Circumcision Blurb in Mothering Mag - Page 2

[Heavenly]

I took it like this. Circed men showed a higher incidence of stds BUT they also seemed to have a higher number of homosexual relations so this may be the cause of that. I think they were just trying to say it isn't the circed or not circed that determines how many get stds but the sexual activity. Just my take on it.

[Mothra]

Heavenly-- The article is entitled "Circumcision Doesn't Pay". It seems silly to explain away the STD thing with homosexuality if the point of the article is to discuss why circumcision is unnecessary.

The fact remains, as well, that the idea that circumcised men are more likely to be homosexual is total crap.

[candiland]

I dunno....... sudden, severe genital trauma right after birth COULD affect a man's psychology in relation to his sexuality.

I know that many people are gay, regardless of what happens, b/c it's sometimes biological. But I wonder if circ.ing isn't a small percent in that equation.......:

[somemama]

Originally posted by Mothra


The fact remains, as well, that the idea that circumcised men are more likely to be homosexual is total crap.

It's not saying or even implying that all men will be more likely to be homosexual if they are circ'd. It's just saying that IN THAT PARTICULAR STUDY, with those particular men, a higher number of THOSE MEN reported having same sex partners.

[Frankly Speaking]

Originally posted by Sheacoby
Frank, I took Meiri's post to mean that she bets at one time circ was promoted to prevent boys from becoming gay, that parents were told circing your son will prevent him from becoming gay. Not that she thinks it does. Just like circ was supposed to prevent masturbation.

That's still being promoted by some such as Edgar Schoen. He has also said that most men who are restoring are gay and there is just no truth to that statement at all. The problem comes in the fact that Edgar Schoen was once on the Circumcision Taskforce and regardless of the reason he was removed and regardless of the outrageous things he has said and done, he does still have some credibility in the medical profession, among writers and among defenders of circumcision. Those groups will diligently bypass reams of information against circumcision and quote questionable sources such as Schoen, Wiswell and Morris. Slowly, these people are being marginalized and eventually, they will skulk off into the shadows and inane information like they present will be viewed the same as some of the other things we hear about the early days of circumcision.

An interesting side note is that Thomas Wiswell wrote a scathing review of Dr. Paul Fleiss' book at Amazon.com that not only attacked the book but attacked Fleiss personally. Fleiss has filed suit against Wiswell for (I believe) libel and defamation of character. At least until the suit is finished, this should have a chilling effect on Wiswell and cohorts. It's about time!





Frank

[Mothra]

It is bad science. One study on this does not merit stating this as fact. If, in fact, that is what this study found. It is bad science to draw such a conclusion with no other evidence and it is bad journalism to include it in an article with no other qualifying statements. It takes away credibility from the entire, valid arguement against circumcision.

[DesireeH]

I took it like this. Circed men showed a higher incidence of stds BUT they also seemed to have a higher number of homosexual relations so this may be the cause of that. I think they were just trying to say it isn't the circed or not circed that determines how many get stds but the sexual activity. Just my take on it.

Thats what I thought too. Has anyone emailed them? I wonder what they will say.

[lollaleeloo]

Originally posted by Heavenly
I took it like this. Circed men showed a higher incidence of stds BUT they also seemed to have a higher number of homosexual relations so this may be the cause of that. I think they were just trying to say it isn't the circed or not circed that determines how many get stds but the sexual activity. Just my take on it.

ITA. I took it as their attempt to refute claims to any link between foreskin state and risk of STDs. However, they still could have worded it a little better, choosing instead to highlight specific types of sexual behavior that increase the risk of STDs (which are not certainly limited to homosexuals btw). That would have left if less open to misinterpretation.

[mollyeilis]

I am not sure how anyone could read something negative in a reported study (there was no editorializing of it), but I wanted to point out that the last bit of the sentence was left out. And it has continued to be left out in discussion here:

"Relative to uncircumcised men, circumcised men were more likely to report having had homosexual partner(s) (7.5% v 5.3%, p =0.012) and partners from abroad (19.7% v 13.1%, p...0.001)."

It was just a sample study, and since it studies STDs I'm sure there were questions about behaviour involved so they could cover all bases.

[Smilemomma]

I kind of saw it the other way around. So many more men are circumcised in the US than are not, so it's only logical that more gay men are circumcised, *not necessarily* that more circumcised men are gay, get it?

Isn't it just a numbers thing?

[somemama]

The study was done in Great Britain.

[*Erin*]

It seems silly to explain away the STD thing with homosexuality if the point of the article is to discuss why circumcision is unnecessary.

YES. and i also agree with your comment, mothra, that it makes the entire arguement against circ (and mothering) less credible.
i still do not see the point of throwing that sentence in there if not to imply that gay men are more sexually risky, or less desirable than straight sons.

an earlier poster asked if that had anything to do with our son's intactness, or circumsicion-i have a dd, so no decision to make, though if i did have a boy, i'd leave him intact.

[Sustainer]

I was a bit taken aback when I read it, too. My first thought was, "Are they implying that boys who are circumcized are more likely to 'become' gay? That doesn't make any sense!" Then I thought it might be the other way around: A gay man who reads that he is at greater risk for STI's, and then reads the false claim that circumcision reduces the risk of STI's, might run out and get himself a circumcision (since the study was done in Europe, he's less likely to be circumcized in the first place). Unfortunately, this would mean that the idea that intact men actually have a lower risk of STI's might be called into question, because people might attribute the difference to the fact that gay men are more likely to get circumcisions. In order to counter that, we would have to do a study in which both groups are matched for the number of gay men.