The just concluded 11th International Symposium on Genital Integrity, Circumcision and Human Rights achieved its dual aim of bringing together a diverse group of people to share information and connect on a personal level.
Many of the presentations were highlighted in various press releases describing the content and importance of each one. See the summaries and links to the pdf versions below.
The event took on an unexpected urgency this year due to a series of related events, beginning with the AAP's apparent softening of its position against female genital cutting. The organizers commented on these in several press releases.
"In May, the American Academy of Pediatrics flirted with approving a kind of female genital cutting, even though that is illegal in the US. Scores of boys have died of tribal circumcision in South Africa in the last few weeks. And a Cornell doctor has been testing a new method of cutting back the genitals of intersex children - without knowing what sex they might want to be when they grow up,” co-organizer Marilyn Milos says. “We see events like these as related, all breaches of the simple right of people to control the destiny of their own bodies.”
“On the plus side, the Dutch Medical Association has came out unequivocally against male genital cutting and several more countries have passed laws against female cutting,” co-organizer Frederick Hodges adds.
Download GI-symposium-media-release
Ironically, the proffered justification for the AAP's change in outlook implies that boys are in a substantially similar position as girls viz genital cutting.
“The AAP’s recent, short-lived policy on female genital cutting described a proposed ‘ritual nick’ as ‘much less extensive than male genital cutting’ but it now rejects even that nick. Sessions at the Symposium will deal with the harms and risks of both male and female cutting, and non-therapeutic operations on the genitals of intersex babies,” co-organizer Frederick Hodges says.
Download GI-symposium-media-release-2
Now for the critique. After three of these conferences, I have come to believe in their importance. However, I have also begun to see unmet needs that could be easily addressed with a little planning and cooperation.
The Symposia serve as a place to look inward. Everyone comes together to talk about the intervening two years. We discuss progress, set backs, and plans. But mostly we network and renew our sense of hope.
The good and bad news is that we need something that is both more and different. Strategy and planning is something we come away from the Symposia without when that is exactly what we need right now in spades. We also need the kind of training that is fostered through an interactive experience to expand our ability and confidence to reach beyond ourselves, beyond our walled garden.
In the years ahead, I hope that we can reach out beyond the walls and interact not just with the people who agree with us, but also with those who disagree with us. Perhaps it is too soon to talk about what that may mean in actual practice. However, the time is coming when we can and must do so.
Marilyn Milos of NOCIRC, Amy Callan of Intact America, the interns,
Georgeann Chapin of Intact America, David Smith of NORM-UK
Symposium Press Releases
Circumcising makes the penis smaller: doctor
Circumcising babies in America always causes disfigurement in men, a family physician told an international conference this afternoon.
“By any cosmetic or surgical-outcomes criteria, their penises are harmed - twisted, bent or scarred” Christopher Fletcher MD of Santa Fe said, “and though it is counter-intuitive, they are smaller and skinnier than those of non-circumcised men.”
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African health care “an HIV risk”
Circumcision experiments “like Tuskegee”
Health care in Africa is a risk for HIV transmission, a conference at Berkeley was told today.
The World Health Organisation and UNAIDS warn UN employees of this, but it has been kept from ordinary Africans for 25 years, Dr David Gisselquist said.
He told an International Symposium on Genital Integrity at Berkeley, California, the current push for circumcision is an example of the distracting emphasis on sex alone as the cause of Africa’s AIDS disasters.
“The key to stopping AIDS in Africa is to trace and investigate suspicious infections in children and adults to find their source,” he said. “When Africa’s medically-caused HIV outbreaks have been investigated and uncovered, it will be possible to have a rational discussion about circumcision in Africa.”
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Download GI-symposium-media-gisselquist
Circumcision device ‘like BP in Gulf’, conference told
Many devices have been invented for circumcising boys and men, but none overcomes all its problems, a researcher from New Zealand told an international conference on genital cutting today.
“No device takes full account of the actual structure it is designed to remove,” Hugh Young said. “Only one even acknowledges that the cut is not exactly circular.”
He was particularly scathing of the Accu-circ, a new single-action disposable chopper that resembles a cork-puller, works like a stapler and conceals the penis when it cuts.
“In poor countries, if it can be dismantled, it will be re-used, raising the risk of cross-infection - including HIV,” he said.
“If it won’t dismantle, and if it fails to cut completely, or sticks part-way, the operator is left like BP in the Gulf of Mexico, but perhaps with blood leaking out instead of oil.”
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Download GI-symposium-media-young
Circumcision “more harmful than imagined”
Circumcising babies is much more harmful than most people imagine, an international conference was told this morning.
Cutting off the foreskin of baby boys without medical need causes not only physical damage, but psychological and cultural consequences, Dr George Denniston told the 11th International Symposium on Genital Integrity at the University of California at Berkeley.
Dr Denniston is Clinical Assistant Professor at the Department of Family Medicine of the University of Washington in Seattle. He is founder of the international medical organisation, Doctors Opposing Circumcision.
Dr Denniston says that there are many areas - abortion, divorce, lowered self esteem, and even war - where it is obvious that harm has occurred, but the harm has not been quantified. The implications of that harm are so vast that, when taken together, they can diminish an entire culture.
Speakers have come to the symposium from Australia, Brazil, Canada, Egypt, England, Ireland, Italy, and New Zealand.
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Don’t foreclose kids’ options with operations, conference told
Children are entitled to an “open future,” with no options foreclosed that could not wait for the child’s expressed preference, a conference on genital cutting was told this morning.
Seattle attorney John Geisheker successfully argued the case of a 14-year-old Oregon boy who did not want to be circumcised after his father’s religious conversion.
Geisheker, Executive Director of Doctors Opposing Circumcision, said courts pay undue deference to parental discretion - cultural and religious – at the expense of the child’s human rights. He suggests the best guiding principle is the “open future” articulated by philosopher Joel Fienberg.
The Feinberg Principle, Mr. Geisheker argues, should apply even more strongly where the child is subject to irreversible and non-therapeutic bodily alterations of any kind, which include many other interventions than male circumcision, though that is easily the commonest. They include operations to flatten the ears, Europeanize Asian eyelids, assign gender to intersexed children and “normalize” boys’ and girls’ genitals.
The 11th International Symposium on Genital Integrity is being held at the University of California at Berkeley.
Speakers have come to the symposium from Australia, Brazil, Canada, Egypt, England, Ireland, Italy, and New Zealand.
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Hospitals risk legal action over circumcision
Hospitals and medical providers face special legal risks when they allow healthy newborn babies to be circumcised, a conference on genital cutting was told today.
Zenas Baer, a Hawley, Minnesota lawyer with extensive experience in circumcision cases involving informed consent, says our society is morally and legally committed to the principle of self-determination, which implies the right of every person of sound mind to determine what shall be done with his or her own body.
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Intersex surgery “not for parents or doctors to decide”
Whether to operate on an intersexed child is not a simple clinical decision, an international conference on genital cutting was told this morning.
An official Australian children’s advocate said the decision was not one to be taken by doctors, nor by frightened parents following clinical advice, nor the dictates of culture or religion
Paul Mason told the 11th International Symposium on Genital Integrity that children are children first and girls and boys second.
“If genital surgery on an intersex child is not necessary to preserve the child’s life, or to treat or prevent a likely and serious illness, the decision whether and how to operate can be put off until the child is old enough to express an informed view about the options, and in a forum that addresses any conflicts of interest,” he said. “That age depends on the intervention and the risks.”
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