Akhlut wrote:Broomstick wrote:You are so full of shit - you really think that Pharonic circumcision, which removes the clitoris, labia, and sews up the opening of the vagina and urethra to something the size of soda straw is the exact same thing as foreskin removal? Get real. Sure, male castratos have reported orgasm capability as well, but you'd be nuts to argue that castration doesn't impact sex.
If you're willing to outlaw one, why not completely outlaw the other?
While they are both mutilation, one is a fuckton more damaging than the other, or don't you understand the world is analog, not binary? You're arguing that two different levels of damage are exactly the same when to anyone with a brain they clearly are not. It's the difference between burns-and-skin-graft on a foot and having the foot cut entirely off. Neither is desirable but most people view complete amputation as worse than "mere" severe damage that still leaves the body part functional even if not perfect.
Any society that allows the mutilation of children is abhorrent and abominable.
So will you impose equal penalties for any parent piercing the ears of an infant or a child who otherwise is not competent to give consent?
I don't see why not. Probably a lesser penalty, due to the relatively insensate nature of ear cartilage, but a penalty nonetheless.
Why lesser, when you view all damage as equally intolerable and barbaric?
Also, you moron, traditional piercing through the ear lobe, what the vast majority of people mean by the term, doesn't go through cartilage. It does cause pain, children cry when it's done to them. Also, if you DO do a piercing through cartilage is usually hurts
worse. Thanks for displaying your ignorance.
They can't have their cake and eat it too; if they want to live as Iron Age barbarians, then they shouldn't be living in a 21st century nation with laws protecting children from genital mutilation.
Bronze Age, actually.
Actually, most observant Jews I know in the Orthodox and even quite a few Conservatives simply will not use the phone on the Sabbath, neither to call nor to answer it, and will even turn off the answering machine or disconnect the phone. Sorry to burst your bubble, but not all Jews seek a means to cheat.
Not all, sure, but there is a market in Israel for such cheats against the spirit, if not the letter, of the laws of YHWH.
So, because some cheat they all cheat, right? Just ignore the fact that many Jews who could easily afford such equipment
do regard it as cheating and view the ones who do use it as hypocrites and worse, because, you know, those Jews are all alike, not the like rest of us who are individuals, right?
And it's probably closer to 5000-600 years of circumcision, not 4,000, although the historical record that far back is a wee bit murky.
Especially since they lifted most of their theology from the Zoroastrians and altered most of their books to reflect the new theology. So, it's not even like they're using "pure" Judaism anyways.
Who the hell ever said there was ever "pure" Judaism? Or did it occur to you that in part they were referred to as the "Twelve Tribes of Israel" due to differing customs? It's not like there's a Jewish pope or anything to keep the brand pure.
However, one practice found over and over in Judaism is infant circumcision.
3% of Jews not circumcising their male offspring is hardly a groundswell of change. There have always been a certain percentage who try to get out of the requirement. The larger Jewish community - the 97% - usually kick them to the curb as bad Jews.
I was illustrating the possibility of devout Jews not engaging in barbaric practices.
If they aren't circumcizing then 97% of
Jews don't regard them as devout no matter what else they do.
Jews get to decide these things, not you.
What I find pathetic are the number of people attempting to reason some way out for the Jews, or rationalizing that they will find an exception, or be willing to compromise. Greater than 90% will not - they will not compromise, they will not even look for an exception, and will continue the practice one way or another unless physically stopped from doing so.
I certainly hope they're stopped from harming innocent children. I imagine if this were any group other than the Jews engaging in behavior like this, that group would be rightfully shouted down as being barbaric and possibly evil.
You mean... like vast swathes of American Christians who are still circumcising their baby boys? South Korea? Australia? Well, OK, Australia is "only" about 2/3 of men and boys being circumcised and admittedly there is some dispute about the exact number.
I've leaving out the many African nations as it is all too easy to dismiss them as barbaric and the predominantly Muslim nations like Indonesia because, after all, Muslims are so easily confused with evil by the mentally deficient.
It's a funny thing about circumcision - it's so easily hidden by ordinary trousers. Did you really think this practice was limited
only to Jews and a slice of Muslims? Part of the problem with eliminating it is that it is widely practiced around the world, even if the rates are very low in Europe among Christians and secular people, and so many people just don't see this as a big deal.
It's rather like the reaction I get when I say ear piercing in infants is child abuse – the practice is so widespread and accepted people just don't get it. Mothers who get upset at the pain caused by their kid getting a shot at the doctor think nothing of drilling holes in their kid's ears for purely ornamental purposes. They just don't get it. We see the same thing about circumcision on this very forum from time to time, when some young man, typically cut himself, will post that he doesn't get the furor, he was circumcised as an infant and
he's OK so what's the problem here? When the victims themselves don't see it as a problem it means you have a VERY difficult job eradicating the practice.
