Category: Logic

No conspiracy. I think the media is lazy.

Here are three stories to demonstrate that media reporting on male circumcision borders on propaganda. First, from Aidsmap:

A meta-analysis of studies of circumcision in gay men and men who have sex with men (MSM) has not found sufficient evidence to show that being circumcised reduced their risk of acquiring HIV. Although it finds a small reduction in the risk of HIV infection in circumcised men, this is not statistically significant – in other words it could just be a chance finding. Furthermore, the study, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, found that although circumcised men who were exclusively insertive for anal sex had a lower risk of infection with HIV, the difference with uncircumcised men was still not statistically significant and could have been chance.

Fair enough, and there are further possibly-relevant nuances in the article. Those aren’t my focus here (nor do they overcome my principled objection to forced circumcision). Rather, consider how the editor titled this news:

Jury still out on whether circumcision protects gay men against HIV

What would it take for the jury to finally be in? We see how quickly it’s in on unstudied results assumed from a study that appears to give the results the researcher wants. (The answer? Six days.) When the jury gives an answer you don’t like? Deliberate further. I don’t wonder why.

Note: We can debate the semantics of scientific investigation of the hypothesis and findings, but pro-circumcision researchers use only a very loose application of either.

Second, from Time (emphasis added):

Circumcision is believed to lower H.I.V. transmission in several ways. The inner surface of the foreskin is rich with cells that are more vulnerable to H.I.V. than cells on other parts of the penis; because they are also closer to the epithelial surface and at higher risk for tears during intercourse, they increase susceptibility to infection. Removal of the foreskin further lowers men’s odds of developing genital ulcers (from diseases such as syphilis), which in turn lowers their vulnerability to H.I.V. during intercourse. In theory, circumcision should be protective for all men who participate in insertive sex, including heterosexual men and men who have sex with men.

Believed to lower is accurate, because all studies involving (voluntary, adult!) male circumcision and HIV risk reduction look at results. None of them have shown what generates the results researchers claim. There are theories, but nothing concrete. It could be nothing more than flawed methodology, right? Yet, Time reported male circumcision’s claimed role in reducing HIV risk as its 2007 medical breakthrough of the year. Has the magazine changed its opinion to one of logically-defensible caution?

Third, from the Jerusalem Post:

Almost a third of male immigrants from the former Soviet Union are uncircumcised, according to a survey by the Geocartography Institute commissioned by the Jerusalem AIDS Project.
…

The survey also found that 2.2% of women who immigrated from the FSU “didn’t know” whether their partner was circumcised, and 72.8% of female partners of uncircumcised new immigrants would prefer that they don’t undergo ritual circumcision.

That 72.8% figure is interesting. It’s subjective, a point I actively make, even when it benefits me. But this is the type of irrelevant statistic pro-circumcision propagandists like Dr. Brian Morris love to spew when their carefully-chosen studies suggest that women prefer circumcised partners. We mark anyone who would argue in favor of compulsory breast implants for teen girls because their male partners prefer large breasts as intellectually ridiculous. The same applies here. What women prefer only matters if the male choosing circumcision for himself wants it to influence his decision. For the anti-intellectuals who don’t get this, the propaganda can work against them. They’ll never notice, of course.

Continuing, with emphasis added:

Research carried out abroad shows incontrovertibly that circumcision reduces by 60% the risk of a man being infected with HIV by a female carrier. In many African countries with high HIV rates, men are lining up for circumcision, and Israel’s experience in circumcising thousands of adult males has aroused interest in the UN and among African governments.

How does incontrovertibly reconcile with believed to lower? In the same way that “six in 10 circumcised men are immune to HIV infection”?

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.

———-

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.

Restrict Employer Choices, Have Fewer Employers

BusinessWeek has a debate today on the Employee Free Choice Act, which is up for consideration before Congress. I’m against based on the very little information I know. Essentially, the pro and con between Rep. George Miller (D-CA) and Home Depot co-founder Bernard Marcus provides the bulk of my knowledge. If Rep. Miller’s rhetoric sufficiently corresponds to what the Act would do, I’m against it because Rep. Miller demonstrates that he only recognizes rights that are convenient for his partisanship.

