Category: Circumcision

Always check your assumptions.

I’m always curious to see how our biases encourage us to frame reality. It can be something as simple and unimportant as complaining that the umpire squeezed the strike zone on your team’s starting pitcher instead of admitting that each pitch consistently passed the plate over the batter’s box. Or it can be something more, as this entry demonstrates in referencing the U.S. Supreme Court’s refusal to hear the Oregon circumcision case, which I mentioned yesterday.

UPDATE – My good friend Rabbi Zalman Berkowitz at miyan this morning reminded me that a conversion is in almost all cases not complete without the bris. In other words, the Supreme Court is preventing the kid from his religious aspirations by not ruling in favor of the father. It is not going too far out on a limb to come to the conclusion that this case prevents freedom of religion, and is an invasion of privacy. The case now goes back to an Oregon judge to determine whether the boy wants to undergo the procedure.

That’s an interesting way of analyzing the Court’s decision that is self-evidently wrong. The blogger assumes that the boy wishes to convert and have himself circumcised. The Oregon Supreme Court concluded that it did not know the answer to that question, only the stated claims of the father (for) and mother (against). The Supreme Court is merely saying that procedural paths short of its consideration have not been exhausted. The Court did not close the option for the boy to undergo circumcision if he indeed wishes to convert and undergo circumcision. But assuming the boy wants the circumcision is (at least) one assumption too many.

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It’s worth remembering that the Oregon Supreme Court established two tests for the lower court to use in its evaluation. If the boy wants circumcision, the case is over. Fair enough, you will hear no complaints from me. His body, his choice.

But if the boy does not want circumcision, the case continues, with the lower court instructed to determine if the father’s imposition of circumcision would cause irreparable harm to his relationship with his son. The court essentially ignored that this would be the imposition of medically unnecessary genital surgery on an individual who objectively denies consent. One person is granted property rights over another if the court rules using a subjective test. Apart from being ethically wrong, that is hardly a precedent for arguing that the state is preventing freedom of religion.

This is also a good time to again state my position on ritual child circumcision. The problem with ritual child circumcision is not its religious aspect. The age – and by extension, ability to consent – of the circumcised is the sole issue. The child can’t consent. He might not consent when he can decide for himself. The surgery under consideration is not medically indicated, making this solely an issue of self-ownership. Each person has an exclusive liberty interest in his (or her) body. No one has an option for proxy consent that can ever legitimately overcome this natural right. Claiming a First Amendment protection is no help because the child retains his right to – and from – religion, independent of his parents’ opinion. Government also has a legitimate interest in preventing the imposition of objectively identifiable physical harm on another who can’t consent.

I’ve written in the past that the age of majority should be the legal standard for non-medically-indicated surgery. However, I am not opposed to a competent minor deciding for himself that he wants to be circumcised, for whatever reason he prefers. A 12- or 13-year-old may have developed sufficient maturity to decide this for himself. Perhaps the child in this case fits that, and if so, again, you will hear no complaint from me about his decision or his father’s willingness to grant that request.

Disclosure: I would not consent to the procedure if my (hypothetical,) healthy 13-year-old son asked to be circumcised, if that matters in considering my analysis. Saying “no” to a child’s wish for non-medically-indicated surgery is a legitimate parenting choice. Saying “yes” over a child’s objection is not. The former is a temporary denial of a liberty interest based on the parents’ subjective judgment. The latter is a permanent denial of a liberty interest based on the parents’ subjective judgment. The subjectivity of parental judgment is the crux of this case, as well as the general topic of child circumcision.

The activist judges in Washington are not active.

Here’s an update to the ongoing circumcision case in Orgeon, confirming my expectation from May:

The U.S. Supreme Court has rejected an Oregon dispute between a father who wants to circumcise his 13-year-old son against the wishes of the boy’s mother.

The case now goes back to an Oregon trial judge to determine whether the boy wants to undergo the procedure.

Of course. I’m not an attorney like the father, but even I could figure out that the Supreme Court would refrain from addressing the issue because the lesser options to resolve the case haven’t been exhausted. This is the correct course of non-action.

From a different angle, it will be wonderful when sentence two in the news report is not relegated to an afterthought. It’s the question that matters.

I’ve been thinking.

