate among medical doctors about this issue, exactly as it happened with FGM. Such a debate would attract the most enlightened and scientific minded doctors to the new model, which would encourage them to stick to the first principle of the medical ethics "first, do no harm." Surgery should be the last resort in any medical plan for treatment of sick persons, and it should never be performed on healthy persons. Ethically and scientifically speaking, there is nothing called "preventive surgery." Doctors will change their attitude towards MGM when they start to recognize that it is not appropriate to repeat the ideas of a minority of Victorian doctors, who ignored that circumcision removes the most sensitive part of the penis, and interferes with the natural mechanism of sexual satisfaction (see appendix 3). The Victorian doctors’ ideas pre-dated the British occupation of Egypt. Now, with Egypt’s liberation, is it not high time for the minds of Egyptian doctors to be liberated too?
Revision of the medical institution’s attitude should include medical education as well as medical practice; because it is important to disseminate the most updated information to medical students and young doctors, as well as to the public. Moreover, criticism of the traditional cultural biases, bearing in mind the modern information should be encouraged, with the health interests of the children in focus. This criticism should take place through ongoing medical education. With the great evolution of scientific discoveries in our time, education is no more a close-ended process "khatm el ilm." Doctors should not consider what they studied to fulfill the requirements of their degrees as a perpetual given. All of the medical tools, whether they are pills or scalpels, are double-edged weapons. Various users use weapons differently. Criminals use weapons to serve their personal interests; executors use weapons to serve legal sentences; and medical doctors use weapons to heal people’s sicknesses. Thus, it is doctors’ duty to use their tools according to the most updated medical knowledge, not to their own cultural biases.
The medical institution is also responsible for translation of medical knowledge and making it available to the public. Scientific writings are not similar to artistic ones. For example, novels, paintings, or symphonies will always have the same significance to the audience. This is not the case with theories of science, because unlike products of art, they develop and change with time. That is why scientific writings should not be translated once and for all. The latest edition of any medical text should be consulted before publishing a new edition of its translated version. Without this necessary precaution, re-printing of old medical theories will turn into a tool for deceiving the public instead of enlightening and upgrading their awareness.
IV) Feminist intellectuals and MGM

Feminism...is for building new and fairer social politics
for both genders, especially children.

After she knew the new information about anatomy and physiology of the male prepuce, Dr. Salma stated that she felt like bursting into tears, and that such information should not be concealed from men, who have every right to know it. This is a consistent feminist attitude. Women suffered for a long time from patriarchal social obstacles that hindered their acquisition of knowledge, which may help them to improve their status (Smith 1987). Women will not gain more benefits or empowerment by playing the same unfair role with the assumption that men are the primary beneficiaries from the new information about their bodies’ anatomy and physiology. Feminism is not for women only. It is for building new and fairer social politics for both genders, especially children. Now, with the defeat of the false hygienic justifications for male circumcision, its ugly and unfair face is revealed: a blood and flesh sacrifice presented to the patriarchal society.

Women will also benefit from defending male children’s rights.

The results of the study show that women intellectuals are currently more ready than men intellectuals to launch the issue of MGM. They are more ready to accept change and stop circumcising their own sons, or advising others against male circumcision. Women will also benefit from defending male children’s rights. When women acknowledge that gender issues include men’s rights as well, more open-minded men will support women’s rights.

(W)omen are recommended to take the initiative to encourage men
to break the barrier of silence about MGM, to support them,
and be understandable when some of them show resistance or denial.

Of course, that does not mean that women should dominate the advocacy against MGM. It rather means that women are recommended to take the initiative to encourage men to break the barrier of silence about MGM, to support them, and be understandable when some of them show resistance or denial. Bringing an end to the silence that surrounded such a taboo issue for thousands of years needs patience and persistent efforts to move MGM from the arena of political and ideological conflict to that of the right of bodily integrity for all as a basic human right.
Women’s defense of men’s right to bodily integrity and their work against MGM will not have a negative impact on their struggle against FGM. On the contrary, work against MGM will defeat the argument that is used by some doctors that they can perform a sort of FGM analogous to male circumcision, on the assumption that the later is a simple "beautification" and non-harmful procedure.
When women revise their attitude from the issues of other weak social categories they will win a lot. First, they will win the direct personal benefit of protecting their own children from a useless, hazardous, and maybe fatal injury. Second, they will get a general benefit, because their new attitude will prove that the women’s rights movement is useful to women, men, and the society as a whole.

i disagree

[stormlord]

Originally Posted by azeth [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

i disagree

Epic reply.

I'll join you hasbinbad. I'm glad I didn't get circumcised after reading that.

Personally, I think that if nature gave us foreskin then there must be a purpose. I also don't think it would be very comfortable not to have the foreskin. In fact, just thinking about it makes me recoil. Kind of like when someone scratches their fingernails on the chalkboard. It would also make a mess faster.

Thank you god for foreskin.

While they're at it why don't they cut off our lips? That way people could see our teeth better.

What is this:

The two authors stated that circumcision diminishes the ability of the brain center of sexual pleasure to respond to stimuli. Moreover, it eliminates the secretion of smegma, which is a male genital lubricant with a gentle odor that is attractive to females. They believed that the changes that are the result of male circumcision decrease their attractiveness to females and make males of the tribe less irritable and more tolerant to one another. Therefore, tribal leaders find it easier to control circumcised males and direct them.

So is that saying that circumcision might reduce sensation and secretions?

Link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smegma

Wright states that smegma is produced from minute microscopic protrusions of the mucosal surface of the foreskin and that living cells constantly grow towards the surface, undergo fatty degeneration, separate off, and form smegma.

In healthy animals, smegma helps clean and lubricate the genitals.