(Note: I’m not advocating the opposite of his view. Rather, I believe the relationship between employers and employees must be voluntary and mutual. I am not qualified to set all rules for all exchanges. No one is.)

To Rep. Miller’s essay:

Unfortunately, in recent years, the middle-class life has become increasingly difficult to maintain. Workers’ wages have stagnated as the cost of everything from milk to college tuition has skyrocketed. The staples of a middle-class life—a fair wage, access to health care, a sound retirement—are getting squeezed. The percentage of national income going to workers’ wages is at its lowest level since 1929, while the percentage of our nation’s wealth going to corporate profits is at its highest since the 1940s.

I’m a skeptic; I want data where Rep. Miller provides anecdote. He’s a politician, so I never expect to see it. But, for fun, I’ll assume he’s telling the truth. If “national” income is now being directed to corporate profits rather than to workers, then workers should become investors. They will claim “their” share of the “national” income.

Continuing:

The Employee Free Choice Act would fix this broken system so workers can freely exercise their right to organize. It would do three things. First, it would allow workers to use a majority sign-up process to form their union, without their employer vetoing that choice. Second, it would increase penalties on employers who violate workers’ rights. Third, it would ensure that, once workers form a union, collective bargaining leads to a first contract—not delay and more union busting.

Focusing on point two: what penalties do we have on employees who violate employers’ rights? (I refuse to concede Rep. Miller’s ridiculous use of employer/worker rather than the objective employer/employee.) To demonstrate what I mean by this, Rep. Miller later writes this:

If these advantages aren’t enough, an employer can fire a pro-union worker to make its point, or threaten to close the business down if workers vote the wrong way, without facing more than a slap on the wrist. At the end of this process, the NLRB holds an election on the employer’s premises.

Employees have rights, but employers do not. At least, they do not have the right to shut down their business if one of the inputs (labor) is not to their liking. That’s absurd. Rights belong to the individual, not groups. But if they applied to groups, all groups would have rights, not just the groups who agree with us. Starting a business is not an agreement to perpetuate the business beyond the owner’s desire to continue it. The Employee Free Choice Act seems to suggest that the ultimate decision in running a business – whether or not to continue – becomes the sole discretion of employees. This is a blatant violation of one individual’s rights to satisfy another’s (claimed) rights.

This is not any democracy that most Americans would recognize as such. Yet this is the system that opponents of the Employee Free Choice Act want to preserve. Another process exists. If an employer allows it, as some major companies already do, workers can avoid the conflict-ridden NLRB process and form a union by signing cards, the same way you might form a civic association. When a majority has signed up, the employer recognizes the union.

Unfortunately, current law allows employers to veto the use of this freer majority sign-up process—and they do. The Employee Free Choice Act would simply take this veto power away from the employer and restore the democratic principle of free choice to the workplace.

The right for an employer to determine that she will employ individuals on the condition that they deal with them individually rather than collectively – the employer’s freedom of (voluntary) association – is subject to the whim of the majority. Remember that potential and current employees for any organization can always refuse to continue providing their services. If the employer is unable to find enough people willing to agree to her terms, she will either offer better terms or go out of business. This is the freedom of association perpetuated by natural incentives for cooperation that need no encouragement from government. Rep. Miller’s advocacy for the Employee Free Choice Act shows his misunderstanding of the American concept of individual rights.

Different Maps, Same Destination

Ed Brayton challenged readers to fisk If There Is No God, a column by Dennis Prager. It’s a worthy, if easy, goal. I won’t attempt a response to all 14 points, though. Dispensing with a few should be sufficient to demonstrate that a smidge more doubt should be permitted in Prager’s thesis, which is this:

For all the problems associated with belief in God, the death of God leads to far more of them.