Hi, I run an active blog here. You may not know it because the top of the main page changes so rarely these days. There are now only 5 posts, including this one, on the 21-day-history main page. But I’m still here, still pondering the world and figuring out what to say about it. Normally that’s easy: read news, sit in front of computer, type, publish. Easy.

Yeah, I wish. Really, it takes motivation and creativity. I’ve had little of the former lately and the latter takes effort. I’m to blame.

More interesting – hopefully – is the reason behind the lull. I didn’t know what it was. I just knew that diverted attention left this page stale. The Phillies are still in the playoffs and winning. That takes some. I’ve also rediscovered my Xbox 360, only to get the Red Ring of Death. And so on.

That was my explanation until Friday night. Driving home, I listened to music rather than talk radio or podcasts. Time to not think actively freed me to figure out my the explanation. Apathy. I’ve been at this long enough to realize how consistent the themes are. Too few care much about liberty, choosing instead to structure the world according to their own lives.

Ranting here about the bailout bill, for example, would accomplish so little. The narrative is set. Morons like Harold Meyerson rule the day. It won’t last forever, but while it does, the anti-intellectuals won’t be stopped. I did not favor the bailout, nor do I favor the corporate welfare so many misinterpret as free market capitalism. The story will remain free of facts as long as there is an outcome-determined agenda. The socialist is no different than the corporatist.

I won’t change the world. So what? I don’t write to change the world. I write because I like it. It helps me process the world. It helps me learn. It helps me teach. And I’d rather focus on individuals. If I convince one person to refrain from circumcising a child, it’s worth it. If I provide an insight that helps someone convince someone else, it’s worth it. I won’t change the world. So what.

In other words, I’m back. The pace probably won’t pick up immediately. The Phillies are still in the playoffs, remember. But I’ve decided to stop being angry that people continue to harm others, be it with the state or the scalpel. I’ll write instead. And I’ll get angry again. I’ll just direct it rather than allow it to fester.

Pathetic? Meh.

Age Discrimination: Patient and Doctor Edition

Here’s a story that taps my two main interests:

A MEMBER of the Bagisu Cultural Board has proposed that the retirement age for the circumcision surgeons (Bakhebi) be set at 60 years if their sight is still good.

He said this would minimise the accidents that occur during the operation. John Musila made the remarks at a consultative workshop on the promotion of safe male circumcision in the era of HIV/AIDS, held at Communications Centre hall in Mbale town on Saturday.

I’ll take the paragraphs in reverse order. As for reducing accidents during circumcision, clearly not performing circumcisions would be most effective. Again, I do not care what an adult chooses for himself (or herself). But that’s not what we’re ultimately discussing with this story. When introducing the HIV topic, we inevitably move from voluntary, adult circumcision to involuntary, child circumcision. Making the latter safer is better, but it is barely an ethical improvement.

Now I’ll assume only that we’re talking about voluntary, adult circumcision. In considering the libertarian implication of the age restriction, I’ll also assume the legitimacy of the state licensing the medical profession¹. Obviously it’s irrational to have a blind doctor. But what does age have to do with it? A 30-year-old doctor can go blind and a 75-year-old doctor can retain all of her capabilities. The test is competence, not arbitrary lines the may or may not lead us to a good result most of the time.

This is similar to suggesting that we must prohibit medically unnecessary circumcision, unless it’s imposed on children to meet their parents’ religion. There is no principle involved. In the scenario in the story, if the doctor is competent, no needless limits should be placed on him to prevent him from engaging in his profession. He must be free to trade his services to a willing customer.

¹ My default position on this low-priority issue is an endorsement of something close to our status quo.

Government can and will break its own rules.

When I say that the introduction of single-payer healthcare would not lead to the en – or even a significant reduction in – the circumcision of infant males in the United States, I do not hope I’m right. But I still see no reason to think I’m wrong. My analysis includes the evidence that countries with nationalized healthcare don’t pay for ritual/cultural circumcision. I also understand that claiming any particular market is somehow different is dangerous. But it’s quite clear that Americans have an irrational affinity for cutting the genitals of male children. That is a political rather than economic factor in this debate. Our politicians have never shown an ability to say “no” when confronted with a choice of excessive spending or the potential loss of votes. Wrap in religion and it’s a perfect combination for everyone to ignore facts (and the child).

