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What Happens During Circumcision?

kanuk876

January 12, 2009

9 upvotes

/r/MensRights

http://www.cirp.org/library/procedure/plastibell/

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Post Information

Title	What Happens During Circumcision?
Author	kanuk876
Upvotes	9
Comments	9
Date	January 12, 2009 2:33 AM UTC (17 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/MensRights
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/7p0vs/what_happens_during_circumcision/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/MensRights/what-happens-during-circumcision.1055531 https://theredarchive.com/post/1055531

Comments

[–]offat9 9 points10 points11 points 17 years ago (0 children) | Copy Link

[–][deleted] 2 points3 points4 points 17 years ago* (4 children) | Copy Link

[–]kanuk876[S,🍰] 2 points3 points4 points 17 years ago* (3 children) | Copy Link

[–]runningscared 2 points3 points4 points 17 years ago (2 children) | Copy Link

[–]kanuk876[S,🍰] 3 points4 points5 points 17 years ago* (0 children) | Copy Link

From Boyle et al, "Male Circumcision: Pain, Trauma and Psychosexual Sequelae"

Consistent with the early reports of Anna Freud (1952), McFadyen (1998) observed psychological trauma in her son following circumcision. This is sometimes extreme enough to impede the maternal-infant bonding (Marshall et al., 1982; Van Howe, 1996). As reasoned by Herman (1992) and Rhinehart (1999) the common factor underlying circumcision trauma is an experience of violence and powerlessness--inflicted by other human beings. Such an event was described in a study of 12 Turkish boys circumcised in late childhood. Cansever (1965, p. 328) reported that "Circumcision is perceived by the child as an aggressive attack upon his body, which damaged, mutilated, and, in some cases, totally destroyed him." Ritual circumcision appeared to be associated with increased aggressiveness, weakening of the ego, withdrawal, reduced functioning and adaptation, and nightmares consistent with PTSD.

Ramos and Boyle (2001) investigated the psychological effects associated with medical and ritual "operation tuli" circumcision procedures in the Philippines. Some 1577 boys aged 11 to 16 years (1072 boys circumcised under medical procedures; 505 subjected to ritual circumcision) were surveyed to see if genital cutting led to the development of PTSD. Interestingly, Mezey and Robbins (2001) estimated the incidence of PTSD as 1.0% to 7.8% in the general British population where circumcision is not very prevalent. On the other hand, using the PTSD-I questionnaire (Watson et al., 1991) in a predominantly circumcised population, Ramos and Boyle observed an incidence of PTSD of almost 70% among boys subjected to ritual circumcision, and 51% among boys subjected to medical circumcision (with local anaesthetic). Long-term follow-up would be needed to gauge the extent to which PTSD persists over the lifespan of these circumcised boys.

The outcome of painful childhood trauma includes long-lasting neurophysiological and neurochemical brain changes (Anand & Carr, 1989; Anand & Scalzo, 2000; Ciaranello, 1983; Taddio et al., 1997; van der Kolk & Saporta, 1991). Richards, Bernal, and Brackbill (1976) found that circumcision may impact adversely on the developing brain, and that reported "gender differences" may actually arise from behavioural changes induced by infant or childhood circumcision.

Rhinehart (1999) in a report of adult clinical cases concluded that a man circumcised as a child is more likely to react with terror, rage and/or dissociation when confronted with situations interpreted as threatening. As in any situation of post-traumatic stress, an event resembling any aspect of the original traumatic experience is more likely to provoke negative emotions such as panic, rage, violence, or dissociation.

It is therefore not surprising that PTSD may result from childhood circumcision (Goldman, 1997, 1999, Menage, 1999; Ramos & Boyle, 2001), just as it does from childhood sexual abuse and rape (Bownes, O'Gorman, & Sayers, 1991; Deblinger, McLeer, & Henry, 1990; Duddle, 1991). Several researchers have concluded that PTSD may result from circumcision and/or from circumcision-related sequelae in later life. For example, Rhinehart (1999) reported finding PTSD in middle-aged men who had been subjected to infant circumcision. Circumcision involves an imbalance of power between perpetrator and victim, contains both aggressive and libidinal elements, and threatens a child's sexual integrity by amputating part of the genitalia. Some men circumcised in infancy or childhood without their consent have described their present feelings in the language of violation, torture, mutilation, and sexual assault (Bigelow, 1995; Hammond, 1997, 1999).

There's a lot-o-citations for you.

But in the end it doesn't seem to matter how many citations are provided... people are hell-bent on mutilating their children's genitals for some reason. Look at the dates in the above references -- some of them are over 50 years old.

Circumcision has never lacked evidence against it.

The proponents of circumcision fabricate purported benefits of circumcision faster than researchers can shoot them down. Case in point: when I was born, the justification given was UTIs, today it's HIV.

Miller writes in "CIRCUMCISION: CULTURAL-LEGAL ANALYSIS":

circumcision was promoted as a remedy for alcoholism, epilepsy, asthma, gout, rheumatism, curvature of the spine, and headache; hysteria and other nervous disorders, paralysis, malnutrition, night terrors, and clubfoot; eczema, convulsions, and mental retardation; promiscuity, syphilis, and cancer. Physicians also advised circumcision for the treatment of neurasthenia, a generalized condition characterized by "morbid fears, fear of society, of solitude, or traveling, of places, of disease, or morbid impulses, to kill one's self or others, mental depression, wakefulness, headache, impaired memory, [or] deficient mental control."

By far the most important health benefit of circumcision lay in its efficacy at treating masturbation and spermatorrhoea (wet dreams).

Susan Brison in her book "Aftermath" discusses the persistent and life-changing nature of trauma thus:

But many trauma survivors who endured much worse than I did, and for much longer, found, often years later, that it was impossible to go on. It is not a moral failing to leave a world that has become morally unacceptable. I wonder how some people can ask of battered women, "Why didn't they leave?" while saying of those driven to suicide by the brutal and inescapable aftermath of trauma, "Why didn't they stay?" Jean Améry wrote, "Whoever was tortured, stays tortured," and that may explain why he, Primo Levi, Paul Celan and other Holocaust survivors took their own lives decades after their physical torture ended, as if such an explanation were needed.

I would love to see the results of a study investigating a possible link between suicide and neonatal circumcision. To my knowledge, no such study has ever been done, and likely will not until after circumcision rates have drastically fallen.

[–]Gareth321 0 points1 point2 points 17 years ago (0 children) | Copy Link

[–]mikeylopez 1 point2 points3 points 17 years ago (0 children) | Copy Link

[–][deleted] 0 points1 point2 points 17 years ago (0 children) | Copy Link

[+]b34nz -6 points-5 points-4 points 17 years ago (0 children) | Copy Link