We may all note that he has not listed the problems associated with belief in God. How many problems are associated? I’m supposed to accept on faith that it is 0 <= n < 14, where n is the number of problems associated with belief in God. I know we're talking about faith, but it is reasonable to explain what those problems are. At least identify the value of n.

We are constantly reminded about the destructive consequences of religion – intolerance, hatred, division, inquisitions, persecutions of “heretics,” holy wars. Though far from the whole story, they are, nevertheless, true. There have been many awful consequences of religion.

I guess that means we’re discussing 6 < n < 14. Is it worth noting that religion has a commanding jump in the creation of problems?

A momentary break: I am an agnostic rather than an atheist. My only goal is to show that a principled approach may arrive at the same destination. A better destination, since each is free to choose for himself, but that’s a quibble not necessary to advance my rebuttal.

So.

What one almost never hears described are the deleterious consequences of secularism – the terrible developments that have accompanied the breakdown of traditional religion and belief in God. For every thousand students who learn about the Spanish Inquisition and the Salem Witch Trials, maybe two learn to associate Gulag, Auschwitz, the Cultural Revolution and the Cambodian genocide with secular regimes and ideologies.

One of those four is not quite like the others. That Prager includes this specific grouping reveals his attempt to be either blatant propaganda or wild ignorance. But I’ll just ignore it.

Instead, is the goal of American secularism a desire to convert every believer into an atheist? Or is it an approach to group rules that allows the individual to decide for himself, as long as he does not infringe on the legitimate rights of others? Giving offense is hardly the worst outcome possible, not that there is any right not to be offended. Nothing in the American experiment points to secularism being defined any broader than this. Prager’s 14 points will be ridiculous even in the most generous consideration.

1. Without God, there is no good and evil; there are only subjective opinions that we then label “good” and “evil.” This does not mean that an atheist cannot be a good person. Nor does it mean that all those who believe in God are good; there are good atheists and there are bad believers in God. It simply means that unless there is a moral authority that transcends humans from which emanates an objective right and wrong, “right” and “wrong” no more objectively exist than do “beautiful” and “ugly.”

Secularism seeks to establish principled rules for human interaction. Deriving the notion of a right to be free from harm does not require God, only that all humans are equal. That is objective. The goal is not to arrive at chaos, only at a structure that is as impervious to arbitrary whim as possible.

4. Human beings need instruction manuals. This is as true for acting morally and wisely as it is for properly flying an airplane. One’s heart is often no better a guide to what is right and wrong than it is to the right and wrong way to fly an airplane. The post-religious secular world claims to need no manual; the heart and reason are sufficient guides to leading a good life and to making a good world.

If we do not receive an “instruction manual” from our parents, we are provided with the undeniable reality of consequences. Where our upbringing lacks, others have a way of teaching. Unless Prager is suggesting that humans are incapable of learning, he’s just swirling extra drivel into a simple concept to darken the clarity.

5. If there is no God, the kindest and most innocent victims of torture and murder have no better a fate after death than do the most cruel torturers and mass murderers. Only if there is a good God do Mother Teresa and Adolf Hitler have different fates.

The concept of God centers around the idea that He is unconditional love. Until man sins. Then He is a vengeful God. There are eternal consequences. But wait. These are mutually exclusive ideas, so rather than obsess over the correct doctrine, the secularist ignores the question as it pertains to anything other than this life. Each person may decide the importance of this to the rules he chooses for himself, but he may not use this as the guide for rules over others.

There are consequences for the behaviors of both Mother Teresa and Adolf Hitler. We’re not perfect, but we seek to structure those as close to fair as possible using congruent principles. Institutionally we do not reward a Mother Teresa. She creates subjective good. Others will respond as they see fit. Institutionally we seek to prevent an Adolf Hitler. He engaged force against others and caused objective harm. That is the standard.

Life isn’t fair. Explain it how you want, but rationalizing it may not be possible. We do the best we can. Reconcile that how you want, but don’t expect me to respond the same way.

