Author: Tony

Kenyan government to roll out human rights violations.

The Kenyan government is rolling out a plan that overlooks a few key issues.

The Kenyan government has embarked on an ambitious national programme to fast track the national rollout of male circumcision as a means of preventing HIV.
…

According to the new policy document, circumcision will be rolled out for males of all ages in a culturally sensitive way and in a clinically safe setting.

I searched for the policy document but haven’t been able to find it. Still, this says everything. Males of all ages. And they’re more worried about culturally sensitive ways than they are about human rights or common sense. These children aren’t having sex. And there are other, more important (the only?) reasons for the HIV epidemic in Kenya (italics added):

Why is there more AIDS in some parts of the country than in others?

Infection levels are generally higher in urban areas than in nearby rural areas, and some parts of western Kenya have the highest recorded rates in the country. HIV is still spreading in Kenya, so that many rural and urban areas that had low infection levels in the past are now experiencing higher infection rates. Many factors may contribute to these differences, such as high population density, more movement of people because of trading and migration routes, non-practice of circumcision, sexual networks within communities, and cultural practices such as wife-sharing and widow inheritance.

Fixing the “non-practice” of circumcision will solve nothing as long as the last two remain in practice. If, at the very least, the last two are properly compensated for with condoms, fixing the “non-practice” of circumcision will be unnecessary.

Worse, this mentality:

“Our pilot is a free mobile outreach, where a team of five members – a doctor, clinical officer, care assistant, nurse and driver – goes into various communities and sets up camp in a room at a local medical centre or in a tent, and invites people to come or bring their children for circumcision,” said George Obhai, monitoring and evaluation manager at Marie Stopes Kenya.

Before the mobile team arrives, the local hospital or clinic is contacted to conduct community mobilisation, and on the day every man getting circumcised receives counselling from a trained member of staff before the procedure is carried out.

“Interestingly, many of the ideas people have about male circumcision work in our favour, even among the Luo; for example, people believe that it improves the sexual experience and that ladies prefer circumcised men,” he added.

I respect the idea that moving from traditional circumcision to clinical circumcision will improve the situation for boys, however small the improvement. But to willingly embrace subjective nonsense because it works in your favor is absurd. Medical procedures on children must be based in science alone. There is medical need or there is not. Everything else is irrelevant and should be explained and disregarded as such when it appears.

This plan – as will all similar efforts around the world – will be properly seen as worthless failures when we analyze the long-term results many years from now.

**********

In somewhat related news, this bit of genius (link via by way of Male Circumcision and HIV:

It is now illegal to encourage the use of condoms in southeast Nigeria’s Anambra State. The state government has also banned the advocacy and distribution of other forms of contraceptives including IUDs (intrauterine device) and any other “un-natural” birth control.

“Instead of teaching children how to use condoms to enjoy sex they should be taught total abstinence,” the state commissioner for health, Amobi Ilika said when announcing the measures in late March at the state capital, Awka. “The use of condoms has greatly encouraged immorality,” he said.

The question of proper governmental role aside and an understanding that condoms are still available, what could possibly go wrong?

Failure is not a sin to be prevented at everyone’s expense.

I’m slowly beginning to figure out that politics is a test of wills. Whoever has the most endurance will win. My resolve is based on strength of ideas. Unfortunately, politicians are supported by power to be used as freely and stupidly as possible. Eventually, they’ll win because everyone with sense will go insane.

I’m not quite at insane, so today, this:

The Senate on Thursday passed a bipartisan package of tax breaks and other steps designed to help businesses and homeowners weather the housing crisis.

The measure passed by an impressive 84-12 vote, but even supporters of it acknowledge it’s tilted too much in favor of businesses like home builders and does little to help borrowers at risk of losing their homes.

The plan combines large tax breaks for homebuilders and a $7,000 tax credit for people who buy foreclosed properties, as well as $4 billion in grants for communities to buy and fix up abandoned homes.

And what about those of us who, while stupid enough to buy in the bubble, were smart enough to finance at a fixed-rate on a loan properly proportioned to our income? We get nothing? Mind you, I don’t want anything because I’m not interested in sending money to the Treasury so that it can then be returned to me masked as a constituent service. I’m already paying indirectly for the mistakes of others, as everyone is and must in a free market. I’m content with that because I know it works. This is just part of the process. But why should I also pay directly for the mistakes of others?