There is one fact in the above narrative that is not accurate. If you’ve guessed that countries with nationalized healhtcare pay for ritual circumcision, congratulations, you understand politics at the expense of economics. From England:

… medical opinion has swung against it, and the procedure is now mainly carried out here for religious reasons.

As such, according to NHS guidelines, it should only be carried out, and paid for, privately.

But an investigation by More4 News has found an increasing number of health trusts are bowing to pressure, and offering circumcisions free on the NHS.

I’d normally embed the video here. I do not like the still image presented before the video plays. You can find it at the link above, or directly here.

Take note that no one in the report mentions what the boys might want. It’s a religious requirement for the parents to impose on their children. That’s enough for everyone to ignore the obvious questions beyond the cost, even though unnecessary circumcision is unjust, both morally and legally. But even in a culture like England that generally does not circumcise, mix the parents’ religion with an inability to pay and the state pays. America will be different how?

The bit about “unscrupulous circumcision practitioners” is particularly fascinating. The doctor interviewed in the beginning of the report operates in a glass house. No, he’s not a mechanic circumcising an infant with a soldering iron. Yet, he is a professional sworn to an oath placing the patient’s health as his first priority. As long as his child patients are healthy when he mutilates them, he is nothing more than an unscrupulous circumcision practitioner with training. The physical results may be less troublesome, but those children will still carry the mark of his criminal lack of ethics for the rest of their lives.

Post Script: I still detest the idea of single-payer healthcare because of the inevitable deterioration in health and care before we get to any discussion of rights.

When is a poor tactic a crime?

I’m curious about the facts behind this arrest, because I can assume several different scenarios:

On 8/26/08 at 6:50 p.m., Victoria Marmontello, 37, of 4224 Aurora Path, Liverpool, NY, was arrested for Endangering the Welfare of a Child, a class A misdemeanor. Released on an appearance ticket, Ms. Marmontello is scheduled to answer the charge before Town of Parish Court on 9/09/08. She is accused of talking about sex and circumcision to minors on 8/07/08 and demonstrating what a circumcision looked like by showing the circumcised penis of another minor to the children while at a campsite located in the Town of Parish.

Hmmmm, what to make of this? There are necessary details missing from this report to get an accurate understanding, so I’ll fill those with assumptions. I’ll try to make those clear while speculating with my experience-influenced guess.

Probably the problem with talking about sex and circumcision to minors is more problematic to prosecutors because of the sex, not the circumcision. When I speak to minors, I keep the emphasis on circumcision because the kids don’t need discussion of sex to grok the angle I take. Sure there are sexual consequences, objective and subjective. Those aren’t necessary. Children have rights, and their healthy bodies don’t need surgery. Minors of a reasonable age – teen-ish? – will make the connection based on their own knowledge, so I leave it out until they ask questions. And, while I find it hard to pass judgment on discussing sex with minors without the specifics of this case, I err to more knowledge is better than less knowledge. If the allegation is factually correct, I doubt Ms. Marmontello used tawdry terms intending to titillate.

More likely the problem on this point was teaching children about circumcision. I’ve witnessed parents and chaperons pull children away after realizing that the protest they’ve stumbled upon is not “innocent”. I’ve heard the comments, usually some variation on “it’s your parents’ right to decide and they do it when you’re a baby”. The objection is always about the adults trying to continue their own willful ignorance and forcing the same on their children. Educate children properly and they tend to question. Parents who circumcise don’t like that. If our protests weren’t at the steps of the Capitol, with police support, I suspect some parents would challenge our rights with a bit more vigor.

None of that is to suggest it’s impossible to cross a line when discussing circumcision with minors. It is. But there needs to be more than being factual and anatomically correct.

The thornier question is the latter charge. Again, there are relevant facts left out here. “Showing the circumcised penis of another minor” is not enough to know what happened. I suspect she showed a picture rather than had a boy drop his pants. That’s what I’ll assume. Such pictures are certainly widely available on the Internet, many of them in the context of the numerous possible complications from circumcision. I don’t use them for the same reason I think anti-abortion advocates are stupid to throw around pictures of aborted fetuses. It’s counter-productive. And with children other than your own, it’s especially stupid. Probably more stupid than showing them pictures of a circumcised adult penis because of the obvious child porn implications.

