Circumcision ban to be snipped from ballot

[RandySF]

The November ballot just got a few inches shorter.

San Francisco Superior Court Judge Loretta Giorgi today issued a tentative ruling saying the ballot measure to ban circumcision must be withdrawn, calling it "expressly preempted" by state law.

She said that the California Business and Professions Code prohibits local regulation of medical procedures. She goes on to write that it "serves no legitimate purpose" for an illegal measure to remain on the ballot and ordered elections chief John Arntz to, um, cut it off.

The ruling is tentative, and Giorgi is still scheduled to hold a hearing on the matter Thursday at 9:30 a.m. But observers say it is very unlikely that she'll change her mind considering the vehemence of her initial ruling.



http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/cityinsider/detail?entry_id=94103#ixzz1TMbWuKg5

[Drale]

1. Good /nt

[UrbScotty]

2. Good for those who work in circumcision wards, who make an average of $20 per hour - plus tips!

[jberryhill]

7. They are the ones who had skin in the game

[JohnnyLib2]

3. But, but---

We really need the distraction this week. :cry:

[Luminous Animal]

4. I wish I could show you the idiotic propaganda put out by these people (and no, it is not the comic

book), but when I went to the website listed on the flier, there was some pretty scary warnings about passing on any information about the site. Ordinarily I'd scoff but something about it freaked me out.

[Cant trust em]

5. Fantastic. This is too much.

Let me say that there is no way in hell that I will every circumcise my son (yet to be conceived). But I don't need the government to tell me not to do it.

[Warpy]

6. Every man on DU who is reading that headline

has either just crossed his legs or dropped his hands into his lap.

[hobbit709]

13. Nope.

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:
But then I'm told I have a warped sense of humor.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

8. This whole circumcision thing is ridiculous.

The other day some dude compared it to female clitoral mutilation. Err.. not.

ACTUALLY, the male equivalent of female clitoral mutilation, would be removal of the penis.

However, the anti-circumcised anti-circumcision group (who belong with the anti-abortion group, carrying signs, etc.), are unaware of anatomy, so why even bother to explain it to them?

[Warren DeMontague]

9. It's not the same thing, so that makes it okay?

It's the baby's body. On what sort of authority do you have it that that particular chunk of a baby boy's body is so totally useless?

Nature and evolution just fucked up, there, huh?

I don't think it should be against the law, I accept that despite what I think parents "should" do they're going to make up their own minds about this, just as I did... but I personally consider the practice unnecessary, outdated, and frankly abhorrent.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

12. So what? It's healthier. I've had a couple of uncircumcised men try to convince me that

the uncircumcised penis is just as healthy, when the fact is, it isn't, for the very physical reasons.

At the end of the day, it's up to each woman to decide what they want to risk in themselves, and what they like, and what each couple wants for their kid.

My brother was not circumcised and he wishes he were. He's now afraid of having it done.

[Warren DeMontague]

15. That's bullshit.

So, really, it's about the preference of any woman who might be a sexual partner down the line, that's the thing that matters? What sort of a shitfit would you have over that statement if the genders were reversed?

It's the baby's body. I'd much rather err on the side of not performing UNNECESSARY SURGERY on an infant and risking the idea of them deciding to do it later in life, than presuming to make the decision for them. And I have family members AND friends who are not circumcised, and they're all very happy with the way they're put together.

[laundry_queen]

20. Yep, total bullshit

My ex, and all family members are uncircumcised. Pretty much all of my friends who have had baby boys didn't circumcise them. It's a myth that an uncircumcised penis isn't as healthy, and no one that I've been with that was uncut has ever wished they were circ'ed. In fact, I've found the opposite. I have a friend whose dh was maimed during a circ and had issues from that. Besides, the very teeny chance of a particular kind of cancer versus the real risk of bleeding, infection, error and loss of penis during a circumcision seems a bit lopsided to me. I know what I'd chose if I had a baby boy. And it wouldn't be unnecessary surgery. And I would say that I'd prefer an uncut partner (I've had both) but personally I'm more interested in the kind of person I'm with than if they are cut or not.

