Pro-foreskin letter for expecting families you don't know well

[admin]

Here's an updated version of a letter I sent my Catholic sister-in-law when her daughter was pregnant with a baby boy.
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Hi Cathy, it's Ron.

I don't feel right pestering Danielle and Dan, but I'm an expert on circumcision and I'd hate to think they made a decision about their son that could have been better informed. I'd be happy to discuss how and why it is that I've helped over 55,000 clients undo the sexual damage of circumcision.

The happy couple may not know:

- The New Testament says in a dozen places that circumcision is not part of Christianity. There has never been a circumcised pope in over 1700 years. "If Ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing." -Galatians 5:2

- The infant cutting rate in the US is close to 50/50 and dropping, so a child will differ from many peers regardless.

- Over 95% of the secular world does not cut babies. Two-thirds of the cut males on earth are Muslims (which is odd since the Qur'an says nothing about genital cutting).

- Infancy is the worst time to get a good cosmetic outcome because the foreskin is fused to the head of the penis (normally until somewhere between age 5 and puberty) and it would first have to be torn away from the glans before cutting can commence. And about half the time, infant circumcision also leaves unintended negative effects, like skin bridging, stitch tunnels, excessive tightness, jagged irregular scars, pits and gouges to the glans, coarse hair growing high on the shaft, etc. And partial glans amputation, life-threatening infections, severe blood loss, and even death of an otherwise healthy baby are not unheard of. See {http://CircumcisionHarm.org/gallery1.htm} http://CircumcisionHarm.org/gallery1.htm

- The global average age at which a healthy normal intact boy first sees his glans is 10.4 years. The foreskin normally becomes retractable due to the boy's own curious manipulations. Caregiver foreskin retraction causes injuries {http://tlctugger.com/wp-content/uploads/ForcibleRetractionPresentation-PFFR.pdf} http://TLCTugger.com/wp-content/uplo...ation-PFFR.pdf which can leave symptoms that are used to justify circumcision. The AAP says only the owner should ever retract a foreskin (this means even doctors shouldn't retract his foreskin).

- In non-cutting cultures only about 1 in 16,000 will ever need a circumcision for a medical reason.

- Circumcision outcomes are very haphazard {http://CircumcisionHarm.org/gallery1.htm} http://CircumcisionHarm.org/gallery1.htm, but even a successful circumcision alters sex dramatically. Intact men generally say the foreskin is the best part. It protects the suppleness of the glans, gives a frictionless gliding stimulation option, and also contains thousands of specialized nerve endings.

- Some healthy American babies die from circumcision. Estimates range from 2 to 10 deaths per 100,000 circumcisions. A large careful study in Brazil showed one death per 7700.

- Hospital consent forms almost never disclose all the risks and drawbacks of circumcision, or that baby foreskins are SOLD: {https://www.google.com/search?q=penis+facial} https://www.google.com/search?q=penis+facial

- Not one medical association endorses universal circumcision. Many roundly condemn the circumcision of healthy children.

In my case, if I could magically time-travel and intervene, I would grab that doctor's scalpel and ram it into his eye right through to the back of his brain if necessary to defend helpless infant me from what I've come to understand as sexual mutilation. That amputated skin would have grown to 15 square inches of exquisite pleasure receptive sexual interface.

Let me be clear. He knew what he was doing and did an excellent job. But there's no right way to do a wrong thing. EVERY circumcision removes the most nerve-rich part of the penis, eliminates the frictionless slinking and gliding mode of stimulation, and leaves the glans exposed so it will dry and desensitize year by year.

Sorry to burden you with this. I will now butt out and say nothing more unless asked.

Warm Regards,
-Ron

[Ben15aussie]

This is a great letter, and your campaign empowerment is fantastic. Its success however will be dependent on just how serious a Catholic these people are, and how influenced they have been by the public narrative there.

While recognising there must be a diversity of positions held by people who identify as Catholic (or any other major religion), and without making assumptions on this specific case and these specific people - but rather talking in a more generalised sense - the potential issue in communicating to Catholics (or any other religious person in general) is that you are trying to make an argument based on rationality, logic and reason, which are, by their very worldview, not instruments given high regard of importance by those whose value systems are based on faith, tradition and emotion.

On top of that, adding concerns regarding sexual pleasure is not going to resonate with a ideology rooted in the claimed idea of sin and a distaste for sexuality in general with an enormous amount of sexual repression inherent in thr draconian philosophies of these organised religions. I think your message would carry the greatest impact with these types of people if you focused on the biblical clauses and focus on the idea of the baby being already a "perfect creation" in their ideology (even although that is false based on any number of real world genetic circumstances, but it's about tailoring a message that will be receptive to a certain mindset).

For any message to be successful, it must be tailored to the value system of the receiver. When it is, there is a greater chance of the receiver having an "ah ha!" moment as there is a greater chance it will carry resonance with them and when a message resonates with someone, that's where change can happen.

[Frizzen]

I think adding something like this toward the end might also be helpful

http://www.drmomma.org/2011/01/neonatal-circumcision-video-for.html?m=1