Neonatal male genital mutilation should be made illegal in developed nations

Due to unfortunate circumstances, Con was unable to post his argument for Round Four, which means he will be unable to discuss one of my most important arguments (presented in Round Two): that MGM is a gender rights issue. He may provide rebuttals for that during Round Five, but I would like the voters to keep in mind that I will have no opportunity to refute them. Since this round would normally be used partially for refuting Shifter's arguments in Round Four, I will use it to reinforce some of the things I mentioned in previous rounds. For example, one thing that I find is difficult for people to accept is the fact that anti-"mutilation advocates wish for people to not be able to mutilate their children on religious grounds. One is not required to be anti-"semitic or anti-"muslim to want to protect boys from being mutilated because of religion, just as one is not required to be anti-muslim or anti-African to want to protect Muslim girls and girls whose parents are of African descent from mutilation of the genitals. I simply argue that no one has the right to remove normal, healthy tissue of any person without consent, regardless of the parents' religion. I would like to emphasize, also, that in a developed nation, it is impossible to anticipate the child's future religious beliefs at birth. It is entirely possible that a child born to Jewish or Muslim parents could later convert to a different religion or become atheist, or simply become less involved with the religion over time and later decide that he misses his foreskin. Therefore, we should not allow parents to mutilate their boys, regardless of the boys' parents' religion. I would like to make it clear that I do not wish to make it illegal for people over the age of 18 to be mutilated. If someone over 18 feels that they want to be part of a certain faith, or for any other reason wants to be mutilated, then I would not want to prevent them from doing that, as long as they are aware of all of the risks of complication and that they will have reduced sexual pleasure. Another argument that is occasionally made is that we let parents decide other things for their children, suck as whether or not to give them vaccinations and remove cancerous tumors, or even pierce their childrens' ears. Where I went to elementary school, parents were required to give their kids vaccinations, unless they did not want to do so for religious reasons. I argue that this is harmful to the child, as it risks the child's well being and even the child's life. Refusing to vaccinate children should be illegal too, but this is a different argument. Tumors are not a normal part of the body, and require medical care. The foreskin, however, is a normal, funcional, important part of the body. Additionally, no child is going to grow up and then decide that they would have wanted to keep their tumor. Compared to genital mutilation, ear piercings are very trivial, and do not tread on the infant's rights at all. While it is possible for the child to later say that he or she would have preferred to not have pierced ears, this is not typical. The difference in the procedures is that genital mutilation removes healthy tissue, whereas ear piercings do not interfere with the child's future lifestyle in any way. Another reason that people will get their son mutilated is because of the health benefits. They cite the studies in Africa regarding HIV, which are irrelevant to developed nations, as men in developed nations almost always are within access to proper sanitation so they can clean out the anaerobic bacteria that cause the increase; the decreased risk with mutilation of HPV, to which there is now a vaccine; the increased risk of urinary tract infections in the first few years of life, which can be completely treated in a matter of weeks, the symptoms being relieved in a few days; and the higher rates of penile cancer in intact men. The penile cancer claim is the most ludicrous. If you cut off part of your body, you cannot get cancer in that part of the body. Cutting off any oart of the body to reduce cancer of that part of the body is unnecessarily crude. I will conclude with my three main arguments. Male genital mutilation takes away the boy's ability to give consent. The procedure removes healthy tissue without the child's consent, and regardless of the parents' religion, this is not O.K. After all, in a developed nation, it is impossible to anticipate a child's future religious affiliations at birth. It is also impossible to anticipate whether or not the boy will want to be mutilated. MGM is also a gender rights issue. In most developed nations, women are protected from being mutilated before they are able to give consent. Men, however, are usually unprotected from this, and a man will often undergo genital mutilation because his parents think that this will get him into heaven (Mutilation is actually not a sacrament in Judaism, and according to the Torah, an intact Jew is still a Jew [1]). I would like to point out the similarities between MGM and FGM: both are performed for religious and aesthetic purposes, and both are performed on unconsenting infants and reduce sexual pleasure, without removing the victim's ability to orgasm. However, for some reason, it is legally O.K. to mutilate baby boys in developed nations, but not baby girls. MGM reduces sexual pleasure. The foreskin protects the head from keratinization, a process which severely reduces sensitivity; moisteurizes the head, serving as a natural lubrication; provides a sliding mechanism during intercourse and masturbation, which causes a large amount of pleasure; and also simply houses a large number of nerve endings. I urge everyone to vote pro if you believe that neonatal MGM should be made illegal in developed nations, just like FGM. [1] http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com...