Akhlut wrote:Broomstick wrote:It's a little like saying that because you occasionally see an Amish teenager driving around in a car (yay, teen rebellion and rumspringa) that all Amish everywhere are stinking, car-driving hypocrites and not to be trusted.
The Amish are allowed to drive cars around whenever they want. I've seen them in Walmart taking home their groceries in a minivan.
The fuck they are.
Question: how do you know these people are actually Amish? Did you ask them? Or were they Mennonites, who share many things with the Amish but
do allow driving? Or is this you once again displaying ignorance of others?
The Wal-Mart 20 miles down the road from me sure as fuck didn't install facilities for horses and buggies for automobile driving Amish.
They're supposed to be conservative in their use of technology and to try and live simply, but the use of advanced items is permitted for various reasons.
And this is a problem because...?
This may surprise you, but the Amish are just as free as anyone else and allowed to determine how they will live. Hey, give them bonus points – they don't allow their children to formally join their church until actual adulthood so no one can say they were forced into the lifestyle, they insist on it being a conscious choice to make the commitment (about 1/4 of the kids do, in fact, leave the Amish prior to joining the church). It's not for you to shake your finger at them and say “Well, you allow X or Y so you're a bunch of stinking, cheating hypocrites.
Yes, they are supposed to live simply, plainly, and with the focus on family and community but while they interpret that to mean lower tech than the mainstream there is, in fact, no religious prohibition on adopting advanced technology if the community chooses to do so. What so many find baffling is that they so often choose NOT to adopt the new. OMG! They
don't want the latest Justin Bieber recording? WTF is
wrong with those people?
Also, way to impugn me with antisemitic accusations, however, there are, in fact, Jews who try to get around all their own self-imposed laws through legalistic rules-lawyering, and your self-serving martyrdom won't change that.
The problem is not that you're pointing out the existence of cheaters, but you're insisting the conduct of a single-digit percentage of a large and diverse group is somehow
characteristic of the whole. If 3% of, say, Frenchmen are thieves does it follow all Frenchmen are thieves? Of course not. But because 3% of Jews don't circumcise their male offspring you somehow think this is indicative of the sentiments of most Jews. It's not. They are an insignificant outlier. You don't get that the
overwhelming majority of Jews seen male infant circumcision as a positive good. It's a totally alien mindset to you which is why you just don't get how important this is to Jewish identity. Yes, if you base your opinion of a group on THREE FUCKING PERCENT of the group (Yay! Jews that
don't circumcise! It's possible so let's outlaw it and fuck the 97%!) that IS, in fact, bigotry.
And – for the umpteenth time – this is NOT MY PERSONAL VIEW. So take the “self-serving martyrdom” bullshit and shoved it up your ass. I am on record here in multiple threads as being opposed to anything other than medically necessary circumcision. Well, OK,
adult males can do whatever the fuck they want with their dicks but I still think voluntary circumcision is stupid and foolish. Or do you not understand what is meant by “Devil's Advocate”? Are you unfamiliar with the notion that a good debater can argue either side of an issue?
What prompted me to do that was NOT a personal liking of the practice – I despise it – but because of all the fucking
ignorance about another culture being displayed here. Which, in your case, apparently is not limited to the Jews but also extends to the Amish. Wouldn't surprise me if the trend continues in regards to other groups as well.
Akhlut wrote:Cutting off an infants' flesh without anesthetic is generally considered harmful and, if not performed in the name of a religion (or in the US, by a doctor due to cultural inertia), would generally be charged with dozens of crimes and thrown in jail for a very long time.
Since there is not Biblical prohibition on anesthesia and no requirement that the child feel pain during the procedure,
in fact the use of anesthesia in infant circumcision is now
routine even when performed by a mohel (or, as my mother used to call them, “a creepy old men in the synagogue” which should make it clear what her views were) in a religious setting. I don't doubt there are some assholes who neglect to use it, but that's
also true in secular hospitals with trained doctors for some asinine reason. Again, Akhlut is showing he has, at best, only a superficial and frequently wrong knowledge of what the hell he's talking about.
What the fuck do you think they do, rip it off with their teeth? Holy fuck you might at least try something as simple as Wikipedia or Google. Here's another fact: they also sterilize the fucking instruments they use, which are modern tools just like a doctor would use. This doesn't make it OK, of course, but it's not like they're using rusty razor blades or broken beer bottles or something.
Ralin wrote:Why the hell do so many people here suddenly think it's racist to not cater to people who want to hurt others because of their stupid woo-woo beliefs? If we were talking about Christians wanting to spank their children anyone siding with them would be dog-piled in seconds, and that's also backed by their religion/culture.
The problem isn't with saying “that practice is unacceptable in the modern world”, it's morons like Akhlut saying “well, 3% of Jews don't do this, so they rest of them can get along without it and they should STFU and not bitch” with no understanding that the group can and will resist, and “I've seen Jews (or Amish) cheating on their own rules so they're all liars and cheats!”, which latter, especially, is full of chewy bigotry.
