MEDICAL FRAUD and the criminal assault of boys
Letter in response to Benatar and Benatar's article published in the American Journal of Bioethics which says that circumcision is a question for parental discretion. - March 2003. The following professionals do not agree and argue otherwise. This response was also published in the American Journal of Bioethics.
Circumcision as Human Rights Violation: Assessing Benatar and Benatar
Rio Cruz, PhD
Lenord Glick, MD, PhD
Jack Travis, MD, MPH
Executive Co-Directors
International Coalition for Genital Integrity
Benatar and Benatar conclude that amputating normal, natural, protective, and sexually important tissue from a non-consenting infant does not constitute abuse but is rather a matter for parental discretion. But to arrive at this conclusion, they ignore several important points:
1. The prepuce is a unique, complex structure necessary for normal sexual function and is composed of thousands of specialized nerves, Meissner's corpuscles, vascular systems, and stimuli receptors that have evolved over millions of years to maximize human sexual experience. The inherent pain aside, such an amputation deprives an individual of a normal penis and of the full range and depth of sexual pleasure it provides. It should be self-evident that cutting off primary sexual tissue unalterably changes the way sexual acts are perceived and performed. To assert otherwise places the burden of proof upon those who would alter the normal anatomy and natural sexual experience. The Benatars fail to provide such proof.
2. Not one national medical society in the world recommends infant circumcision. This includes the American Medical Association, American Academy of Pediatrics, American Academy of Family Physicians, American Cancer Society, and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. In fact, most world medical societies recommend against it and agree with the conclusions of the Canadian Paediatric Society that in the absence of unequivocal medical indication, "Circumcision of newborns should not be routinely performed."
3. Worldwide, circumcision of male or female genitals is relatively rare. Other than as religious rite, non-therapeutic circumcision is almost never performed in Europe, Australia, New Zealand, non-Muslim Asia (with the exception of South Korea), or Latin America. Approximately eighty-five percent of the worldıs male population and ninety-eight percent of the worldıs female population are not circumcised. The United States is the only country in the world to circumcise a majority of infant males for non-religious reasons.
4. The authors hint, but choose not to demonstrate, that the individual's right to bodily integrity can be abridged for cultural, religious, or other perceived "benefits" imposed by force upon others. This suggestion goes in the face of centuries of social evolution and law that has come to recognize the right of the individual to bodily integrity against coercive pressures that do not have compelling, rational, demonstrable benefit. This sovereignty asserts that children are not the chattel of parents, physicians, the group, or nation. Their genitals are not communal property. Others have no right to impose, by force, their cultural, religious, or aesthetic preferences upon an individual's body without substantial rational benefit.
Numerous human rights documents declare the self-evident but hard-won right to bodily integrity. Forced male circumcision has been recognized as a human rights violation in at least one legal case and in two United Nations reports. It can be deemed a violation in accordance with such documents as the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Article 5) and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (Article 13). On January 26th, 2001, the U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child received conclusions and recommendations on reports submitted to it by nine countries. Among the conclusions received was that all children "should be allowed to decide at 21 years of age whether or not they want to be circumcised." For these reasons and many others, the Swedish parliament has recently voted unanimously to consider whether infant male circumcision is a human rights violation equal to female circumcision.
Failure to consider these and other important issues in the case of forced genital cutting, leaves the arguments put forth by Benatar and Benatar as simply disconnected from 21st century legal and human rights advances. Consistent with growing human rights awareness, only a mature individual has the right to decide whether to diminish or otherwise alter his or her unalienable right to full sexual experience and bodily integrity unless some life threatening or severe health pathology is present.We trust that the world community will continue to assert every individual's right to genital integrity and an intact body.