7. Without God, people in the West often become less, not more, rational. It was largely the secular, not the religious, who believed in the utterly irrational doctrine of Marxism. It was largely the secular, not the religious, who believed that men’s and women’s natures are basically the same, that perceived differences between the sexes are all socially induced. Religious people in Judeo-Christian countries largely confine their irrational beliefs to religious beliefs (theology), while the secular, without religion to enable the non-rational to express itself, end up applying their irrational beliefs to society, where such irrationalities do immense harm.

Genital modification on healthy infant males. Is this immense harm? And what of the perceived religious differences between the sexes, enshrined in law? Don’t preach to me about rational versus irrational.

Not that I am pointing a particular religion here. Religious indifference to the rights of another human being because your God instructs you to harm your child is not rational. Consider:

… But in recent years, they have increasingly catered to Christian families who eschew a hospital procedure in favor of a $300 to $800 house call, a trend Sherman has dubbed “holistic circumcision.”

“They want their babies circumcised in the comfort of their homes surrounded by family and friends, and they want it performed by someone highly experienced, who brings spirituality and meaning to the practice,” he said. “And it’s over in 30 seconds, compared to what hospitals do, which can be from 20 to 45 minutes, with the baby strapped down.” [ed. note: see footnote below]

Who derives meaning from this, the parents or the boy who loses a healthy, functioning part of his genitals? So, again, don’t preach to me about rational versus irrational.

Or we can look
back at what Prager had to say about circumcision on his radio show, from January 19, 2007:

It is only in a very affluent, bored society that people walk around wondering “boy, what I have I lost by not having fore….?”. I… It, it… It’s beyond, it’s beyond narcissistic, it’s actually somewhat pathologic.

There is more, including references to San Francisco in exactly the way you’d think a bigot would use San Francisco as an example. Note, too, the ad hominem attacks from the allegedly rational side. So, again, don’t preach to me about rational versus irrational.

Moving on.

14. “Without God,” Dostoevsky famously wrote, “all is permitted.” There has been plenty of evil committed by believers in God, but the widespread cruelties and the sheer number of innocents murdered by secular regimes – specifically Nazi, Fascist and Communist regimes – dwarfs the evil done in the name of religion.

Religion: less evil than secularism! Still evil! But less so! Maybe pay the marketing department a little more? And hire from better universities.

Seriously, though, how much of that disparity in scope is timing? With 20th century technology, the Crusades would’ve been the same level of “tame”? I can think of many actions that are wrong, despite the existence of other related actions that are more severe. Despite relying on principles of equality and political philosophy and not directly on religious teaching, I still arrive at the truth that those actions are wrong.

I understand a set of rights, open to expansion through reason. Dennis Prager understands a different set. Including the idea of profane versus holy speech suggests that his is merely a subset of mine. That’s acceptable, but only when chosen through free will. Even if that free will exists only because of God, as Prager argues. Restricting my choices does not compute with my robot brain. One man’s God has no legitimate veto over my rights.

¹ More from the article:

As Christopher Watson held his screaming baby’s legs still on the tabletop pillow, Kushner snipped the foreskin. The process took less than a minute.

The infant’s wails soon surrendered to a wine-dipped cotton swab, then his mother’s breast, while Kushner relayed a list of instructions about how to care for the child over the next three days.

Forgive me for thinking that causing unnecessary pain and reducing his genitals are more important than how long those take.

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.

If there is a better private system, this is not it.

I’m a libertarian because maximizing individual liberty is the primary goal of collective human action. Whatever the means, achieving maximal individual liberty is the end.

The question is, of course, by what means? I’ve toyed with the idea – to be honest, not seriously – of no government. I understand and accept the idea that private processes would develop in the absence of a formalized government. The protection of rights present¹ in our current system of government would largely remain. However, given human nature, there is too great a threat to individual liberty inherent in no formal government. A monopoly on force is dangerous, but no such monopoly is not automatically better for the individual. A government with limited, stated powers designed to protect the rights and liberty of all its citizens is, I believe, the ideal.