In agitating against forced circumcision, it’s painfully clear that our society is insane about anything related to sex. Medicalized unnecessary genital cutting – male and female – began in America as a solution for masturbation. As much as it’s undeniable that I am not the one with flawed thinking on this topic, dancing around society’s insanity is just smart strategy. We can and must address it, but trampling on it is dumb. It’s possible to teach about circumcision with nearly the same efficacy with a long sleeve shirt.

To be clear, I’m not endorsing Ms. Marmontello’s alleged actions. I’ve assumed the most innocent explanation for the latter charge. There could be more. If there isn’t, I don’t think that scenario should be a crime. Thoughts?

Post Script: I made it all the way to here without making a remark about circumcision endangering the welfare of a child. So there it is. Cutting your male child’s healthy genitals: not a crime. Someone explaining to your children about cutting your male child’s healthy genitals: a crime. Yeah, that makes sense.

State property or parental property is still property.

In the sense that the term is used to imply a moral obligation and chosen desire to provide and care for children, I have no objections to discussing parental rights. To some extent that’s what I read as the goal in this editorial by Thomas Bowden of the Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights. I just wish the correct use was the basis of the discussion rather than the caveat. Mr. Bowden introduces the topic in response to the recent ruling in California affirming the legality of homeschooling.

But where’s the real victory for parents’ rights? Rights identify actions you can take without permission. A true victory would have been a judicial declaration that parents have an absolute right to control their children’s upbringing–and that they therefore don’t need government permission to educate their children as they see fit.

There’s much more verbiage in the essay taking that same lazy approach. But absolute should not be accepted as a stand-in for nuance. Is this particularly libertarian?

To give parents a permanent victory, California would need to make its law consistent with America’s founding principles. Parents are sovereign individuals whose right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness includes the right to control their child’s upbringing. Other citizens, however numerous or politically powerful, have no moral right to substitute their views on child-raising for those of the father and mother who created that child.

We know that rights are ignored far too often, but that doesn’t provide us justification to fling the word about as if expanding its definition and application are all that matter. That justification doesn’t exist, nor is that approach to rights correct. Where the individual is concerned, yes, but children are also individuals. Sharing DNA is not a contract capable of converting an obligation into a right. Creating the child is the parents’ right as individuals. Raising that child is better approached as an obligation with important qualifications. (I use obligation as an objective term not meant to imply a burden.)

Mr. Bowden gets closer later in his essay:

Of course, there are certain situations in which government must step in to protect the rights of a child, as in cases of physical abuse or neglect. …

Education, like nutrition, should be recognized as the exclusive domain of a child’s parents, within legal limits objectively defining child abuse and neglect. …

The qualification is key to advancing liberty first, for each individual. How best to do that, and on which principles, is next. Parents are the correct answer. But setting limits using objective standards should never be lost in the issue. Parents must be free to homeschool their children because they are best positioned to respond to the child’s positive right to an education. That is not a concession that the child may be held in a perpetual state of ignorance that will inhibit or prevent her from becoming a functioning, independent adult. Bowden succeeds where he makes that point. I wish he’d gotten there earlier so he’d have more time to defend this proper view of liberty instead of retreating on exaggerated claims.

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For discussion: How likely is it that children will respect liberty when they become adults if they’re only granted their basic, fundamental liberties at the discretion of their parents? Where liberty is denied, is it really better if parents deny it rather than the state?

Let’s ramble together.

It’s been too many days. Blah, work, blah. More on this sometime this weekend. Moving on.

Many, many circumcision stories have popped through lately. I’m aiming for a quick hit to clear them out. First up:

“In our study we found gay men who were circumcised at infancy didn’t report having some kind of negative or positive impact on sexual dysfunction.

“However, nearly all men who were circumcised after infancy reported some sexual dysfunction, erectile problems or premature ejaculation, and one in five reported some complication as a result of the circumcision. …”

We all see the obvious flaw, I think. Didn’t report. Is it too difficult to extrapolate that self-reporting is subjective, and therefore inferior, to objective considerations. How about I theorize that all circumcision results in some form and degree of sexual dysfunction. Those circumcised at infancy just don’t realize it. I can’t (and won’t) say that’s true, but it’s no worse than the above.

Next, there was an international conference on HIV/AIDS in Mexico City recently. Of course all discussion of circumcision seemed to focus entirely on the allegedly miraculous power of circumcision. I encountered very little consideration of ethics. I found an example of this indifference in the New York Times, which is almost always reliably bad in this respect.