Link:
http://www.urbandictionary.com/defin...=smegma&page=6

"Analogous to tears, smegma is the compilation of secretions by ectopic sebaceous glands located in the prepuce, the seminal secretions of the Cowper's gland and the prostate, the mucin content of the secretions of the urethral glands, and the sloughed epithelial cells. It provides the necessary mucosal lubricant and moisturizer and is rich in sexual pheromones. The prepuce normally prevents detection of this phenomenally charged scent until the glans is exposed at the time erection takes place." - Robert S. Van Howe, MD

"Smegma is probably the most misunderstood, most unjustifiably maligned substance in nature. Smegma is clean, not dirty, and is beneficial and necessary. It moisturizes the glans and keeps it smooth, soft, and supple. Its antibacterial and antiviral properties keep the penis clean and healthy. All mammals produce smegma." - Thomas J. Ritter, MD
"Is smegma useful? Yes, certainly. It lubricates the cavity between the foreskin of the penis and the glans, thus allows smooth movement between them during intercourse ... Nature has ... provided a natural ointment, smegma, to ensure easy lubrication and protect this delicate region of the male genital organ. / To secure its even distribution, smegma is formed from the whole inner surface of the foreskin cavity ... Smegma production ... is concentrated in the cells of innumerable small prominences, minute microscopic protrusions of various shapes and sizes found on the inner surface of the foreskin cavity ... Sexual intercourse becomes a regular feature of life (in adulthood) and the function of smegma assumes its full value ... Freshly formed smegma ... is a wholesome lubricant--making for ease in erection and smoothness in sexual intercourse." - Joyce Wright, MD

Link:
http://www.cirp.org/library/normal/wright1/

Without correct treatment, ill health of the foreskin is liable to worsen - formation of smegma continues and, without outlet or access for cleaning, deposits collect and harden within the foreskin cavity. Such compact masses of smegma can lead to chronic disease, and even prepare the way for cancerous changes.

Cancer of the penis is not common in the United States but is frequent in certain tropical countries. It is almost always associated with uncleanliness and longstanding ill health of the penis. Usually a preceeding phimosis is present. Since the tumor commonly develops with such a closed foreskin cavity, it has been considered that retained smegma could be the cancer-inducing agent. [CIRP note: Cancer of the penis is now known to be associated with the presence of the human papilloma virus (HPV). Cancer of the penis may occur in both circumcised and uncircumcised men if HPV is present. Additional risk factors are hygiene, genital warts, and number of sexual partners. Smegma is not now believed to be carcinogenic.]

Nevertheless, experimental investigation of this so-called "smegma theory of genital cancer" has had little direct bearing on cancer in the male sex. Rather, it has been concerned with the causation of cervical carcinoma in in women. (cancer of the neck of the womb.) This might be conceivably be induced by smegma transferred to the vagina by the male during sexual intercourse.

Such research is beset with difficulties. In the first place, distinction must be made between normal smegma and accumulated smegma, which has undergone a variety of changes in the warmth of the foreskin cavity. Hence, any potential cancer-inducing property could well lie in products formed by chemical breakdown or bacterial action rather than in smegma itself.

A further problem arises in collection of fresh smegma in sufficient amount for experimental research. For this reason some workers have used smegma from horses because these animals produce it is large amounts. But despite repeated inoculations of horse smegma into the vaginas of laboratory animals, the results have been conflicting with regard to its inducing malignant disease.

Clearly a number of factors are involved in the causation of malignant disease of the genital organs. Whether smegma does or does not play a part will be known only when the causes of cancerous changes in general become clear. [CIRP note: It is now clear that smegma is not a carcinogen. Cancer of the genital organs are caused by HPV and smoking. See Cancer for more information.]

Meanwhile, personal hygiene and care of the penis rank high as a protection against chronic disease. Remember that it is stale and accumulated smegma that is a source of ill health for the penis. Freshly formed smegma, washed away regularly and constantly replenishing itself, is a wholesome lubricant - making for ease in erection and smoothness in sexual intercourse.

This is interesting. Perhaps ancient cultures performed circumcision to help prevent diseases and/or cancers of the penis because they did not properly clean it? Makes sense since primitive cultures do not clean themselves very well. Seems like a great way to do it would be to go for a swim in the creek?

Then again, a recent study in the UK found little to 0 cancer cases in egyptian mummies. They theorize that cancer did not exist in pre-industrial times in any significant amount.

Here:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencete...n-mummies.html

[Ihealyou]

My eyes have been opened, Hasbinbad.

[Yak]

I laughed sooooooooooooooooooo hard man! +1

[korrowan]

tl:dr

[Hasbinbad]

Originally Posted by korrowan [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

tl:dr

It's "Tl;dr." guy, and of course you didn't.

[SlankyLanky]

ever had a un cut cock presented to you? its pretty beastly bro. get that shit snipped if you have a boy people, nobody wants to pull back your foreskin and see your pale dick head.

[Hasbinbad]

Originally Posted by SlankyLanky [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

ever had a un cut cock presented to you?

No.

Originally Posted by SlankyLanky [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

its pretty beastly bro.

That's only because you've been indoctrinated into a society where it is the social norm to be mutilated.

Originally Posted by SlankyLanky [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

get that shit snipped if you have a boy people

You're sick.

Originally Posted by SlankyLanky [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

nobody wants to pull back your foreskin and see your pale dick head.

If it's pale, you have other issues.

[SlankyLanky]

to eleborate, i dont find it physically attractice, if you want to argue that im lulz poisoned by the christian tradition maybe your right. but plenty of other countries have started cutting the flaps off the jacks. if ide never seen a uncut dick (or regular as we are taught to think) that i think looked good, maybe i wouldnt see uncut cocks as pretty frightening beasts. long story short uncut dicks just skeeze me out.