That is the ideal. We don’t live in libertopia, though. Such a government must exist with its limited powers explicit and limited only to protecting rights. I use the term collective human action above to express this narrow, rigid concept of legitimate government. We act together specifically so that we may be free from each other generally.

Since a government’s objective is to maximize liberty, I’m interested in minimal restrictions on individuals. The valid test for restricting an individual’s free action is objective, unrequested harm. Where an action causes such harm, a government’s power to restrict the action is legitimate. Beyond that boundary, any government action is a violation of the powers granted to it by its organizers.

(There is a large, important gray area concerning subjective harm. Although it must be explored to develop a complete political philosophy, I leave that discussion alone for my purposes here. It’s pointless to consider the subjective before settling the objective. It is also unnecessary because I wish to consider only objective harm here.)

So, circumcision.

A recent string of Free Talk Live episodes discussed circumcision in the context of how far states should go in preventing child abuse. The show’s hosts generally take an anti-state position, relying instead on the expectation that private systems will fill the void if we dismantle the state. In many cases I’m sympathetic to this view. Particularly with economics and all the ways in which our government seeks to improve our world, the state makes obvious, large mistakes because it must plan rather than rely on ever-changing needs to direct the market. But in matters of protecting rights, I am not sympathetic to this view. The state is a means to protecting rights and achieving individual liberty. This function is necessary in any society, and the properly-constrained state is the least bad option. “Properly constrained” is the key, of course. I do not foresee a private market in force being any more properly constrained than the state yet still undertaking the necessary task of protecting citizens.

From the June 11, 2008 episode (approximately 1:26:45 in):

Mike (Caller): So I think we’ve all agreed that at three or four years old, a child cannot make a rational decision.
Ian: I would certainly agree with you. No doubt about it. And here’s what I would suggest. You should go and live on a piece of property that has deed restrictions or private law, whatever you’d like to call it. You can call it deed restrictions, you can call it private law. Then, you know, in that world of private law, you can construct and create whatever sort of rules you want to as far as the behavior of your neighbors is concerned. And if you want to ban things like mutilation, or hitting children, or whatever it is that you consider anathema to your belief system, it would not be allowed by punishment of whatever it is that you determine the punishment should be.
Mark (Host): And before one moves to that community, they have to agree upon those rules.
Ian: Right. Then you wouldn’t have anyone around you that was doing those awful things and you wouldn’t have to be concerned with it. And then those who wanted to mutilate their children, or whatever, could go and live together in their own little, you know, their own little society.

Being anti-state is the wrong way to approach this issue as a libertarian. Certain rights are inherent and universal to all humans. Do the children in the latter community not have the same rights they’d possess if born in the former community? Children would not choose these community rules as adults would, so the protection of rights become merely the will (or whim) of the strong. Suggesting this as a viable option towards maximizing individual liberty treats children as property. What is it worth to be free of force from the state if you are not free of force from your parents?

Maximizing individual liberty requires limiting an individual’s liberty to the extent that his unfettered actions would infringe on another individual’s liberty. Doing so in that limited manner protects individual rights. We can argue whether the state or some other method is the best way to maximize individual liberty by protecting the rights of all individuals, but there is no valid argument that this should not be the primary goal of any society.

On June 16, 2008, a caller continued the discussion on circumcision (approximately 17:40 in):

Dan (Caller): Hi, Ian. Umm, a couple weeks ago, or maybe it was last week, I’m a podcast listener, so I get times mixed up.
Ian (Host): Okay.
Dan: There was a gentleman who called in, actually, a couple Christians who called in talking about how they don’t want to force their morality on people but, you know, if people are, you know, abusing their kids and you’ve got to do something, you’ve got to have the government around to do something. And I just wanted to submit that in a totally free society where you have, you know, where people have the liberty to basically do what they want as long as they’re not hurting anyone else, you’re still going to have people hurting each other, but it’s no different than today. My point was going to be that, uh, why can’t the kids, if they have a case that they’ve been abused, uh, why can’t they just sue in retrospect?
Ian: They should be able to.

