just an idea, why not make a movie about the country that circumcizes (aka mutilates) its baby boys as something normal, or even desired?
shareGreat idea...... and add to that the mutilation of children for their parents vanity - I refer of course to ear and body piercing.
shareYes it is overdue. I heard that Peter Jackson was to make a film on the life of David Reimer based on the book, The Boy Who Was Raised As a Girl, but opted to do King Kong instead. I am very hopeful he will still attempt a story of David's life, and cover the subject of male circumcision with his impressive directing skills.
share[deleted]
so that means you wouldn't want to have sex with Colin Farell? But you're probably right, I'm sure he has every possible infection and it must really stink, too. Just like every other European man.......... those poor European women, having to deal with uncircumsized (I prefer the word "intact") guys all their lives. It's really strange that they still haven't emmigrated to America
share[deleted]
I certainly object to male circumcision, and I am really surprisde that it is so normalised in America (for the record I am 'European' - British). I tend to think parts of the body are there for a reason, and the foreskin protects the sensitive head of the penis, which, if not protected in this way can become desentsirized over the years. This can lead to big problems with getting/keeping erections as early as a man's thirties and fourties (according to the article I read). Anyway, the penis is not there for primarily aesthetic pleasure, and I'm sure it can't be THAT hard to wash properly. If I had children, male or female, I wouldn't let someone with a surgical knife near them unless they had a VERY good reason.
That said, since there is such a huge difference between male and female circumcision, I find the term 'circumcision' for women misleading, I prefer to use the term female genital mutilation.
I think it is good background information for the film to understand fully what female genital mutilation involves. Firstly there are varying degrees of 'circumcision' for women, and unlike male circumcision, it is done specifically to prevent development of a sexual response in the woman, and to support male supremacy. I am pasting a description from an article which explains the procedure clearly -
There are three main types of circumcision:
1)The removal of the tip of the clitoris;
2) Total removal of the clitoris and surrounding labia;
3)The removal of the clitoris and labia and the sewing up of the vagina, leaving only a small opening for urine and menstrual blood - a process known as infibulation.
So drastic is the mutilation involved in the latter operation that young
brides have to be cut open to allow penetration on their wedding night and are customarily sewn up afterwards.
-
It was obviously the latter procedure that the women in the film suffered, which is why Colle found it so unbearably painful to have sex with her husband, could not give birth to her two babies before they died inside her, and needed a cesarian for her surviving daughter. A female child having this done is going to suffer far more pain than a male circumcision, it is more dangerous, and she is going to suffer lifelong pain and often major problems with urination.
To conclude, circumcision of any kind is wrong (I believe), but it angers me when someone tries to equate the two. I'm sure that wasn't what you meant tkulawik, but I have heard people do this. I just felt that this whole issue needed clarifying, especially since it wan't necassarily obvious to the uninitiated viewer what exactly the characters in the film had had done to them.
Well alright, but the men in that part of the world say "I wouldn't want my penis anywhere near an uncircumcized vagina". Also, male circumcision reduces a guy's pleasure for life. All you have to do is clean it out, in the shower, thats it.
And yeah, I do agree that cutting out the clitoris is worse. But, I don't think it should even be legal to circumcize guys. Mabye some exceptions, but a doctor can't just do it unless it is NECCESARY. And no, it shouldn't be up to the parents either, its too cruel and senseless. Mabye if a guy is over 18 and wants to pay to get circumcized, he can, but parents can not do it to babies.
These films make MOOLAADE look like a sunday picnic!
http://www.lungsfilms.cjb.net/
Better never find any Australians attractive then, assuming that they're circumsised, then really really like each other, end up in bed, and whoops! He's one of the 90% o f Australian guys who aren't! omgz. It's really sad in my opinion that you'd reject someone who has what nature/god/birth gave him, naturally, rather than the human modified version.
http://www.notebookinhand.com Friendly forum for creative literate types
OH come on!! I won't even bother trying to debate with you. Sheesh!
shareCabooklover, you're either a troll or extremely stupid.
If the latter, you have been told a lie on a par with the lie that the women in "Moolaadé" are told, that if they remain uncircumcised they will smell. The power of religious claptrap. And you believe it!!
