- It's a procedure rooted in ritual and religious tradition and has no health benefits in a modern society.
Actually, it has been widely demonstrated to reduce the spread of HIV, among other STDs. http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/resources/factsheets/circumcision.htm I think Hitchen's view of it is colored based on his dislike of religion. I agree with b_b, male and female 'circumcision' is not a reasonable comparison. He's being a bit hyperbolic there.
It's just important to recognize that there are reasons beyond religious ones why the practice continues. One reason is cosmetic. In countries where it is dominant, some parents simply want their child to fit the norm. To be honest, I found the teeth I had pulled, braces, and other orthodontic procedures I had as a child to be infinitely more scarring than my circumcision. (I say infinitely, because I can't remember my circumcision at all.) And, those painful orthodontic procedures were by and large done for cosmetic reasons. If most people let their teeth go crooked, but one religious group didn't, we would have to call religious childhood orthodontics barbaric too.
If people consider an uncircumcised penis to be as socially negative as crooked teeth, then IMO it would be very difficult to justify being ok with one and not the other. And what is more, preventing crooked teeth can easily be a more painful process. I'm curious about this. Can't really search at work, but if you can point to one, I'd like to see. I think sex is pretty great. I'd hate to think it could have been even better. And I'm not even Jewish! :)There have also been studies that show that an in-tact penis provides more pleasure to both the man and the woman during sex.
- Circumcised males may also be at risk of premature ejaculation, or alternatively may have to resort to prolonged thrusting during intercourse in order to stimulate sufficiently the residual erogenous penile nerve endings to trigger ejaculation (Bensley & Boyle, 2001). They report that the unnatural dryness of their circumcised penis often makes coitus painful, resulting in chafing and/or skin abrasions (Gemmell & Boyle, 2001). Concomitantly, O'Hara and O'Hara (1999) found that female partners reported significantly greater sexual pleasure from intercourse with genitally intact men as compared with circumcised men. Money and Davison (1983) had previously documented a loss of stretch receptors in the prepuce and frenulum and an associated diminution in sexual response, thereby restricting a circumcised man’s ability to achieve arousal. Consequently, erectile dysfunction may be a complication of male circumcision (Glover, 1929; Ozkara, Asicioglu, Alici, Akkus, & Hattat, 1999; Palmer & Link, 1979; Stief, Thon, Djamilian, Allhoff, & Jonas, 1992; Stinson, 1973).
This video should be very enlightening to you.
Barbaric parts of the world... A tension exists here. On the one hand, we look at other parts of the world, see what they do, and say that it is simply "their" way; they have their own cultural and social meanings, and we have no right to tell them otherwise. On the other hand, sometimes what they do is just wrong to us. FGM is one such thing. It's wrapped up in their cultural meanings, but for the rest of us it is indeed a barbaric practice. Anyway, male circumcision is a different kettle of fish, I suppose (since FGM is used to control women's sexual behaviour, and causes sex to not be physically pleasing). As a European, I'm quite glad to be intact.
In the West we have the underground sex trade. That fails the religious criteria, so while it is equally disgusting, I think it is more of a law enforcement issue. No one in the main stream would argue against efforts to shut it down.
I agree. I wish more Americans would see the hypocrisy in this line of thinking, but they just don't and it's frustrating.