That continued after a commercial with a restatement (approximately 20:04 in):

Dan: Ok, um, I was talking about how there have been some Christian libertarians who have been calling in talking about how, you know, they they just can’t accept the idea that we have to allow everyone full liberty to raise their children how they want to, you know, because, you know, what if, well what if they’re, you know, doing something like, you know, they brought up female circumcision or something like that.
Ian: Yeah.
Dan: And what I was saying is why, you know, the burden of proof should be on the accuser. So why don’t we allow people to do, to, you know, to raise their kids as long as there’s no clear signs of abuse, and if the children are damaged by it, sue in retrospect. That rather than having the burden of proof constantly on the parents so they have to prove to this government that we have constantly that they’re not abusing their children.

Proposing a post facto process for recourse in the event of harm is a no-brainer. (What system of mediation, if not the state’s legal system?) We have a system for this today that covers all sorts of offenses that are also a crime. Obviously harmed individuals have a claim to compensation against those who harmed them. Offering that as a substitute for prohibition avoids the real issue of rights violations. We prohibit certain assaults despite having options for restitution after the assault because protecting the right of every individual to be free from harm is at the core of liberty.

Unfortunately the typical libertarian approach to hypothetical questions seems to revolve around the assaulted being able to pull out his concealed weapon and stop the assault, hence
no need for the state. I exaggerate wildly, even though my hyperbole is useful in hypotheticals because adults have some ability to defend themselves, whether through brains, muscles, or technology. There is merit to the argument of self-defense. But we’re not discussing adults. Many, if not most, minors lack sufficient resources in these defense mechanisms. Infants lack all resources. Yet, as citizens with equal, natural rights, all minors must be treated as more than inconvenient obstacles to extending hypotheticals into real world rules. The notion that children complicate libertarian political philosophy – or worse, that libertarianism does not apply to children – is a failure of application, not the underlying principles of liberty and rights. The reasonable concept of proxy consent matters because parents are the proper decision-makers where necessity demands it, but proxy consent does not matter most. No adult has a legitimate claim to violate those rights merely because he or she is the child’s parent.

Permitting parents to surgically alter the healthy genitals of their (male³) children grants them an illegitimate liberty interest in altering – and harming – the body of another at the expense of his legitimate liberty interest in self-ownership, a right that includes his foreskin. Endorsing that because it precludes state involvement, even with a post facto compensation system in place, turns antipathy for the state into a fetish, at the expense of individual liberty. Being oppressed in private is still oppression.

The debate continues (I’ve omitted an inconsequential bit):

Mark: Ok. Yeah, absolutely true. Umm, I think that, uh, people that have been, you know, harmed by their parents in some way should be able to sue and umm, I would think in the case of a female circumcision that likely they would, uh, you know, a jury would find for them. Umm, male circumcision, maybe not so much. You know, pervasive morality matters in a, in a society, and if you’re going to get a jury of your peers, you know, they’re probably not going to find that you were harmed significantly by a male circumcision. Maybe they will, I’m not sure.

It’s a strange kind of libertarianism that places the “pervasive morality” of the majority before the protection of individual rights and objective standards of harm.

Continuing, with omissions for space:

Ian: You mean Dan’s idea?
Mark: Yeah, Dan’s idea would be, would take care of it relatively quickly because, well, people don’t want to be sued.
Ian: Well, right, because, uh, if there was a judgment against the parents in that particular case then, uh, then the other parents that were considering doing that would have to think twice.
Mark: Absolutely. And of course social ostracization would, uh, keep these types of things from really cropping up within private, voluntary societies so you’d have private arbiters, you’d have parents who, and uh uh and new new parents who would already have signed on to the rules. And, uh, man, if they broke those rules, they would not be able to prosper, and they would be hit pretty hard financially.

There is some merit in this argument, but as it applies to doctors, not parents. That’s already starting in the U.S. It will have more impact as the courts become more sympathetic to the proper inclusion of medical ethics into unnecessary genital cutting.

