SHOULD THIS 12-YEAR-OLD HAVE HIS PENIS RIPPED AND SLICED?

(Dr. Gastaldo's remarks are interspersed ######.)

tonygreen@news.oregonian.com (Tony, please forward this email to the
attorneys you mention in your article.  Thanks.)

http://www.oregonlive.com/oregonian/stories/index.ssf?/base/news/117764432910266
0.xml&coll=7&thispage=1

Divorced parents clash over 12-year-old son's circumcision
Three-year fight - The father, a convert to Judaism, sees it as a
matter of religious observance
Friday, April 27, 2007
ASHBEL S. GREEN

A former Medford man who converted to Judaism wants his 12-year-old
son to do the same. That requires circumcision -- something the mother
adamantly opposes.

#### [DR. GASTALDO REMARKS] Not all Jewish religious authorities think
Judaism requires circumcision.  See quotes at the end of this post.

#### Years ago, Rabbi Pinchas Aloof of Del Ray Beach, Florida informed
me that ONLY A DROP OF BLOOD is required from the penis.  Rabbi Aloof
added that this drop-of-blood "circumcision" must be performed by an
observant Jew.

#### In regard to who performs the surgery:  Many (most?) American MDs
are not observant Jews and American MDs fraudulently equate their
obviously illegal TOTAL foreskin amputation with the ancient Jewish
ritual that leaves most of the foreskin on the penis.

See Pediatrician 'ethics' (Attn: Gesundheit et al.)
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/chiro-list/message/2908

The divorced couple has been battling over the issue for three years,
including whether the boy wants to undergo the procedure. So far,
Oregon courts have squarely sided with the father, who has custody.

##### When ripping and slicing the boy's penis is being considered,
Oregon courts should side with the BOY.

##### The American Academy of Pediatrics says:

"[T]he pediatrician's responsibilities to his or her patient exist
independent of parental desires...A[n infant's screaming writhing and
bleeding obviously constitutes the - TDG] patient's reluctance or
refusal to assent [and - TDG] should...carry considerable weight when
the proposed intervention is not essential to his or her welfare and/
or
can be deferred without substantial risk... [T]hose who care for
children need to provide for measures to solicit assent and to attend
to possible abuses of 'raw' power over children when ethical
conflicts
occur."
AMERICAN ACADEMY OF PEDIATRICS
Informed Consent, Parental Permission, and Assent in Pediatric
Practice(RE9510)
Pediatrics Volume 95, Number 2 February, 1995, p. 314-317
http://www.aap.org/policy/00662.html

##### And there is this...

MEDICAL TRIBUNE 30:16 (8 June 1989)
FORGET THOSE HEADLINES ABOUT CIRCUMCISION
AAP IS AGAINST ROUTINE CIRCUMCISION
http://www.cirp.org/CIRP/news/1989.06.08%3aMedicalTribune

So far, Oregon courts have squarely sided with the father, who has
custody.
That doesn't surprise Kathy T. Graham, associate dean for academic
affairs at Willamette University College of Law.
"The primary custodial parent is the one that makes the decisions
about religion and education and about matters of child-rearing,"
Graham said.

#### Hopefully the custodial parent - the father - has been informed
that withdrawing a drop of blood will suffice (assuming Rabbi Aloof
was right).  Hopefully, the father has been informed that God
reportedly/originally commanded that most of the foreskin be left on
the penis.

Other family law experts agree, but say the courts should at least
look into the situation to make sure the surgery is in the best
interests of the child.
"You're talking about not just religious instruction or whether you're
going to send the child to parochial school or public school,"
commented Lawrence D. Gorin, a Portland attorney. "This is a matter of
permanent change of bodily structure. And it's irreversible."

#### If the procedure must be/is to be performed, it should be done
the way the Jewish GOD reportedly intended.  Again, maybe Rabbi
Pinchas Aloof is right - a drop of blood is sufficient.  Or maybe the
Jewish God's reported original intent - leaving most of the foreskin
on the penis - is the best religious way to go.

#### Regarding the Jewish God's reported original intent - leaving
most of the foreskin on the penis...

#### The late Edward Wallerstein won an American Medical Writers Award
for his
book,  Circumcision: An American Health Fallacy [NY:
Springer 1980].

