Print Story Sometimes its difficult to know what to think.
I mean, this seems at first sight to be very a sensible response, given the well known health benefits.

However...



As a committed libertarian, I cannot help but feel this smacks of coercion.

I wonder if this kind of thing may soon spread to illiberal Bliar's Britain, you know, some rent-a-cop security guard manning the doors of your workplace: "I'm sorry sir, you cannot enter your office today, as you have not been circumcised"...

Is it ever right to infringe someone's right to an education like this, even if the obvious health benefits are not in doubt?

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Sometimes its difficult to know what to think. | 5 comments (5 topical, 0 hidden) | Trackback
you can pry my... by MillMan (4.00 / 1) #1 Mon Feb 12, 2007 at 06:32:28 PM EST

When I'm imprisoned as an enemy combatant, will you blog about it?


...penis out of Oprah's ass with your cold, clammy by debacle (4.00 / 4) #2 Mon Feb 12, 2007 at 09:02:29 PM EST
hands?

"I'm very responsive to certain stimuli, and pain is pretty much at the top of that list." - BadDoggie

[ Parent ]

Aye.. by Bob Abooey (4.00 / 3) #3 Tue Feb 13, 2007 at 06:16:30 AM EST
That's the thing I used to really hate about school - the constant dick inspections.

Warmest regards,
--Your best pal Bob


Another upstanding British public school alumnus by sasquatchan (4.00 / 1) #4 Tue Feb 13, 2007 at 10:05:57 AM EST
I see.

[ Parent ]

Strikingly implausible by Alan Crowe (2.00 / 0) #5 Wed Feb 14, 2007 at 01:29:34 PM EST

The article said that only uncircumcised men get cancer of the penis. The fact was presented as uncontroversial.

This worried me two ways.

  1. Perhaps I would get this uniquely emasculating cancer.
  2. How little science knows
The second concern requires a little amplification. It is strikingly implausible that the foreskin causes cancer. It is just a flap of skin. So there must be a causal chain and other links that could be broken and which would also eliminate penile cancer. Indeed one usually thinks as cancer originating inside a cell at the level of molecular biology. It is very hard to imagine a mechanism for which a foreskin is necessary. This limiting of possibilities surely makes the causal chain a promising target for research, and yet the article gave no indication of alternative prophylaxis's based on such research.

I Googled and found pages denying the link that I had found so worryingly implausible.

I don't really know what to make of this. Well actually I think that I do. Apparently penis cancer is rarer than breast cancer which itself is too rare to worry about (I'm a man!) So I'll just forget all about it. (Except that it strikes me as another case of using a rare illness to scare people - since it is rare there will be a lack of solid information)





Sometimes its difficult to know what to think. | 5 comments (5 topical, 0 hidden) | Trackback