There was no question about the ethical need for an early stop of the trials. …

But there was a question about the ethical need to constrain the implementation of voluntary, adult circumcision to adults volunteering to undergo circumcision. Public health officials ignored that ethical need within six days. They’ve continued to ignore it since.

For example, in an article titled “Not such an unkind cut, after all”:

Modern techniques make the risks associated with circumcisions insignificant.

Insignificant according to whom? Not necessarily the person facing those risks, yet that gets ignored in favor of propaganda.

Brisbane doctor Terry Russell, who has performed about 19,000 circumcisions, says he has never had a case in which a blood transfusion was required, or a systemic infection ensued. “We see minor local infection in about 2 per cent of the boys that we do, but most are treated without putting them on antibiotics.”

Russell uses the PlastiBell for his procedures, which is a small ring that fits inside the foreskin, over the head of the penis. The foreskin is compressed between the ring on the inside, and a string which is tied to the outside of the foreskin. The clamping cuts off circulation in the area, reducing the risk of bleeding and infection. The PlastiBell accurately defines how much foreskin should be removed, “so you can’t take off too much or too little”, says Russell.

Too much or too little according to whom? Not necessarily the person losing the (functioning, healthy) foreskin, yet that gets ignored in favor of propaganda. And where there’s propaganda, we can almost always find one of our cadre of propagandists. This time, it’s Brian Morris:

An unequivocal advocate of circumcision, Morris notes that men who have the procedure enjoy better hygiene.”Just general, day-to-day, run-of-the-mill hygiene is so much better in circumcised males. This is something that washing with soap just can’t fix, because the bacteria return quite quickly in uncircumcised males,” he says.

And female genitals? Other parts?

… Morris claims that the medical benefits of circumcisions are such that the procedure should always be considered a direct medical need.

Morris needs a dictionary that will properly define need, preferably in a medical context.

Morris says one in three uncircumcised males will suffer an illness that will require medical assistance for a disease directly related to not getting circumcised. From this perspective, Morris argues, it is unethical not to routinely circumcise given the relatively simple and painless nature of the process and the harm that can be avoided.

Do women who get breast cancer suffer a disease directly related to not getting a mastectomy before cancer strikes? Morris is playing very loose with logic, yet he gets featured as if he’s the reasonable voice. The best¹ the reporter can apparently do to counter Morris is this:

That both pre-pubescent boys and adults can undergo circumcisions might support Mason’s contention that the matter should be left until the child can decide for themselves.

It’s not “now or never” for circumcision and all its allegedly wonderful benefits. That’s a large caveat in favor of considering ethics and human rights, no? And maybe it suggests a more vigorous examination of the bit where Morris equates potential benefits to direct medical need than the reporter attempted?

Finally, via Religion Clause, an article from World Net Daily about a lawsuit in Italy over infant baptism. This particular aspect stood out.

[Alliance Defense Fund senior counsel Joseph] Infranco said, “All parents have the right to raise their children in their religious tradition, which obviously includes participation in the historic rituals associated with that religion.”

We could discuss baptism, and I’d probably agree with this statement. But it’s far too broad. If we can judge psychological harm, then no, I won’t concede the point without a debate. If we can judge physical harm, then I will never concede the point. Historic or not, ritual or not, there is no defense for permitting parents to impose physical harm. Children have individual rights – particularly to their bodily integrity – that can’t be ignored in favor of imagined, non-existent rights to treat individuals as collective property.

I didn’t really stick with the quick hits, did I?

¹ For those who wish to mix issues and push for nationalized healthcare as a strategy to reduce infant circumcision, the reporter dropped this into its own paragraph as a defense for the clear intention of the article. I think America would see this emphasis on long-term costs more than an emphasis on short-term costs. Or rights.

Reducing the burden of diseases later in life would also save money in the already over-stretched health budget.

When the choice is between hubris and rights, central planners will always choose hubris.

Monkey Smile Jamboree

In three minutes, this video neatly summarizes much that is wrong with the American mindset surrounding infant male circumcision.

After a bit about “what is circumcision”, we have this exchange:

Teen: “Does it hurt the baby?”
Adult: “It doesn’t feel good, but they don’t remember it.”
Teen: “Yeah, but it doesn’t matter the memory of pain, it matters the pain or not.”