#### Wallerstein wrote in a 1983 article:

"Originally, the surgery involved only cutting the tip of the
foreskin.
This was changed in the Hellenic Period to prevent [Jews from]
elongat[ing] the foreskin stump in order to appear uncircumcised."
[Wallerstein E. Humanistic Judaism 1983;11(4):46]

#### In 1997, Hershel Shanks, PhD editor of Moment, noted that "the
rabbis of the
Talmud OFTEN changed the Biblical rules" (emphasis added)...
[Shanks H. Tolerance v. Halachah. Moment. (Jun)1997;22(3):6, 8-9]

"....[I]n Biblical times, Jewish descent was determined by the
Jewishness of the father...The rabbis changed that 2,000 year-old
tradition...Indeed the rabbis of the Talmud OFTEN changed the Biblical
rules (emphasis added)..."
[Shanks H. Tolerance v. Halachah. Moment. (Jun)1997;22(3):6, 8-9]

See Is Jesus really God? (also: NO CIRC = MAYBE CIRC)
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/chiro-list/message/4074

The mother is running out of legal options.
The Oregon Supreme Court has been briefed, but has not decided whether
to take the case.

#### I hope the Oregon Supreme Court takes this case.

Mark Johnson, a Portland lawyer commenting on the case, said the court
shouldn't let the case be decided based only on the legal papers filed
on behalf of the mother and father.
"Frankly, the child should have a lawyer," Johnson said.

#### I AGREE - THE CHILD SHOULD HAVE A LAWYER.

#### If the boy does not wish to have his penis ripped and sliced - or
if he does not wish even to have a drop of blood removed - he should
be supported in this decision.

See HIV: Keeping MDs out of prison: Dr. Poland, AAP and infant
circumcision revisited
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.med/msg/43c7261a4aafff5a

The Oregonian is not identifying the family members, in order to
protect the privacy of the minor.
The couple married in the early 1990s. She filed for divorce in 1998.
The man started studying Judaism in 1999 and eventually converted. He
now lives near Olympia . The child initially lived with his mother,
but the father later gained custody.
In court papers, the father claims the boy gradually concluded that he
also wanted to convert to Judaism and understood that this required
circumcision.

#### BUT DOES THE BOY WANT HIS PENIS OPERATED ON...

The father also claims as the custodial parent he had a constitutional
right to raise his son in his religion.

##### No such Constitutional right exists.  Without even addressing
the phony "babies can't feel pain" neurology of American MDs...

#### Attorney WE Brigman wrote:

"[C]onstitutional rights...including freedom of religion, are
inadequate to prevent the states from using their authority to treat
circumcision
as child abuse...The most obvious way to proceed with enforcement...is
through
criminal prosecution under existing state laws." [Brigman WE:
Circumcision as child abuse: the legal and Constitutional issues.
Journal of
Family Law, 1984;23(3):337-57]

The father made an appointment for a circumcision in 2004.

#### WITH WHOM DID THE FATHER MAKE THE APPOINTMENT - WITH A MOHEL
(JEWISH RITUAL CIRCUMCISER) - OR WITH AN MD? (SOME MDs ARE BOTH.)  If
the MD is not an observant Jew, there may be no "religious validity" -
or so Rabbi Pinchas Aloof indicated to me.  See above.

The mother responded by going to court, saying her son told her that
he was afraid to defy his father, but didn't want the procedure.

#### The boy needs an attorney.  He may be being forced to have his
penis ripped and sliced...

She asked for a hearing where she could present evidence that the
circumcision would be dangerous. She also sought custody of her son.
But Jackson County Circuit Judge Rebecca G. Orf sided with the
father.
"I am still of the opinion that the decision of whether or not a child
has elective surgery, which this appears to be, is a call that should
be made and is reserved to the custodial parent," Orf said in a
hearing.

#### This is not a mere piercing.  Jackson County Circuit Judge
Rebecca G. Orf should have listened to the mother and let her present
evidence of danger.

More than a million U.S. infants are circumcised each year, but
circumcising adults or teens remains relatively rare.

#### More than a million infants have their penises ripped and
sliced.  They all scream their protests - though some are rendered
unconscious by the pain.

Despite her ruling, Orf ordered the boy not be circumcised until the
legal proceedings were done.
The Oregon Court of Appeals affirmed Orf's decision without an
opinion, often an indication that the three-judge panel found no merit
to the appeal.

#### The Oregon Court of Appeals did not help a boy who may be being
railroaded into having his penis ripped and sliced.

The lawyer for the mother has asked the Oregon Supreme Court to take
the case, and gained an ally called Doctors Opposing Circumcision,
which filed a brief last week.

#### Hopefully, Doctors Opposing Circumcision gave the sordid history
of what happened in 1988, soon after I exposed American MDs
perpetuating uncorrected, phony "babies can't feel pain" neurology.

There is no schedule for when the court will decide whether to review
the case.

#### Again, I hope the Oregon Supreme Court takes this case.  See the
LONDON discussion below.

The mother's attorney declined to comment.
The father, an attorney who is representing himself, did not return a
phone call seeking comment.

#### In California's LONDON case, the mother sued AFTER her infant's
penis had been ripped and sliced.  She sued via an attorney for her
child.  The father, an MD, disagreed with the mother.  The California
Supreme Court agreed with the father.  In California, stare decisis -
it legal for parents to have an MD rip and slice the penises of their
children.