Specifically, the last thing homebuilders need right now are tax breaks that will inevitably encourage more speculation. There is an existing inventory of homes that may be purchased. Perhaps those aren’t the homes people want. I don’t claim to know, nor do I need to know. But expecting willing buyers to find a willing builder to produce the correct new home in the correct location without incentive from the government is the only reasonable position. A tax break just covers up the risk of speculation and the reality of failure. Dumb.

That’s not to say the proposed $7,000 tax break for buying a foreclosed home is any better. That incentivizes buyers into a foreclosed home over a non-foreclosed home. If they prefer the foreclosed home over a non-foreclosed home, they’ll be willing to negotiate a price without the incentive. If they prefer the non-foreclosed home over a foreclosed home, the incentive may skew their decision away. Sure, the owner(s) of the non-foreclosed home could lower their price by $7,000, but that just demonstrates the perversion Congress is imposing on them to benefit another party. It’s the same game of picking winners and losers outside of the marketplace.

Remember, though, that the actual marketplace is not a zero-sum game. Both parties gain from their transaction, or they wouldn’t enter into it. If they would agree without an external incentive, the incentive is unnecessary. If they would not agree without an incentive, the incentive skews the market away from its optimal point. Buyers have a required range of acceptable terms and sellers have a required range of acceptable terms. If the two do not overlap, that is not a failure of the market. The market is working as expected.

The housing market needs to stabilize. Unfortunately for me it will stabilize below what I owe. However, I want that to happen sooner rather than later because that is better for me, as it would be for any homeowner, whatever their equity status. More information is better than less information. But the market will not stabilize correctly, or as quickly, as long as Congress forgets that its job description does not include “Do something”.

I wouldn’t use the word “debate”.

Following on today’s earlier entry, how many pro-circumcision myths does this short essay, “The Debate Over Circumcision,” inadvertently expose as flawed?

My first son had what can only be described as a bad circumcision. While he was still in diapers, the skin at the tip of his penis started to get sticky and when we changed him, we were unable to pull the skin back to do an adequate cleaning. “It’s a problem,” the pediatric urologist explained. I am sure there is some medical term for the condition, but all I can remember is that it required a trip to Boston’s Children’s Hospital where, in the office, my little boy had to get “re-snipped.”

This was very, very difficult to for me watch. Despite receiving a local anesthetic, my son cried a lot. So did I. When I found out I was expecting another boy, I did more research on circumcision and stumbled across countless websites arguing both for and against the procedure. Given that my husband and I are not of the Jewish or Islamic faith, where circumcision is customary, there was no real reason to choose circumcision other than family tradition. The medical arguments don’t really hold all that much weight, in my opinion.

The complications the author’s son experienced are easily explained. At birth, the foreskin adheres to the glans thanks to synechia. The inner foreskin is mucosal tissue, just like the nose, mouth, and female genitals. It doesn’t magically stop being mucosal tissue after circumcision. It only stops acting like mucosal tissue through years of keratinization. Until that occurs, any loose foreskin will tend to re-adhere because it is moist mucosal tissue. As the author discovered, this can require further surgical intervention. It can also lead to complications (NSFW – graphic images).

This is objective harm. Even when parents understand some of the risks – through the experience of their previously healthy sons – from medically unnecessary infant circumcision, they’re willing to proceed again. The risk of it becoming reality for the boy is inherent in every infant circumcision. No one has the right to impose this risk on him without medical need. No one should have the legal option to impose this risk on him, either.

A libertarian argument for a new law.

Mark, who writes the excellent Publius Endures, left an excellent (and appreciated) comment over the weekend. Normally I would reply there, as I do with most comments. But Mark included one point that I’d like to discuss (emphasis added).

I must say that the circumcision debate (to the extent it can even be called that) has made me feel relieved that my wife and I are having a girl since we don’t even have to consider the issue. Circumcision is frequently done almost without thought, essentially as a ritual. Until Andrew Sullivan started blogging about it in the last few years, it was an issue that I didn’t even consider – I thought it was something that was just what was done. People like you and Sully are starting to open eyes that the practice largely lacks any kind of basis other than as a cultural norm.
The main reason to perform circumcision, as far as I can tell, is that it may create some awkwardness when the child becomes a sexually active adult. The thing is that by the time that becomes an issue, the child will be more than capable of making the decision on his own.
If we had our child a year ago (and it was a boy), I think I would have opted for circumcision just based on the fact that it is a social norm and that there is little publicity about the arguments against circumcision. Were the decision to come up now, I would almost certainly not circumcize.
I’m not sure the procedure should be made illegal, though, but only because I’m generally opposed to adding new laws. However, parents need to be better informed about the risks and generally nonexistent benefits of circumcision.

