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Letters in issue 2 |
Circumcision
Congratulations on (I hope) the safe arrival of your latest child, “Byron”. It looks really great, interesting and worthwhile. I encourage you to continue and hope the efforts will be rewarding at many levels.
I do have serious issues with one article, the one on Circumcision. It really got my blood up and enraged me.
This is an intensely emotional issue and here were a lot of emotive and volatile claims with no objectivity, data or scientific backup. Moreover it was written in the name of a pseudo “Information Service” yet contained highly inflammatory and definitely non-objective statements falsely represented as an authoritative discourse.
I happen to be circumcised yet am unsure whether I would or would not circumcise a son (should we ever have one). I would never wish to persuade people either for or against circumcision, yet am very happy to talk with them. The decision for or against by any parent is an intensely personal matter and is not decided by fact alone. It is appropriate for people to gain information and talk with others about this subject. It is most definitely not appropriate for a one-sided article to misrepresent, mislead and deceive people with false information.
You may be interested in extremely relevant information in a United Nations Aids Report from June 2000. (Information on this available at <www.salon.com/health/feature/2000/06/30/circumcision>). It relates that American anthropologist Priscilla Reining drew up a map of the African cities enduring the highest HIV infection rates and superimposed upon it a map of those places where the predominant cultural practices were to circumcise or not to circumcise. The correlation was striking: HIV was spreading fastest in places where male circumcision was not routinely performed. In a medical climate where even a 5% difference in HIV rates is significant, this report mentions that scientifically rigorous testing showed that men who were not circumcised ran between 2.3 and 4.5 times the risk of contracting AIDS as men who had the procedure done.
Related to this, University of Illinois at Chicago anthropologist Robert Bailey estimates that lack of male circumcision may account for up to 55% of HIV infections in nations where fewer than one in five men are circumcised.
Les Einhorn
Byron Bay
Author’s response
I can only say that after a 25 year exploration of the subject, I cannot condone irreversible mutilative surgery on healthy children. I have no objection to adults who at the age of consent can make decisions about themselves concerning surgery. Children are not in a position to protect themselves. The parents do not have the right to request unnecessary surgery on their children. They do not have the right to give consent when the procedure has not been proven in science to have a therapeutic benefit. Although Mr. Einhorn sees my article as one-sided, I think it is in the interest and care of children.
I do not wish to misrepresent, mislead or deceive with false information. The foreskin is a healthy and necessary part of the penis and it functions best when left in its original place.
Dr George L Williams
Paediatrician
Founding Director of NOCIRC Australia.
Love letters
I just got your magazine and it is so good! My hearty congratulations on a job well done. I am grateful and honoured to be a part of your inaugural issue!
I read your editorial and I liked it very much. Yours is an interesting story, and the perspective you shared was thoughtful and important. You know, it is excellent to see your example and challenge to hold the individual in community. Right in the face of the Fabian social welfare view in which all children are really the wards of the state whereby social engineering takes priority over individual parent/family opinions. This is what justifies the “therapeutic state” and coercive psychiatry and pressuring parents and accusing them of medical neglect when they resist state policy on psych drugs. Yet the attitude you model is really right, I think, that they are all our children. And at the same time you are encouraging individuals to challenge the state policy which says they are “our” (the state’s) children.
John Breeding
Austin, Texas, USA
Thank you for sending me a copy of your first issue. The presentation is excellent and I was very impressed by the quality and scope of the articles. Congratulations on producing a first class, interesting and topical publication.
Larry Anthony, MP
Thanks for the good work you are doing on behalf of children.
George
(email)
Special Needs Children
I have thoroughly enjoyed every article in byronchild. I am a fourth time mother and one can never ever have enough information.
I was wondering if byronchild would do an article on children with special needs. My third child Matthew was born at 28 weeks, just a premature baby, and all the medical problems and stresses would also make an informative article as I can never find any factual information on prematurity. He was also born with Pierre Robin Syndrome, a cleft palate and currently has a tracheostaomy. He will be two on June first but still cannot speak and doesn’t eat. Matthew attends Byron Bay Early Intervention which is helpful to children with special needs and their parents.
Good factual information such as your magazine makes parents, carers, grandparents etc. feel empowered and in my case feel as though I am not the ‘only one in the world’.
Leanne Dunn
Brunswick Heads
Kindred strives to adhere to strict advertising guidelines. Please help us keep our Google Ads in alignment with Kindred's values. Contact us with the URL of any ad on this page if you think it is contradictory to our content.Thank you. |
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The Future of Food DVD
There is a revolution happening in the farm fields and on the dinner tables of the world a revolution that is transforming the very nature of the food we eat.
The Future of Food offers an in-depth investigation into the disturbing truth behind the
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The Power of Community: How Cuba Survived Peak Oil DVD
When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990, Cuba experienced a major economic depression. With imports of oil cut by more than one-half and food imports by 80 percent, people were desperate for food. This film tells of the hardships and struggles as well as
Price: $ 41.00
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Kindred strives to adhere to strict advertising guidelines. Please help us keep our Google Ads in alignment with Kindred's values. Contact us with the URL of any ad on this page if you think it is contradictory to our content.Thank you. |
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Eating By Colour: a New Approach to Food
Rainbow Food is a fresh approach to eating for the whole family. Rainbow Food is designed to restore our original innocent relationship with food. It is practical, easy to use, and is beneficial to the emotional body as well as the physical body. |
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A Call to Arms
One rarely thinks of motherhood as political. But as Kali Wendorf, editor of Kindred sees it, mothers, and fathers, need to find their voices in the political domain. "Our world is becoming increasingly sterile and hostile. We are moving away from the |
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Regaining Sanity: Part 2 Coming out of isolation into a community style of parenting
Along with the disintegration of extended families, the past few decades have seen an increasing amount of social and economic pressures being placed on the nuclear family unit. Our culture is more geared towards rampant consumerism than towards supportin |
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I’m An Individual!
Children have a unique constitutional type. According to the Ayurvedic theory of doshas everything in the universe is comprised of different proportions of space, air, fire, water and earth. |
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Autism is Treatable: Hope that is real, treatments that heal
Sara and her family are one of thousands of families who have discovered successful treatments for their children's autism and shared their successes with other parents and researchers at the Autism Research Institute. |
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