Circumcision is pretty rare in Europe. There's a world outside your little cave or wherever it is you live. And trust me, we're very healthy on the whole thank you very much :-)
The male circumsicion is brutal and primitive too. And as with the female circumcision, arousal is lessened considerably. I can't imagine how dull it would be to have sex without my foreskin.
Hell, don't listen to me, read up on some medical research:
http://www.nocirc.org/
and
http://www.noharmm.org/
and
http://www.circumcision.org/
and
http://www.healthcentral.com/drdean/408/81112.html
check all the links, learn about the dangers, and about male genital circumcision, and then come back and post something less childish.
If your views about circumcision are because you are Jewish, or you are a Jewish person reading this thread, you may be interested to know that a hell of a lot of Jewish people are also questioning this malpractice:
http://www.jewishcircumcision.org/
Yes, that is a Jewish website about the wrongs of circumcision. In the same way that Collé in "Moolaadé" informs the men (thanks to what she learnt from the radio) that in spite of their beliefs, there are plenty of good Muslim women going to Mecca who are not circumcised, the same is true among many Jewish men. Check out http://www.jewsagainstcircumcision.org/ if you need further convincing.
A lot of people sadly have their children circumcised "because they did", "so they look like their parents", blah di blah. How selfish.
Anyway, I'll let you digest some of these websites, and please come back a little more informed next time.
Well thank you for the information but I also think its about personal prefrences. Those men in the village could choose to either marry women who are not circumcised or they could find a woman who has had it done. I personally do not like men who have not had it done. End of discussion.
Ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country.
Then that makes you as bigoted and stupid as the silly men in "Moolaadé". Why don't you be a good girl and go and burn your radio or something....
shareYou think that's bad. When I was a child, my parents had the doctors mutilate my body even more than just circumcision. First they had my tonsils removed, and then they went inside me and took out my appendix. And then, for the icing on the cake, they sent me to a dentist to get my wisdom teeth pulled out. My teeth! What sadists!
shareHow pathetic comparing getting tonsils, appendix and wisdom teach removed to a circumcision. A circumcision unless done for a medical reason is purely cosmetic. Those other procedures are not.
share[deleted]
You're repeating old ignorance, not scientific fact. Many forward thinking countries now ban circumcision except for medical reasons (actual health problems). The male foreskin is a natural part of the body, it serves roughly the same purpose as the human eyelid. I can't imagine you ignorant fools defending cutting off a baby's eyelids.
share[deleted]
"I personally do not like men who have not had it done. End of discussion."
I think you meant to say:
"I personally am ignorant and do not care about reality or scientific facts, I prefer men who are mutilated and disfigured to those who are normal. End of discussion."
I just want to state that I'm European and haven't even seen a circumcised penis in my life, so I'm for foreskin and all.
However, a woman preferring a circumcised penis is no worse than a man preferring silicon breasts in my opinion. Not that that's good either, but I know men who specifically likes girls because they went through breast augmentation.
A preference doesn't come from ignorance but in this case, maybe being superficial.
that's just a myth. And, it's the same sort of myth that perpetuates female circumcision.
http://www.notebookinhand.com Friendly forum for creative literate types
Yes, it is a bad thing and the American parent has been duped. It started out being a theory that to protect women from cancers of the female genitalia men must be circumcised. We know now that the theory was never proven. This is why boys are circumcised by OBs and not pediatricians. This procedure does lessen feelings in the head of the penis for men. It does not look different it just looks unscarred and as nature intended.
Your feelings reflect those of men in Africa concerning this topic with women. You feel that a mutilated penis is more appealing than a natural one. Tsk tsk.
UN urges circumcision in AIDS-hit southern Africa
By Kamil ZaheerTue Dec 19, 10:57 AM ET
AIDS-stricken Southern African nations should develop a policy of mass male circumcision to fight the disease, the head of the United Nations anti-AIDS agency said on Tuesday.
Several recent medical studies have reported circumcision cuts the risk of HIV infection among men by 50-60 percent, and the findings have been backed by UNAIDS.
"These (African) countries should now prepare how to introduce circumcision on a large scale," UNAIDS chief Dr. Peter Piot told Reuters. "The science is clear."
Baby boys should be targeted first but then attention should switch to adolescent boys and adult men, said Piot, who is in New Delhi to meet Indian officials on how they plan to tackle the world's largest HIV/AIDS caseload.
