Ah, the circumcision debate. I'm guessing the author of the article is not circed - I've never known anyone who has been done to want to go back.

Robert, don't worry, it's OK not to be circed, don't feel bad. But it doesn't mean you've got to wage war against those that are and glad that they are. And who want their sons circed for same reasons, that you would not understand. Let it be.

“jakew, Monday, 16 January 2012 7:37:42 PM”

Hello Jake Waskett. Yes, I know who you are and I feel rather honoured that I've attracted the attention of one of the worlds most famous circumcision fetishists.

http://www.circleaks.org

If I am wrong on specific like numbers then I am willing to concede however, every site I could find state 10 to 15 square inches and then there is this graphic example (penis photo's):

http://www.covenantcircumcision.info/pages/OneThirdPenis.html

This part of the text because the last line is under the photo's:

“What is amputated during circumcision is not only the outer skin seen between the lines in the first photo, but also the inner skin that is progressively revealed distal to ring No. 1 in the subsequent four photos. This is what totals the 12-15 square inches of innervated skin that an adult penis is missing.”

On keratinisation I'm going to quote an answer I found elsewhere. I had thought the protection from HIV was supposed to come from keratinisation of the glans and this says the same:

--

“The study you refer to regarding keratinisation by Short, Szabo, et al is by rabid circumcision proponents. You have to know your sources. Cold & Taylor dissected the glans of circumcised and intact medical research cadavers and found that the keratinised layers were up to 10 times thicker in the circumcised men than intact men. The significance of this is that the keratinisation covers over sexually sensitive nerve endings reducing the sexual sensitivity of the men.

In "How does male circumcision protect against HIV infection? BMJ. 2000; 320: 1592-4)" the authors claim protection from keratinisation that you claim does not exist. Which way is it?”

--

beyond that I will leave it to more qualified people to deal with. I haven't spent thousands of hours on this topic and have no desire to but after a cursory search I found a list of names for some known fetishists:

Schoen, Wiswell, Morris, W.Bailey, Halperin, Short, Szabo, Bleustein, Moses, Melman, Cohen, Quaintance and Waskett

You and your mate Brian Morris are there. Good night Jake.

On the weight of evidence, I am convinced that circumcision is generally unhealthy. I can't see why someone whose "religion" (more accurately, their national-identity in the guise of religion) does not include circumcision would elect to do this to their son.

This practice deserves shame. If God wanted us to be circumcised, we would have been born this way! One should seriously consider not to befriend parents who do this to their children, but I would definitely stop short of making it illegal, for these reasons:

1) Just as I mentioned in http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=12960&page=0#223650 - the family always come before the state.

2) Without the option to do evil, one is left with no option to do good. Give the good people a chance to accumulate merit by NOT circumcising their boys.

3) No need to create martyrs: When the Jews were forbidden by the Romans to circumcise their sons, they did it anyway and many of them were happily executed by the sword as a result.

To respond to Kingsley:

"I feel rather honoured that I've attracted the attention of one of the worlds most famous circumcision fetishists."

It's interesting - and telling - that you begin with smear tactics.

"every site I could find state 10 to 15 square inches"

So one might reasonably conclude that it's a commonly repeated myth.

"I had thought the protection from HIV was supposed to come from keratinisation of the glans" -- no, there appear to be several mechanisms, including removal of target cells found in the preputial mucosa.

"The study you refer to regarding keratinisation by Short, Szabo, et al is by rabid circumcision proponents." -- in the absence of evidence, this is laughable. Can one dismiss any inconvenient evidence by claiming that it is authored by rabid advocates?

"Cold & Taylor dissected the glans of circumcised and intact medical research cadavers and found that the keratinised layers were up to 10 times thicker in the circumcised men than intact men." -- if they did, they didn't report on this in the peer-reviewed literature. The piece they wrote together in 1999 (http://www.cirp.org/library/anatomy/cold-taylor/) says nothing of the kind. It's remarkable that you reject evidence which exists in favour of that which does not.

"the authors claim protection from keratinisation that you claim does not exist." -- please actually read the source. It says: "The inner surface of the foreskin, which is rich in HIV receptors, and the frenulum, a common site for trauma and other sexually transmitted infections, must be regarded as the most probable sites for viral entry in primary HIV infection in men."

According to Jake Waskett, "The inner surface of the foreskin, which is rich in HIV receptors, and the frenulum, a common site for trauma and other sexually transmitted infections, must be regarded as the most probable sites for viral entry in primary HIV infection in men."

Unfortunately, Waskett is quite ill-informed. To the contrary, the study by de Witte et al. (2007) actually showed that Langerin cells in the inner foreskin prevent HIV-1 transmission.

See L. de Witte et al.(2007). Langerin is a natural barrier to HIV-1 transmission by Langerhans cells, Nature Medicine, doi:10.1038/nm1541

Circumcision has health benefits. It's like a vaccination.
It's 100% effective against phimosis for example.

Interesting about the Australian publication that claims the clinical
trials in Africa are flawed. Funny that the results of mass
circumcisions in Africa have measurable results even better than what
the studies showed.

500 studies are mentioned by Dr. Tobian, not doctor Morris. And yes
he's read them.

As for the Royal Dutch statement, I have to wonder if Van Howe (Dutch?
and avid anti-circ person and not such a good researcher) has
influenced that statement. Most other medical organizations
acknowledge there are health benefits.

The "fine-touch" studies were not reproducible and other studies
have shown no difference in sensitivity between circ and uncirc.

I agree with "Senior Victorian": Leave the matter to families to
decide. I'll add that families need to make an informed decision
based on evidence and not other people's emotions.

To Kingsley Bugarin: Consider yourself lucky to be circumcised at
birth. You are missing nothing important. I know. I had myself cut
as an adult and wish it had been done at birth. It's riskier as an
adult, requires stitches, and there's about a month of sexual
downtime. Not a decision I would have wanted to make for myself.

As for the 20,000 to 30,000 nerve endings, I don't recall anybody
counting them. So these are made up numbers by the anti-circ
fanatics. Same with the 15 sq in. of "higly erogenous tissue".
Total nonsense. These numbers seem to be the anti-circs breathing
their own hot air.

To PGS: Thank you! I too have talked with friends circ'd at birth.
I mentioned that some people want to "restore" their foreskin.
The response is always "why would anyone want that back?"

More in next message.