[Warren DeMontague]

21. The whole "it's not as clean/it's harder to clean" is a crock, too.

The fact of the matter is, it's a procedure desperately in search of a legitimate justification. The people who say "we're doing it because we've always done it and we want to do it and we're going to keep doing it" are at least being honest with themselves.

We actually spent a good amount of time agonizing over this before our son was born; When I was born, I had it done, I don't even think they gave my mom a choice, it was just done routinely to everyone. Aside from the fact that I come from a generation where it was the standard practice, I come from a family that is marginally Jewish and I grew up in an area that was predominantly Jewish. I didn't know anyone growing up who wasn't; maybe there was one kid in our whole High School, or two. I always assumed when I had kids my sons would have it done, not due to any religious inclination but just, again, because... My aunt didn't do it to my cousin in the 70s, and I remember thinking what a weird hippie she was. My sister didn't have it done to my nephew, and this was in the 80s, and I still thought it was very weird at the time.

By the time my wife was pregnant with my son, and we knew he was going to be a boy.. (somehow, I always knew) we started talking about it and again, I pretty much assumed we would do it. My wife is actually a practicing Jew, so one would think she would be more inclined towards it than I was. She had a lot of cultural pressure to do it... but she was more against it than I was, and was reading books about it and doing research on it.. I was totally on the fence up until the birth, probably leaning towards rather than against.

Then, the birth was really tough.. tough on my wife, and tough on my son. They were taking care of my wife up so I took my son to the nursery to get checked out and to have some tests done. They pricked his little foot for a glucose level and he screamed, and I felt an instinctive urge to protect him, even though I knew, obviously, they had to do this to check that he was okay... so we went back and were recovering in the hospital together, and this decision was making me miserable. And I think it was making my wife miserable, and the dr. wanted to know what we wanted to do... and I think my wife & I both looked at each other and had the same thought; like, if thinking about doing this is so stressful, fuck it, let's just NOT DO IT. After the thing with the foot, I think, I decided that no one was going to do anything to him unless it was absolutely necessary or medically indicated.

So we didn't. And we've NEVER regretted that decision, and now my son is old enough to understand... he's sort of appalled that anyone would consider taking off a part of his body without checking with him, first.

[Sarah Ibarruri]

14. As for nature being all fucked up, it sometimes is, yes. There are many things that are fucked up

Evolution is not magical, and life as we know it is not some perfect thing designed by some perfect God, that it should go untouched because of its sheer perfection.

We modify millions of things in our lives and bodies, to make them better in one way or another.

[Warren DeMontague]

16. We modify things in OUR bodies.

Yeah. Exactly. Get it?

It's really fucking presumptuous to make that decision for someone ELSE'S body, though.

[onenote]

18. What about other cosmetic procedures on babies. Do you support banning them too?

Protruding ears. Skin tags. Moles. Hemangiomas and port wine stains. Supernumerary nipples. For the most part, cosmetic, not medical issues. Should parents be banned from making the decision to have them addressed until the child is 18 years old (at which point its no longer the parent's decision?

[Warren DeMontague]

19. Honest, straightforward question: Do you have problems with reading comprehension?

Go back and read the post you're responding to, carefully. Then re-read what you wrote.

I'll wait.

[Liquorice]

10. I personally don't think boys should be routinely circumcised. I know the arguments

for it, but it's not something I believe should be done as a matter of course because it doesn't appear to be medically necessary. I'm not sure if it should be made illegal though.

[Kceres]

11. What we did: left my boys intact and told them if they wanted done as teenagers

we would pay for it. Almost all of their friends are intact too, so they said they don't know what all the fuss is about. They like their bodies the way they are.

[Iggo]

17. Ha!