Christopher Hitchens Goes After Rabbi Harold Kushner re: Circumcision

This Forum now available http://www.theforumchannel.tv/ Connecticut Forum panelists, Rabbi Harold Kushner, Rev. Peter Gomes and Christopher Hitchens answer the question, "Why do good things happen to bad people?" For more information, please visit our website at www.ctforum.org

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• Connecticut Forum
• Rev. Peter Gomes
• Rabbi Harold Kushner
• Christopher Hitchens
• religious conflict
• atheist
• jew
• christian
• hartford
• genital mutilation
• circumcision

[Plarzmo]

So, Religion aside... Do you think a man or woman who was not circumcised would one day, around the age of 16 - 20 have a thought that they wanted to remove their foreskin or clitoris?

It's unfair to remove parts of peoples bodies before they are even able to think for themselves. How does that father or mother even know they will share the same religious beliefs? They don't. They just go on ahead and remove parts of their body as a forceful nudge in the direction of the parents religion.

[Tandykane]

Actually here are some rates of complications from actual studies ..

1. iatrogenic Phimosis 2.9%

2. Adhesions 71%

3. Meatal ulcers 31%

3. Meatal stenosis 8%

4. infection up to 10%

5. Bleeding <35%

6. Loss of erogenous tissue 100%

[panegyricooful]

Nowadays is politically incorrect to criticize homosexual marriage yet who are we to impose on children that they grow-up with two fathers or two mothers and this is a stance usually taken by people who abhor religion?

[BestialPorn]

Was Chris circumcised or not? that's what i wanna know.

[Soldier4USA2005]

Another Hitchslap moment.

Too bad we won't see more of them.

And for the Rabbi, to say such a terrible thing, is just horrendous. Mr. Hitchens said it perfectly.

[Tandykane]

Well, when it comes to mental pathology, I guess there is no limit to what people might do to their bodies, but normal and mentally stable people likely not.

[Plarzmo]

I know that's what you were saying.

[doombuggy123]

I'm just saying, there are instances where someone, as adult, may choose to have a circumcision. It's probably for terrible reasons, but it could happen.

[doombuggy123]

It doesn't repress sexual urges, but I think people who are very self-hating and ashamed of their bodies, people who are sexually repressed to begin with, would seek out circumcision as adults.

[Plarzmo]

Right, but there would also have to be a reason for them to be deeply sexually repressed & that's a whole nother topic. I was more or less talking about when a baby is born at the hospital, it's an option then and there for the parents to do this to their children.

Really, how is it any different from a 13 year old wanting lipo-suction, or breast implants, all because they feel sexually repressed?

[Tandykane]

How in hell does circumcision in any real way repress the sexual urge?

I ask this because the Laumann study showed that cut men actually masturbated more and practiced more varied forms of sexual activity.

JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION, Volume 277, Number 13: Pages 1052-1057, April 2, 1997.

CIRCUMCISION IN THE UNITED STATES

Prevalence, Prophylactic Effects, and Sexual Practice