Before I respond, allow me to clarify that this is in no way meant to condescend on this (or any) point. Although I’m certain that I’m right in all facets of my approach, I’ve thought about this every day for many years. I’ve read a lot of bad arguments on both sides. Reading through them can be tiresome, and without self-monitoring, my response can fall into frustration. (I try to avoid outright disdain, even though there are places where it’s richly deserved.) Mark’s comment is none of that. He shows an open mind that demonstrates genuine intellectual curiousity. He grasps the fundamental argument against male infant circumcision and is willing to act based on that new knowledge. Or to not act, based on that new knowledge. I wish more people had that kind of integrity.

Nor am I suggesting that he does not understand any of the libertarian approach I advocate here. Allow me to reiterate, if you’re not reading Mark’s blog, add it to your RSS feed today. His libertarian credentials are well written in his entries. Here, I’m only offering how I think a libertarian approach must be applied. I’ve read that libertarian arguments don’t apply to children. I find that strange, so this is at least tangentially a refutation of that.

To his comment, though, I think there’s an easy libertarian argument that demands legal prohibition. The Female Genital Mutilation Act of 1995 exists. As long as it is valid law, restricting all medically unnecessary genital cutting on female minors, even at the request of parents, the 14th Amendment demands that the government treat citizens equally. The only choices are to repeal the FGM Act or make the law gender neutral. Since we all agree that the former is unacceptable, we’re left with the latter. (Take a look at the work Matthew Hess is doing to achieve an MGM Bill.)

Beyond that, viewing government through a libertarian goal of maximizing liberty, I’m against any law that would restrict people from making that decision for himself (or herself). I can form whatever opinion I want about someone’s decision, but it’s irrelevant to what he should be able to do to himself. Weigh the benefits against the harm with whatever consideration makes sense. But the issue at hand is that medically unnecessary surgery is objectively identifiable as harm. There is cutting. There is an inherent risk of complications, both minor and severe. And infants do not have their choice. Objective harm is forced on them without their consent with no medical need or objective benefit.

Statistics demonstrate that, when left with their choice, males almost never choose or need circumcision. Any reasonable person standard must side with not removing healthy body parts from children. They have the same individual rights that every adult has to the extent that a right is inherent and inalienable. For minors, those rights should be viewed as held in trust rather than created upon reaching the age of majority. Since the first legitimate purpose of government is to protect the rights of each citizen against infringement by other citizens, there is no reason to overlook that just because the person imposing the harm is a parent who views the imposition as beneficial in some (subjective) manner.

Again, I don’t think Mark’s comment indicates that he’s willing to overlook anything. He’s not rejecting a law. But as he points out there is a societal norm in the United States that male circumcision is just an inconsequential snip. As I’ve demonstrated throughout my circumcision category, it’s not true that it’s inconsequential. Even though most American men are content to be circumcised, we are a nation of individuals before any other examination. Adding a new law to include boys protects them as individuals in the same we already protect girls. It is a law that actively advances individual liberty, while actively rejecting an incoherent narrative of liberty dressed in parental “rights”.

We shouldn’t need a law to protect against infant circumcision. But in a perfect world, parents wouldn’t remove healthy body parts from their children out of fear, superstition and conformity. We must legislate for the world we have, with the foundation of individual rights that we know is valid. I could make an argument that existing assault laws cover unnecessary infant circumcision, but no prosecutor is going to pursue that in the common circumstances of male infant circumcision in America. So, barring a sudden shift to rational action by parents, this is an area where the government must legitimately exercise its authority in defense of rights.

Post Script: There’s a little more to Mark’s comment than what I posted here. I left an additional response there, but it was more anecdotal.

I was teased into a dangerous fixed-rate mortgage.

The narrative is established:

Just as subprime mortgage borrowers were teased into taking out loans they later could not afford when the interest rates spiked, scores of municipalities, schools, hospitals and even museums are now facing soaring interest payments on unconventional bonds that proved too good to be true.

Ready to be unleashed on any and every victim:

The District has begun paying an extra $1.2 million every month because its interest payments have doubled, and in some cases even tripled, on $601 million of these bonds. That represents nearly one-seventh of the city’s total debt and includes $24 million for the Washington Nationals’ new stadium, the District’s treasurer said. City officials were convinced by investment banks that these types of loans would be safe and cheaper than traditional borrowing.

