tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-548248685729133691.post5217065593609301715..comments2024-01-17T13:16:10.378-08:00Comments on Joseph4GI: Who's the "Douchebag?"Josephhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14190648498809795551noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-548248685729133691.post-4390612246091137872013-02-28T07:05:25.822-08:002013-02-28T07:05:25.822-08:00We have to be realistic: before this custom ends, ...We have to be realistic: before this custom ends, many millions of babies are still going to be circumcised. We may wish we could save them all, but we won't be able to. And if we let ourselves become angry every time that another baby is circumcised, we won't have the strength to do the task at hand. <br /><br />We have to be there in many fronts. Providing education to parents. Confronting doctors. Promoting legislation. Promoting a ban on the commercial use of foreskins. There is a lot to do. But what we don't need to do is to become angry, to damage our own lives, and to alienate other people.<br /><br />In my opinion, being a parent is scary and beautiful. One thing you can't wait for is to have your baby on your hands and leave the hospital, and get home and feel whole as a family. Having a bunch of rabid lunatics calling us names from the sidewalk and through the windows is not going to convince us of anything, it's just going to convince us that those people are lunatics. <br /><br />So we intactivists have to understand that it's still going to happen, there's going to be more people that won't accept our message than the people who will accept it. And when they don't accept our message, we need to just move on, go away, and put our energy back into our tasks. For each baby that we couldn't save, there are still other millions that may need our help.dreamerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14708824168962037873noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-548248685729133691.post-32556613576799585992013-02-28T07:05:06.984-08:002013-02-28T07:05:06.984-08:00She makes one good point, you make another good po...She makes one good point, you make another good point.<br /><br />From her blog, I value this: "If you want your message to be heard, it does not need to be screamed. If you want to be taken seriously, you do not have to be overwhelming. If you want to spread awareness and information, all you need to do is have a conversation and be tolerable. And if the parent decides to circ despite the information you provided, then you need to let it go."<br /><br />I think intactivists many times fail to speak rationally, and also fail to see that people need time to think, time to process. We hope we can dump all this information on someone and they will have an epiphany and change their stance immediately (or submit to our words). And when this doesn't happen, we get louder and more overwhelming, we gang up on people, and we finally scare them into doing whatever they were going to do anyway, but now they will be reinforced that they have the right to do what they want. Remember, people end up wondering "who are these people who want to take parental rights away", without questioning that their perceived "parental right" opposes their son's right to bodily integrity.<br /><br />However, what bloggers like her fail to see is where we come from. We didn't just pop out of a flower and decided to annoy all the people who practice circumcision. Many of us have faced this issue one way or another, whether we are circumcised ourselves, or whether we researched for ourselves or our children, or whether some had their children circumcised and then realized what had been done.<br /><br />Many of us are victims here. Victims because we did not have a say on what was going to be done to our "private" parts. Our "private" parts were not considered private because we were minors, and so we were subjected to an injury that we grow up with, that we live with for the rest of our lives. So we either rationalize it as many man do, to think that it was necessary and good, or we snap out of it and realize that we were injured for no good reason at all.<br /><br />Many of us wish there had been a "douchebag" who had been there to stop the doctors from raising that scalpel.<br /><br />Some are angry at their parents, some are not. Some know that parents did what they really thought was the best for the child. But some have also asked why, and have found such a lack of empathy, lack of concern, and such defensiveness from their own parents, that they have stormed out and shut parents from their lives.<br /><br />I agree that we intactivists need to be respectful and rational and not overwhelming. But I disagree, I cannot accept that every decision is a good decision. Not when the injury on a baby grows with him and lives with him through the rest of his life, limiting his sexual experiences.<br /><br />dreamerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14708824168962037873noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-548248685729133691.post-68826172317643087972013-02-27T16:39:28.500-08:002013-02-27T16:39:28.500-08:00I think that people who condone genital mutilation...I think that people who condone genital mutilation already know—at least subconciously—that the douchebaggery originates with them.<br /><br />Just look at that poster again: "<b>We cosleep</b>", "<b>He is</b> circumcised", "<b>I work</b> outside the home", and "<b>I</b> exclusively <b>breastfeed</b> her".<br /><br />Notice anything peculiar? <em>In all of the cases except for one, the mother is an explicit actor.</em> <br /><br />Subconsciously or otherwise, the creator of that poster knew that it would engender cognitive dissonance to write something like "<b>I circumcised</b> him" or even "<b>I had</b> him circumcised".<br /><br />So much for celebrating parental choices, because the mother has actually been rhetorically removed from having made any choice <em>whatsoever</em>; indeed, the mother's choice has been recast as an inherent property of the boy himself.<br /><br />It is the douchebag who skirts responsibility.Tom Riddlehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12994425531096864789noreply@blogger.com