The teen has a natural, reflexive push for simple logic. She gets it entirely correct. As I’ve argued before, following the “he won’t remember it” angle could justify anything short of murder. Something else (ethics, medical need) must get in the way, rendering “he won’t remember it” irrelevant. He will experience it. That matters.

Continuing on through the video, the adult pushes to replace logic with emotional conditioning. One of the teen girls asks why all (circumcised) men have “an awkward scar around their penis”. After laughter and a bit of disbelief, the adult responds:

“He’s talking about probably the separation from the shaft and the head, okay?”

This is ignorant. A scar results from every circumcision. It may be at the separation of the shaft and the glans, although it’s usually further down the shaft than that. (Not much, unfortunately, since there are nerve endings in the now-excised foreskin.) But there is a scar. No circumcised male is unique in being free of this inevitability. Any person who’s seen a circumcised penis, or even the result of another surgery, knows this if he or she is willing to acknowledge reality despite its interference with preferred fantasy.

Next comes the low point of the discussion from the adult:

“You want your husband or boyfriend or whoever… your husband, yeah, there we go, to be circumcised.”

If I told my (fictional) son that he wants his wife or girlfriend or whoever to be large-breasted, implying that he shouldn’t be with a smaller-breasted woman because their natural bodies are defective, you would consider me a piggish ass. Rightly so. Forcing one person to conform to the opinion of another is wrong. Including when it involves surgery. Especially when it involves children.

We all remember our economics, right? All tastes and preferences are subjective. Even if I ignore the preferences of the male subjected to circumcision so that he will presumably please his future partner’s aesthetic preference, as this woman does, what about the subjective tastes and preferences of these females? They’re entitled to their own opinion, as long as it’s the adult’s opinion that foreskins are gross? Conformity for all? That is wrong.

Apart from witnessing how the development of a young mind is perverted by an adult’s careless lack of curiosity, this video is instructive of how males are not the only people injured via circumcision. We expect conformity among females. They just get less unlucky in this debate. We achieve their conformity through manipulation rather than mutilation.

There is no free in prevention.

This article about serious side effects possibly related to Gardasil is mostly speculation. Point conceded, so I won’t use it as fact. Instead, it’s worth considering the ethical questions. The (doctor) father of one teen believes Gardasil caused the medical problems his daughter now faces. (Correlation is not causation, of course.) He said:

One thing that’s different about Amanda’s case than some of the others is that both of her parents medical doctors who didn’t think twice about having their daughter get the shot – but are now second-guessing themselves. They call their daughter’s illness after Gardasil “a very sobering experience.” Amanda’s dad says, “as the father of three girls, I’ve had to ask myself why I let my eldest one get an unproven vaccine against a few strains of a nonlethal virus that can be dealt with in many more effective ways. It’s not like they are at high risk. It was the regrettable acceptance of the vaccine party line that [mis]led me.”

Don’t get distracted by “unproven vaccine” or “nonlethal virus”. They’re important in both the medical and ethical evaluation, but “can be dealt with in many more effective ways” should be the focus.

Merck, which makes the vaccine, the CDC and the FDA all say it is safe, effective, and important. Speaking of more than 8,000 adverse event reports and more than a dozen deaths, the CDC told CBS News, “we have found no connection between these deaths” and Gardasil. “We still recommend the vaccine and feel it is an important vaccine for the health of women. There are about 20 million people currently infected with HPV. Women have an 80 percent chance of developing HPV by the time they are 50. HPV is most common in people in their late teens and early 20s. Because the vaccine is a preventative and not a cure, it is important that the vaccine be given prior to beginning sexual activity. About 11,000 women will be diagnosed with cervical cancer and 3,600 will die. This vaccine prevents four viruses that account for about 70 percent of cervical cancers.” [emphasis added]

The CDC ignores the necessary caveats. It is important to give the vaccine prior to beginning sexual activity if the female will engage in risky sexual behavior and/or weighs the risk of infection greater than the risk of possible adverse reactions to Gardasil, among many factors in the decision. Parents can’t know the answers. They can assume, but assuming involves risk greater than they should impose. The threat of HPV is serious but infection is neither automatic nor inevitably deadly. Waiting involves additional risk. But risk involves rights. That can’t be forgotten.