[Click on image to enlarge.]
Link: Circumcision. Billboard is in Swaziland, photo source: joe-ks.com (presumably pronounced "jokes"), "Largest Source of Internet Humour, eh!"
Thanks to Frank McGuinness and David Loewen.
A throng of humanity, 25,000 strong, stretched out from the stage in Golden Gate Park as far as a person at ground level could see. This was the opening ceremony for the annual San Francisco AIDS Walk to raise funds for the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, an organization at the vanguard of AIDS fundraising, outreach, support services, and the dissemination of evidence-based information for the worried, newly infected, and negative alike. These walkers raised over $4,000,000.00 this year.
It's a powerful experience to be in the presence of so many people who have such a singular goal: helping people with HIV/AIDS, keeping the negative people negative and comforting those newly infected and those left behind and those living with it everyday, and just being optimistic. I feel the same thing when I am engaged with Intactivists. But this is not to equate intactivism with the fight against AIDS -- or even to compare them. Yet, one is about life and death and the other is about dignity, quality of life, and human rights.
I understand the place each occupies on the ladder of worthy causes. It is because I understand what comes first that makes me sad that lives are being risked and gambled away because a few see an opening to promote circumcision in a fit of desperation or opportunism. We mustn't be desperate. We mustn't lose our cool at this stage. Too many positive developments are at hand for circumcision to distract us from the fight against AIDS or for AIDS to derail the progress made against male genital mutilation.
Imagine a world, to raise that famous line John Lennon sang for the first time so long ago. Except this time imagine a world without AIDS or circumcision. A place where we don't have to worry that a simple mistake could cost us our lives or the life of someone we love, or that the children of the world have to endure an indignity and mutilation yet again in the name of fear of disease.
More photos after the break.
I am passing this along for anyone who feels this is cultural opportunism at its worst (as I do) who may also wish to make their voices heard. As an aside, I am convinced the most effective advocacy of any point of view is to join the organizations and work to steer them in an ethical direction. Protesting outside is fine and necessary. But this problem needs insiders more badly than ever.
From Ron Low:
Hi David,
Ambassador Stephen Lewis said on the radio today that UNAIDS is now
calling for mass infant circumcision. This is wrong, no?
-Ron
[As far as I know, UNAIDS has only endorsed adult male circumcision in high prevalence, low circumcision countries with a generalized epidemic. This would rule out all, but the sub-Saharan African countries.]
- - - - -
Stephen Lewis was on NPR's Worldview today [July 9]:
http://www.chicagopublicradio
... and he devoted considerable time to advocating mass infant circumcision as a way to fight AIDS.
He will speak at a fund-raiser Thursday evening near Children's Memorial [in Chicago].
My friends and I will be outside the event Thursday with signs reading "Condom: 3 cents, Foreskin: priceless" and "450,000 US men who died of AIDS were circumcised at birth" and "Infants don't have sex, HIS body HIS decision" and "ABSTAIN from cutting helpless infants" etc. AIDS-Free World fundraiser Thursday.
Ambassador Stephen Lewis, the former UN Special Envoy for AIDS/HIV in Africa will speak at a fundraiser for his new organization, AIDS-Free World, July 12th from 6pm to 8pm at Suzanne Cummings Flowers, 630 W. Webster St. Jerome McDonnell, host of WBEZ's "Worldview," hosts. Tickets are $100 and parking is available at Lincoln Park Hospital. Email july12thevent@gmail.com for more info. - - - - -
Regards,
-Ron Low
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"Opt out" circumcision at birth? Who exactly is doing the opting?
“Thirty years from now we’ll be so glad we did it.” Who will be glad? The government? Surely not the individual who loses his foreskin and still becomes infected.
These are just some of the words spoken at the Third South African AIDS Conference. Fortunately, other points of view were heard.
“It’s all about cold steel – it’s more akin to sterilisation, it’s not like giving people clean water, it’s not like breastfeeding that we can all get warm and fuzzy about.”
“A mass circumcision programme is an experiment in disguise.”
Arguments that the procedure would not protect women and would disempower women were also heard. Other questions seemed to be left out, such as who is being targeted? Black South Africans who come from a culture of ongoing concurrent relationships or white South Africans who do not have this cultural background? How likely is it black South Africans will all end up circumcised and whites will not? What will this mean in terms of perpetuating divisions in society?
From all accounts, South Africa has a vast underclass of people living in poverty who are almost entirely black. The country has a minority white population who are far better off and hence have the advantage that whites in richer countries have, such as education, access to testing, condoms, treatment when necessary. It seems obvious this was what Timothy Quinlan of the Health Economics and HIV/AIDS Research Division at the University of KwaZulu Natal was thinking of when he said prevention needs to focus on the two factors known to have the biggest effect on HIV transmission rates: concurrent partnerships and high viral load during primary infection [paraphrase directly from the article].
Update: IRIN has a big front page article on the above conference session. It's bias is obvious giving scant coverage to the opposition. South Africa has a history of questionable approaches to the HIV fight. It is interesting to watch the hysteria around circumcision. It's like a mania. However, it is entirely understandable under the circumstances of a 29% infection rate. What is puzzling is that the white medical establishment seems so sold in that country. I think it must have its roots in circumcision rates of men of a certain age, much like the rest of the English-speaking world of that generation. It's all so explainable ... and lamentable. AIDS will continue to ravage SA until they face facts. Denial and something akin to superstition so far has been their reaction.
Full Aidsmap article next page.
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