Naturally, deceit (i.e. “teased into”) is the only explanation. We can’t expect politicians to be diligent when subjected to the avarice of evil capitalists. They couldn’t possibly be stupid or greedy themselves.

The surge in the cost of these bonds is the primary way taxpayers are being burdened by Wall Street’s credit meltdown.

The insatiable appetite among all politicians for spending unbounded by tedious constraints like tax receipts is the primary way taxpayers are being burdened. Without debt, there would be no upwardly-fluctuating interest payments.

Politicians lie to please us because we allow ourselves to be pleased.

Via Wired, the Los Angeles Times reports on a scheme to fight global warming. Or, rather, I should write that the scheme is claimed to fight global warming, although the specifics (unsurprisingly) suggest otherwise. Consider:

Motorists in Los Angeles County could end up paying an extra 9 cents per gallon at the gas pump, or an additional $90 on their vehicle registration, under proposals aimed at getting them to help fight global warming.

Voters would be able to decide whether to approve a “climate change mitigation and adaptation fee” under legislation being considered by state lawmakers and endorsed by the board of the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

So state lawmakers are offering a Pigovian tax, right? Their interest is in countering the negative externalities of carbon pollution, right? You know the answer, right?

The money would fund improvements to mass transit and programs to relieve traffic congestion at a time when transportation dollars from Washington and Sacramento are hard to come by.

Of course. Sin taxes always purport to be about reducing the offending behavior, but are never actually designed to correct the problematic outcomes. The politicians always end up saluting General Fund.

And it often comes with “words mean what I say they mean” baggage.

[Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn] also objected to the measure’s being called a “fee” — which requires a simple majority for approval — instead of a “tax,” which requires two-thirds approval.

[Assemblyman Mike] Feuer’s bill would allow the MTA board to ask voters either for a fee of up to 3% of the retail price of gas, or for a vehicle registration fee of up to $90 per year. The money would pay for programs to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Want to bet how quickly lawmakers would revisit “3% of the retail price” tax if the retail price of gas falls, lowering tax receipts? Bonus points to anyone who can find an example of Assemblyman Feuer endorsing an expansive governmental role in lowering the price of gas. Oh, wait, scratch that. Finding an example is actually quite simple. Surprise!

Service to the President: What McCain wanted to say.

John McCain offered useful insights into his (dangerous) political mind at the Naval Academy on Wednesday. For example:

I’m a conservative, and I believe it is a very healthy thing for Americans to be skeptical about the purposes and practices of public officials. We shouldn’t expect too much from government — nor should it expect too much from us. Self-reliance — not foisting our responsibilities off on others — is the ethic that made America great.

But when healthy skepticism sours into corrosive cynicism our expectations of our government become reduced to the delivery of services. And to some people the expectations of liberty are reduced to the right to choose among competing brands of designer coffee.

Actually, my healthy skepticism is still healthy. I expect government to ineffectively deliver services it shouldn’t be attempting, even though it tries and tries and tries. And when it fails, my healthy skepticism knows that it will try harder, but with more money.

My definition of corrosive cynicism looks something like the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, a.k.a. McCain-Feingold. This is the belief that individuals can’t be trusted, so someone smarter must look after their interests for them. That brand of corrosive cynicism believes expectations of liberty should be reduced to the right to choose among competing brands of designer coffee. My healthy skepticism understands that competing brands of political speech are a form of liberty thankfully enshrined in the First Amendment. The corroded cynic speaks of quote First Amendment rights.

Continuing:

Should we claim our rights and leave to others the duty to the ideals that protect them, whatever we gain for ourselves will be of little lasting value. It will build no monuments to virtue, claim no honored place in the memory of posterity, offer no worthy summons to the world. Success, wealth and celebrity gained and kept for private interest is a small thing. It makes us comfortable, eases the material hardships our children will bear, purchases a fleeting regard for our lives, yet not the self-respect that, in the end, matters most. But sacrifice for a cause greater than yourself, and you invest your life with the eminence of that cause, your self-respect assured.

Senator McCain and I have different opinions on how our rights are protected. As noted above, we don’t share the same opinion on our rights. But the problem here is his idea of a “cause greater than yourself”. Who decides what cause is greater than me? Who decides whether or not my actions constitute sacrifice? And I’m not thrilled by the idea that “success, wealth, and celebrity gained and kept for private interest” is allegedly a “small thing”.