With parents, we’re back to being stuck with the pervasive morality of the majority at the time of the circumcision, and parents already ignore what their son may or may not want in favor of what they think he wants, or worse, what they want. That misses the point. A male can later make the case that he was harmed, but this solution relies on two faulty assumptions. First, it assumes the male minor’s (obvious) rights aren’t worth protecting while he is a child, perhaps merely because his parents circumcised him rather than a stranger. Their liberty is more equal than his liberty. This can never be correct.

Second, it assumes that money will sufficiently compensate him for his lost foreskin. Not all men would accept that trade-off. Not all parents will be able to fund a judgment against them. And if they don’t expect to have the resources in the future, would the parents be concerned enough about a possible future judgment to not circumcise? Nor will all parents with the financial means to fund a jury’s punishment value the lost dollars more than whatever value they place on the act of circumcising their sons. Remember, all tastes and preferences are subjective. Just as the evaluation of the foreskin’s worth will vary by individual, the evaluation of the worth of a dollar (or a million or a billion) relative to pleasing God/a perceived reduction in HIV risk/avoiding the “ick” factor/etc. will vary by parent(s). There simply is no reliable way to predict what individual’s will do. Incentives matter, but not everyone responds the same way to the same incentives.

This hypothetical system also ignores the extreme cases where the harm to the boy is greater than the typical circumcision outcome. It seems reasonable to suggest that the rare boy who dies from circumcision will not be satisfied by the possibility of money he can’t collect.

We’re left with individual rights as the only defensible guide for what system should be in place. I can’t make this point enough. Every individual, regardless of age, has the same natural rights. An age-based inability to defend one’s own rights does not render those rights subject to the will of another, even a parent. What system will protect those inherent, equal rights? If you value liberty, that is the discussion. If you value only the dismantling of the state, understand what your position entails. Don’t wrap it in talk of liberty and pretend you’ve found an intersection that bypasses the state. You haven’t because compensating the violated after an identifiable, predictable violation rather than protecting before the violation has nothing to do with liberty.

I’ll end with a concise statement of the philosophical consideration at hand, from D.A. Ridgely at Positive Liberty (from a different context):

The quintessentially libertarian position, in any case, is that the burden must fall on the state not before it permits some exercise of individual freedom but before it prohibits it. It is, by contrast, the quintessentially conservative position (of the Burkean variety) that tampering with long established traditions and institutions is so inherently risky that we must apply the social equivalent of the precautionary principle before proceeding.

I’m arguing the quintessential libertarian position. I’m not willing to concede that parents have an absolute right to make medical decisions for their children. Such a right assumes the option to make objectively stupid medical decisions for another. I’m thinking of parents who let their children die while waiting for prayer to save them. Still, parents deserve at least first – and great – deference to their judgment. The burden falls on the state to prove that it may prohibit the circumcision of minors. Where direct medical need is absent, as it is absent in ritual/social circumcision, the objective infliction of harm on the child to achieve subjective benefits valued by the parents, however well-intentioned, is sufficient proof that state prohibition is not only legitimate, but a requirement to protect rights and maximize individual liberty for everyone. Imposing routine/ritual circumcision is not a medical decision, so the decision deserves no deference. Whatever system is in place must recognize that and protect the child. The private system proposed by Free Talk Live is unacceptable because it fails to embrace liberty for all.

¹ Admittedly, our representatives disregard this duty. This is a flaw in e
xecution, not design. But it’s presence in our government is a significant, complicating issue.

² By force, I mean objective harm. The state does not have the constitutional power to cut your genitals at the discretion of its representatives, at least not without due process. (Also, see footnote ¹.)

³ The distinction permitting only the circumcision of male children demonstrates our unprincipled, unequal understanding of the rights of children.

The ability to reason includes recognition of gender-bias.

Ignorance can speak truth, even when ignorance doesn’t intend something so broad (emphasis added):

… I feel that “female circumcision” gives this practice a veneer of respectability to hide behind. Uninformed people likely know that male circumcision is done mainly for hygienic or religious reasons and has nothing to do with sexual pleasure or causing other problems down the road, as mutilation may cause with menstruation and childbirth. Circumcision is pretty much the opposite of mutilation as far as having an effect on a person.