In 2005, UNAIDS said that more research was needed into the possible benefits of circumcision before it could be promoted as part of national HIV programs.
One U.S.-Ugandan study found male circumcision also reduces infections in female partners by 30 percent.
Muslim and Jewish men have to be circumcised according to religious beliefs, and Piot said that UNAIDS understood advocating mass circumcision was a religiously and culturally sensitive issue for many people.
"Changing that is touching very much on the core of values. That is going to make it more complicated than any other medical issue that I can think of."
But he said given the grim HIV situation in southern Africa, it was important to promote the idea of widespread circumcision.
"We are faced with an absolute crisis where you have 20-40 percent of adults being HIV-positive ... you need to use every scientifically proven method to bring down the new infections."
South Africa, Botswana and Nambia are among the worst hit countries in the region, while Swaziland has an infection rate of around 50 percent, UNAIDS says.
Piot said that even if large-scale circumcision was introduced, countries should continue to promote condom use as well as abstinence.
Ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country.
Studies: Circumcision reduces HIV risk
By MARIA CHENG, AP Medical Writer 45 minutes ago
Scientists say conclusive data shows there is no question circumcision reduces men's chances of catching HIV by up to 60 percent — a finding experts are hailing as a major breakthrough in the fight against AIDS. Now, the question is how to put that fact to work to combat AIDS across Africa.
The findings first were announced in December, when initial results from two major trials — in Kenya and Uganda — showed promising links between circumcision and HIV transmission. However, those trials were deemed so definitive that the tests were halted early.
The full data from the trials, carried out by the United States' National Institutes of Health, were published Friday in The Lancet.
"This is an extraordinary development," said Dr. Kevin de Cock, director of the World Health Organization's AIDS department. "Circumcision is the most potent intervention in HIV prevention that has been described."
Circumcision has long been suspected of reducing men's susceptibility to HIV infection because the cells in the foreskin of the penis are especially vulnerable to the virus.
A modeling study done last year projected that in the next decade, male circumcision could prevent 2 million AIDS infections and 300,000 deaths. Last year, 2.8 million people in sub-Saharan Africa became infected with HIV, and 2.1 million people died.
Experts say the breakthrough is a significant one on par with the identification of the virus and the use of lifesaving combination drug therapy.
The two U.S. studies confirm similar results from an earlier trial in South Africa. Given the recent failure of a microbicide trial in Africa and India, and the ongoing difficulties in developing an AIDS vaccine, the potential of circumcision as a new weapon against HIV has become even more significant.
But they caution solid evidence is not justification for mass circumcisions.
African health systems are already overburdened. Circumcision requires much more planning than, for example, an immunization campaign.
"It's a tricky one, but it's something we're going to have to move on," said Dr. Catherine Hankins, a scientific adviser at UNAIDS.
"Male circumcision is such a sensitive religious and cultural issue that we need to be careful," she said.
Several African countries have already met with U.N. agencies to explore new strategies for increasing circumcision services. Swaziland, for instance, recently experimented with a series of "Circumcision Saturdays," where existing health care facilities, normally closed on weekends, were opened by local doctors to circumcise approximately 40 men a day on certain Saturdays.
Providing circumcisions across Africa would not be the first time surgical procedures have been adopted by public health campaigns.
"Cataract surgeries have been carried out extremely efficiently to prevent blindness worldwide," said Dr. Richard Hayes, an AIDS expert at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. In some places, the cataract surgeries are performed by trained paramedics.
In recent years, the fight against the AIDS pandemic has focused on the provision of lifesaving drugs. The circumcision data gives prevention, rather than treatment, renewed emphasis.
"Treating people with antiretrovirals is completely unsustainable unless we can turn off the tap of infection," said Hayes.
While circumcision may offer new hope, it is not a cure for the epidemic.
"This is an additional tool, and it must not replace other interventions," said de Cock, who added that there will be no push for universal circumcision. "There is no one size fits all solution for AIDS."
Together with the United Nations AIDS agency, WHO is convening a meeting in Switzerland in early March to evaluate the circumcision data, and to decide on the next steps in slowing the AIDS pandemic.
In the Kenyan study, 1,391 circumcised men were compared to 1,393 who were not. And in Uganda, 2,474 circumcised men were compared to 2,522 men who were not. After tracking the men for two years, scientists found that circumcised men were 51 to 60 percent less likely to contract HIV than their uncircumcised counterparts. Since the studies were stopped, all the men have been offered the opportunity to be circumcised. And all the men were warned not to lapse into sexually risky behavior, such as abandoning condom use.