I’ve long believed that we are a citizenry who behave as though we are rightfully subjects of the government. Among his many faults, Senator McCain is too friendly to perpetuating that mistaken belief. We are electing the president of a government (previously?) limited by a constitution, not a king limited only by his mandate by his higher calling.

Link via Hit & Run.

How far do parental “rights” extend? What is the basis for limitation?

Passed to me by a friend, let’s draw the natural comparison on this story:

Thailand’s Health Ministry ordered hospitals and medical clinics to temporarily stop performing castrations for non-medical reasons, saying Wednesday that the procedure performed on transsexuals needs stricter monitoring.
…

“As of today, doctors can perform the surgery if there is a medical reason to do so — not for any other reason,” ministry spokesman Suphan Srithamma said.

The move came after a leading gay activist, Natee Teerarojjanapongs, called on the Medical Council to take action against clinics that perform castrations on underage boys.

I don’t have any knowledge of this topic beyond what this story offers. I assume it’s true that some number of males undergo castration to achieve “feminine qualities”. Like medically unnecessary circumcision, neither parental proxy nor choice by a legally incompetent individual should factor. Unlike medically unnecessary circumcision, this appears to be at the male’s request. But this is important to remember:

“It’s a totally wrong perception that castration will make boys more feminine,” Natee told The Bangkok Post last week. “These youngsters should wait until they are mature enough to thoroughly consider the pros and cons of such an operation.”

Unfortunately the real problem appears to be doctors overlooking the existing rule requiring parental consent for boys until they reach age 18. I don’t think there’s contention that enforcing this is reasonable.

So, instead, a thought experiment. I would like to assume that parents are rational enough not to sign off on this type of stupidity. I don’t assume that, of course, because the evidence proving otherwise is too strong. But apart from the distinction¹ on future reproductive capability from the two procedures, how is it any more reasonable to permit parents to impose circumcision than to permit them to impose castration? We can discuss degrees of violation, but that’s a distraction from the truth that they’re the same kind of violation. We don’t debate the depth to which it’s acceptable to stick a knife into someone, even though differences exist in probable outcome from the depth of the assault.

When considering surgery on minors, any intellectual journey towards acceptance after establishing medically unnecessary is unethical and illegitimate. There is no objective justification, so any legal permission granted to parents by society is subjective reasoning devoid of reason. It doesn’t matter if the topic is castration, genital cutting, breast augmentation or any other unnecessary intervention a second-party prefers. The individual isn’t just supreme, he is all that matters.

¹ Reproduction is not necessary for the individual to live, so its foundation is subjective, exactly like medically unnecessary circumcision.

Opinions tell us what, exactly, about policy?

From Friday:

In the [New York Times/CBS News] poll, 81 percent of respondents said they believed “things have pretty seriously gotten off on the wrong track,” up from 69 percent a year ago and 35 percent in early 2002.

Although the public mood has been darkening since the early days of the war in Iraq, it has taken a new turn for the worse in the last few months, as the economy has seemed to slip into recession. There is now nearly a national consensus that the country faces significant problems.

So fascinating, and yet, so very likely irrelevant. Having an opinion is fine, but it’s only useful if that opinion is founded on facts. If it’s based on an idea that we’re suffering partly because the government spends more than it receives, fine. If it’s based on an idea that the mortgage situation in America is partly because some borrowers risked more than they could afford, fine. But those don’t seem to be the case.

In assessing possible responses to the mortgage crisis, Americans displayed a populist streak, favoring help for individuals but not for financial institutions. A clear majority said they did not want the government to lend a hand to banks, even if the measures would help limit the depth of a recession.

How perverse does a person’s thinking have to be to decide that the warm glow of political happiness is more important than results? I’m looking very much in the direction of people laughing today at this story.

Of course, this isn’t an endorsement of what the government’s done recently. A good bit of our trouble is at least an indirect result of government policy. Artificially low interest rates aren’t a good idea. Attempts to squash a signal of imbalance possess a distinct head-in-the-sand mentality. The mortgage interest tax deduction isn’t a good idea because it distorts behavior. Perhaps that’s favorable, but maybe not. My decision to buy a house was a natural step in where I was in my life in 2005, but the potential deduction fit with my increase in income. It did not tip the decision, but I included it in my analysis.