So “female circumcision” sounds kind of like a benign minor medical procedure, while “female genital mutilation” tells it like it is. I don’t think calling the practice circumcision will fire many people up against it – it almost sounds like a P.R. phrase for genital mutilation, designed to mask what really happens.
This practice has also made its way to the United States, through immigration.

I don’t think calling the practice circumcision will fire many people up against it – it almost sounds like a P.R. phrase for genital mutilation, designed to mask what really happens. Indeed. It’s almost as if Americans embrace that mentality with our treatment of male children. Almost, of course, because only They&#153 engage in immoral actions. We&#153 are always correct, never to be questioned again.

I will be using that quote frequently in the future.

There is no do-over in surgery.

I’m still catching up on some of the circumcision-related news items form the last few weeks. Sometimes, I step away from the topic for short periods to recharge my tolerance for the inevitable frustration that arises when considering the various ways the rights of the circumcised are ignored, and the manner in which every breathless proclamation seems to instill even more determination that every male will just love being surgically altered shortly after birth. Stepping away eliminates reduces the number of verbal tirades I feel compelled to unleash. I always come back, though.

This story, forwarded to me by a loyal reader who forwards me useful material that I too often fail to translate into entries, is worth mentioning. Now that I’m looking, I can find a few references to it, but most media seems to have ignored it. Probably because it directly challenges the cheerleading for infant circumcision in the recent past. Anyway, the gist:

A quarter of a century after the outbreak of Aids, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has accepted that the threat of a global heterosexual pandemic has disappeared.

In the first official admission that the universal prevention strategy promoted by the major Aids organisations may have been misdirected, Kevin de Cock, the head of the WHO’s department of HIV/Aids said there will be no generalised epidemic of Aids in the heterosexual population outside Africa.

This is the appropriate point to remind everyone – the unethical scientists at WHO specifically – that the recent research we’ve been bombarded with repeatedly for the last two years suggests that voluntary, adult male circumcision reduces the risk of HIV transmission from female-to-male through heterosexual intercourse. Those infants who’ve been circumcised in the mad rush to embrace fear unsupported by at least the anecdotal evidence any mildly observant individual in a Western society could pick up? Ooops. But, hey, women will dig it, so there’s that.

In case you think this might cause the media to apply any critical thinking to the way they’ve reported on circumcision, fret not, they’re fully prepared to let you down if you get optimistic. In the same article, this:

Critics of the global Aids strategy complain that vast sums are being spent educating people about the disease who are not at risk, when a far bigger impact could be achieved by targeting high-risk groups and focusing on interventions known to work, such as circumcision, which cuts the risk of infection by 60 per cent, and reducing the number of sexual partners.

Interventions known to work. Process that for a moment. It’s known to work¹ at reducing the risk of HIV transmission from female-to-male through heterosexual intercourse! Isn’t the point of this story to report on the possible exaggeration of an epidemic among heterosexuals? I can imagine the editorial review of this article. “Everyone, shake your pom poms with me. Give me a “C”! Give me an “I”! Give me an “R”! Give me a “C”!

I won’t put it in print, but I’m swearing right now.

¹ There is room to debate this, primarily on methodology. Another time, perhaps.

Does that come with a side of epinephrine?

I overheard a conversation yesterday in which this was offered:

  1. Humans need protein.
  2. Meat has protein.
  3. Humans need meat.

Who am I to argue with that irrefutable logic? Still, I’ll offer my own example:

  1. Humans need protein.
  2. Peanuts have protein.
  3. Humans need peanuts.

Even those individuals who are allergic to peanuts, they’re humans. They’d better start eating peanuts or they’re going to die!

If you like meat, defend it (or don’t) with facts. But be honest about it. If you like the taste and think that is more important than the negatives (death of the animal, adverse health effects), say so. I can respectfully disagree. With logic like the above, I just disagree.