Letters to the Editor
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Male Circumcism
The idea that you would fight aids by circumcising men is ridiculous. If you want to stop the spread of aids through genital mutilation, just cut all of their dicks off.
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Joan Walsh, this isn't working
you have to ban the use of Anonymous. trolls found a crack in the barrier. when there's a legitimate use, let them write *you* first, then redirect it.
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Joan Walsh, this isn't working
you have to ban the use of Anonymous. trolls found a crack in the barrier. when there's a legitimate use, let them write *you* first, then redirect it.
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Trust African Solutions?
Like the "solution" that sleeping with a virgin will cure your AIDS?
And ABC isn't an "African" solution. It started everywhere once it was discovered it was transmitted through sexual contact. Same with "zero grazing," though it was called something different, i.e., be faithful.
HIV transmission rates may have dropped in Uganda, but Africa is much more than one tiny little country, and the rest of the continent is still devastated by the disease.
That, and her "solution" as to why the disease hit when it did despite the virus being present for thousands of years, seem to indicate to me that the author isn't really as knowledgeable as she says and has more of an axe to grind than anything else.
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i'm confused
Nothing in the book review actually addresses a cure for AIDS. It addresses the various types of prevention, but that does nothing for those people that are already infected. Is the title just completely misleading or was there part of the book that addresses local cures to AIDs? It doesn't really sound like these local preventation measures are all that radical or even different from what is promoted in the US. We are told to be monogamous or abstinent and when we have sex with partners of an unknown status, use a condom. Isn't "zero grazing" equivalent to monogamy? And is anyone shocked that there are people that profit from other people's misery?
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No to circumcision
That was an interesting article, though I agree with the two scientists who posted here that Ms. Epstein's criticism of AIDS researchers seems overly harsh. Whether motivated by altruism or greed, if they find a vaccine or cure, does it really matter why they did it?
As for David Sugarman's arguments in favor of circumcision, and his allegation that opposition to such stems from anti-semitism, I can respond that as a Jew I am adamantly opposed to circumcision. If an individual desires to be circumcised, let him make that decision when he is old enough to do so for himself. Otherwise, it is just the imposition of genital mutilation on a helpless baby, done in accordance with the religious dictates of ancient, superstitious desert dwellers.
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What we want to hear
I have to agree with those who said this article really says nothing about stopping the AIDS epidemic that hasn't been said before. I guess I haven't read the book, but it seems to me that aside from advising monogamy it is nonetheless what us liberals want to hear. The problem is colonialism, it is the "fat AIDS", that is, the West that is at the heart of the problem and Africans could just solve the problem themselves if all these Americans and Europeans would get out of the way. Somehow that sounds like too easy an answer.
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judaism is a CHAIN, not a link, nick44
in places where you can opt out (as in america circa 2 millenium), half do. they either marry irish or wasp, don't ask the spouse to convert and don't raise the children as jews. or they ignore the whole thing and don't get their sons circumcised. or with socialist enlightenment they view the whole thing as superstitious barbarism. fine. we don't need you. go away. there will always be jews, only your line (which went back a long way) won't be among them. to my mind, you are no longer an "us".
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Sugarman
You're deluded.
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it's hard to make sense of your answer, nick
(in its entirety, "you're deluded") that there won't "always" be jews? or that your children, should you have them, will be jewish? or that you *aren't* one of the 50% of american jews who want to chuck the whole thing? christopher hitchens calls himself "jewish" (on the sharpton debate). he's uncircumcised. he by culture is very anglican. his children aren't jewish. he's jewish? not by my lights. david wolpert (that god exists thing). his kid converted evangelical and he says it's a good thing. jewish? not to me. chomsky's daughter married a nicaraguan. i don't know their particular beliefs, but my guess is that their children won't be brought up jewish. perhaps not even catholic. some socialist liberation theology. maybe baptised maybe not. a made up religion in which you are the only adherent, that's how hitchens and wolpert and chomsky are jewish. it has to be IMPORTANT to you. obviously it's not, nick. so you're not. or, rather, your kids won't be, which to me is the same thing from a 5000 year perspective. dershowitz is a very prominent jew, but his kid married a catholic. and she didn't convert. that makes dershowitz not jewish. would have been killed by hitler is your criterion? if hitler is resurrected in the next generation, maybe. otherwise, not. do i mind? not at all, unless those children have an especial hatred for the taint - and want to erase it from the world. it wouldn't hurt for the goyishe kopf to get a little smarter. i'm really not talking to you, nick. you are a lost cause. i'm talking to the *other* secular jews out there, beset by self-doubt as to their worth. they have a people. whether they like them or not. it's good to have a people. it's makes for a strong identity. it's those i'm talking to.
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Stop the science-bashing
Contemplator and Daniel Dvorkin, thank you both for posting, otherwise this thread would have been worthless.
And while I do not often agree with Mr. Sugarman, I fully support the idea of eliminating the "Anonymous" posting option. If you want to express an idea, put your name (or at least a handle) behind it.
I won't attempt to wade into the circumcision morass, except to note that those who would even attempt to equate male (penile) circumcision with female (clitoral or clitoral/labia) "circumcision" (i.e., genital mutilation) should seriously question the value of their elementary and secondary school educations, specifically in the areas of biology, anatomy, critical reasoning, and logic.