Finally, this:

“What I learned from economics is that the market is not always going to be a happy place,” Sandi Heller, who works at the University of Colorado and is also studying for a master’s degree in business there, said in a follow-up interview. If the government steps in to help out, said Ms. Heller, 43, it could encourage banks to take more foolish risks.

“There are a million and one better ways for the government to spend that money,” she said.

This unquestioning acceptance that the government should have our money, that the only question open is how to spend it, is irrational and damaging. There is only one better way for the government to “spend” almost every dollar it spends: return them to the people who earned them. Or, in the case of the pending Free Money, don’t take out loans in our name and tell us we’re richer. And in the future, stop spending and stop taxing. Let me decide what I deem worthy of my money. I want you to do the same.

Other than those objections, this poll is useful.

Overheard on the Internet

Anyone who follows discussion of circumcision on the Internet will encounter regular moments of an overwhelming desire to hate mankind. It’s impossible to avoid. People are so devoid of any logic or consideration for the child that disgust is the kindest emotion I can achieve. For example:

But I was also thinking, for all you mummies to be out there, are you thinking of getting your son circumcised? And for those of you with girls or who don’t know what you’re having, would you get your baby circumcised ? Does anybody know the pros and cons in doing so ?

If you’ve paid attention to my Circumcision category, you know that actual discussion of pros [sic?] and cons will likely not follow, which is how it plays out. Like here:

It’s completely a personal decision … You cannot make your decision based off of anyone elses opinion. …

I am here in the US and it is a very common practice. It wasn’t even a question for us. Here it is done one day after birth. Neither one of my boys even flinched when it was done. The PlastiBel that they use here takes all of 2 seconds to perform and it’s done.

You should really research it so that that you and OH feel that you have made the decision that best suits your beliefs. Good Luck!

Notice¹ that this response ignores the original question. Instead, it’s a typical defense of parents making a “personal decision” not based on any other person’s opinion, with any other person being inclusive of the healthy child. Whatever suits them is somehow acceptable.

But it gets more blatant:

…

I am not the sort of person to push my views on anyone else but that is what we would do.

Hope you make a decision that you and babies (sic) daddy are happy with.

…

She is mistaken; she is exactly the type of person to push her views on someone else. Her husband is that type of person, too. Neither of them considered that their son might not want to be circumcised. They imagine that only their opinion about his body mattered.

Some inject a little sanity into the discussion, saying it should be illegal. But then comes the inevitable softening to saying it should be a personal decision for the parents based on good reasons. Why? Has one parent on this board who chose to circumcise given any indication that common sense intervened? It should be illegal. That is the only reasonable stance based on more than one analytical approach. Why step away from that? To avoid offending? The legally-permitted violation will continue for some time. There is no reason to enable it longer. Don’t be afraid to call people out on their selfish delusions².

<sarcasm> With all of these arguments for and against the procedure </sarcasm>, I can’t say I’m surprised by the original commenter’s decision:

yeah I think I’m going to get my boy circumcised, seeing as it protects him from all sorts of infections and sexually transmitted diseases, but I heard a story about a man who lived here in winnipeg
He got circumcised when he was a baby and they ‘accidentally’ cut his penis off! Can you believe it ?

It protects him from UTIs in the first year of life, but the risk is minute without circumcision. (Girls suffer more than intact boys.) And the data on STDs is equivocal, at best. (Condoms? Bueller? Bueller?)

The man she speaks of is David Reimer. His circumcision was attempted using cauterization, which is not an accepted method. While he is important to remember because he was a victim of a botched, unnecessary circumcision, there is (unfortunately) at least one recent example from Canada. The child died.

To the first response I quoted above, the circumcising doctor used a PlastiBell ring on the child.

¹ Notice also that the (unverifiable) claim that it didn’t hurt the child is irrelevant. The ability to make a surgical intervention pain-free could justify any number of barbaric procedures. Need matters first, which didn’t exist here. Then, when need exists, a scientific conclusion that the most extreme intervention that is circumcision is warranted because no lesser interventions will correct the malady.

Also, did the child suffer any during the healing period?

² From one mother’s rambling comment excusing her selfishness:

I am happy with my decision, and I am sure my sons will never come to me saying they wish they still had their foreskin.

I’ve heard this so many times. No parent ever thinks it will happen to them. I know she’s psychic enough to know what her son will want, but what if he asks? And what if he asks because he’s not happy about it? Or is he not allowed an independent thought?