Playing a little catch up with three items in this post.
A Tale of Two Technologies: HPV Vaccination, Male Circumcision, and Sexual Health
Does it really take something called "feminist science and technology studies" to get us to a place where we can discuss the sexism inherent in the involuntary roll out of a particular prevention technology applicable to only one of the sexes?
For years, infant boys have had the most sensitive part of their penis lopped off to protect some theoretical female partner of the distant future from cervical cancer. So why is it suddenly so urgent to discuss the sexism in mandating vaccination for HPV in girls, the REAL cause of cervical cancer?
Laura M. Carpenter of Vanderbilt University and Monica J. Casper of Arizona State University aim to tell us in A Tale of Two Technologies: HPV Vaccination, Male Circumcision, and Sexual Health. Unfortunately, one must subscribe to get the full article, and the abstract is so abstract that I remain clueless on what they intend to say. Any readers out there have it? If so, pass it along and I'll do another post later.
Citation Reference:
Gender & Society, Vol. 23, No. 6,
790-816 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/0891243209352490
Circumcision Deserves Circumspection
Elizabeth Reis, an associate professor of women’s and gender studies at the University of Oregon and the author of Bodies in Doubt: An American History of Intersex, writes at The Bioethics Forum on her regret at circumcising her son and asks the AAP to consider the ethics of any recommedation they may make.
Even in the world of medical ethics, circumcision is a subject that is largely ignored. Several of the major medical ethics textbooks don’t even include it in their indexes. And this is what I object to. I think that circumcision needs to be recognized as most parents’ first ethical decision that they make about and for their child. Parents should be informed of what the procedure actually entails. Remember that video of the birth process that many of us had to watch in prenatal classes? Why not see a video of a circumcision? I am convinced that most people do not know what they are consenting to, and if they did they would avoid the procedure like the plague.
...
Even if all the studies on the spread of HIV in Africa are valid and we all agree that circumcision prevents HIV, I think there are solutions other than surgery that would work to decrease the spread of the disease. Condoms also prevent HIV, and in fact they’re still necessary to avoid the virus even if men are circumcised. Fewer sexual partners would also help. Babies circumcised now won’t be having sex for several years, when we hope to have new and more effective strategies for preventing HIV. Avoiding HIV in adults simply isn’t a good enough reason to recommend cutting off a perfectly healthy, useful, and pleasurable part of infants’ bodies.
If men want to make this decision for themselves, for public health or personal reasons, then let them. The American Academy of Pediatrics should elevate the principle of autonomy and encourage parents to let their male children make the choice about circumcision when they’re all grown up.
Some excellent comments are appended to Elizabeth Reis's piece. Worth a read for sure.
National Coalition For Men addresses the AAP viz infant circumcision in a press release
The National Coalition For Men urges the AAP to consider human rights implications of any recommendation to circumcise infant boys. Read their press release here.