Scientists theorize that women would benefit indirectly from lower HIV prevalence in men, and a study is currently ongoing in Uganda to determine this.
In areas where HIV is spread primarily through heterosexual sex, such as sub-Saharan Africa, male circumcision could theoretically slash the infection rate in half.
It is unknown whether circumcision would be equally effective in concentrated AIDS epidemics, as in Asia and eastern Europe, where AIDS primarily strikes gay men and drug users.
i dont know what's so important about circumcision. i am circumcised (as an infant) and i have no problems when it comes to pleasure. i'm happy to have been circumcised and those of you who aren't should also be happy. at least we aren't castrated.
sharethere is nothing unethical about circumsicion. it is a very safe medical procedure whose benefits easily outweigh any disadvantages. it is also an important and sacred tradition to muslim and jewish peoples. to compare it to the female mutilation practices in africa is absolutely ludicrous, and i dearly hope that those of you who have been posting on this thread give yourselves a reality check for 2 seconds and realize this.
The guy's name is Brock Landers.
And his partner is Chest Rockwell.
Those are some great names!
Male cirucmcision has no convincing medial benefit. The ban on FGM includes the female equivalent as well as things far less drastic (for example a nick or a pin prick). New evidence shows that it is washing immediately after sex that allows HIV to spread, and this is a common practice in many parts of Africa. No one recommeds preemptively removing a body part, and the truth is finally coming out. Some people's ignorant attitudes really astound me,
shareWashing after sex ensourages HIV to spread??! Are you smoking crack?? What an ill informed thing to say!!
Many cultures bath, shower or douche after sex. I'm not sure how you can consider this encourages the hiv virus to infect someone. Madness.
It's a documented fact that men who are circumcised are less likely to carry bacteria that could carry HPV which can lead to cervical cancer. It's a matter of hygiene. A foreskin is like an armpit around your penis that doesn't air naturally. For those of you that clean properly there are no problems, but for the mucky pups - it's not nice and full of bacteria. I'm not a huge fan of the circumcised penis, but I do insist on them being clean, cut or not. Comparing circumcision to FGM is completely mad. FGM is mutilation to the degree that women die during the operation, can get all sort of infections, keloids and scar tissue can cause blockages that kill, mean that consensual sex is painful and can cause tearing and bleeding and that women are denied the pleasure that a clitoris can give them. Vaginal orgasms are possible, but the likelihood massively reduced to the trauma in the genital area.
Check your facts before posting. There are enough bullsh*t rumours circulating about HIV transmission. There are also many studies proving male circumcision has medical benefits to both men and women.
[deleted]
Yeah, guess what? Not having unprotected sexual intercourse with multiple partners reduces the rate of HIV transmission to almost 0%. The problems with the spread of HIV around the world is unprotected sex with multiple partners, not circumcision. It's as stupid as saying that elderly people in wheelchairs break their hips far less than elderly people who aren't in wheelchairs, so all elderly people should be told to use wheelchairs. It's absolutely stupid.
shareI am wondering if the posters have seen the film. Or read anything about the subject?
'Female circumcision' is a euphemism for female genital mutilation - extreme operations. There is no way that there is any similarity to male circumcision.
http://comments.imdb.com/user/ur0064493/comments-index?order=date&summary=off&start=0
http://community.livejournal.com/uncut/160052.html#cutid1
Here is the study I mentioned.
"The foreskin is like an armpit around your penis that can't air out naturally."
Then you can go describe your vagina somewhere else.
I've seen how traumatic FGM can be. I hope we can at least keep our discussion civil and not resort to name calling.
Saying there is no similarity is stupid. Male mutilation/circumcision is equivalent to removing the female labia. For the removal of the female clitoris, the equivalent in males would be removing the head of the penis. Female mutilation/circumcision is not one set thing like with males, it has many varying degrees, some of which are equivalent to what males receive.
All necessary mutilation is completely wrong for a parent to be doing, and should be banned in all countries. If a person decides they want to mutilate their body once they reach voting age in their country, then let them make that choice, themselves. It shouldn't be a parent's right to mutilate their children.