#### Fortunately, the California Supreme Court's London decision is
reportedly "unsupported and contradicted by the California
Supreme Court's decision in Conservatorship of Valerie N. v. Valerie
N. (1985) 219 Cal. Rptr. 387).
http://www.cirp.org/library/legal/

The OREGONIAN continues...

Oregon legal experts agree that judges generally defer to the choices
of custodial parents.
"Judges traditionally have stayed away in getting involving decisions
about the day-to-day upbringing of the child," said Gorin, the
Portland attorney.
Still, there are limits.
"It may be that the religious belief is to engage in human sacrifice
or kill animals, but we don't do that," he said.

#### Attorney Gorin should have mentioned the US Supreme Court's
PRINCE decision...

#### According to the US Supreme Court writing in Prince v.
Massachusetts,
321 U.S. 158
(1944): "parents may be free to become martyrs themselves. But it
does
not follow they are free ... to make martyrs of their children before
they have reached the age of full and legal discretion when they can
make that choice for themselves."

See Infant penis ripping, vaccination and breastfeeding
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.med/msg/3213d1e144c9b801

#### Most American males are still imprisoned to have their penises
ripped
and sliced - American MDs need a break to stay out of prison - which
may be the reason NIH is supporting African penis slicing...

See NIH-supported African penis slicing: Dr. Gastaldo's prediction
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.med/msg/f3c427d00019844a

But Julie H. McFarlane, a supervising attorney with the Portland-based
Juvenile Rights Project, said that the child's consent for a medical
procedure is not required until he turns 15.
"I think the dad has the legal right as the custodial parent to make
those kind of religious or medical decisions," McFarlane said. "It's
not much different from cosmetic surgery."

#### Mass infant penis ripping and slicing is obviously illegal.  Back
in 1988, soon after I exposed American medicine's phony "babies can't
feel pain" neurology....  American MDs ignored their own Scientific
Board and suddenly decided the obvious mass child abuse was "an
effective public health measure."  It was an obvious hoax.  Again, the
MDs ignored their own Scientific Board.

The bottom line, McFarlane said, is that "when you lose custody, you
lose a lot of those things that go with custody -- deciding whether
the kids go to school and the rest of the day-to-day parenting
decisions."

#### There is no right to rip and slice children's penises - or
vaginas incidentally.  There is a federal law against slicing vaginas
- boys do not have equal protection - it's obvious sex discrimination.

See Feds vs. Episiotomy (also: Vagina lips sliced off; vagina fused/
closed)
http://groups.google.com/group/misc.kids.pregnancy/msg/ee00ae75abe9ddc1

Andy Dworkin of The Oregonian contributed to this report. Ashbel
"Tony" Green: 503-221-8202; tonygreen@news.oregonian.com

Copied to Andy and Ashbel via tonygreen@news.oregonian.com

I SAY AGAIN:

American MDs fraudulently equate their obviously illegal TOTAL
foreskin amputation with the ancient Jewish ritual that leaves most of
the foreskin on the penis.

See Pediatrician 'ethics' (Attn: Gesundheit et al.)
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/chiro-list/message/2908
SOME RELEVANT QUOTES...

FIRST, INFANT PENISES ARE RIPPED...

"[The first step in all circumcisions]...freeing adhesions [ripping
foreskin from glans], is
tantamount to cruel and unusual punishment and is unfounded
physiologically and
medically." [Kaplan GW: Circumcision: An overview. Current Problems
in Pediatrics, 1977;7(5):8.]

THEN INFANT PENISES ARE SLICED...

"One-half to one-third of the skin on the...penile shaft is sliced
off." http://www.infocirc.org/MensHlth.htm (paraphrasing Ronald
Goldman, PhD, author of Circumcision: The Hidden Trauma)

"The average circumcision cuts off what would grow into
about 12 square inches of sexually sensitive skin."
http://www.infocirc.org/MensHlth.htm (quoting Ronald Goldman, PhD,
author of Circumcision: The Hidden Trauma)

"[Routine infant circumcision] constitutes child abuse...an
acknowledged
hazard to health." [Katz M. Circumcision. AJDC 1980;134:1098]

Attention California DAs who might be reading...

IN CALIFORNIA:  Prosecution of child abuse "does not require any
intent to
violate law, or to injure another, or to acquire any
advantage." [People v.
Pointer (App. 1 Dist. 1984) 199 Cal. Rptr. 357 cited/quoted under
California
Penal Code Section 273a]

"After years of strapping babies down for this brutal procedure and
listening to their screams, we couldn't take it any
longer." [Sperlich
BK,
Conant M. Am J Nurs (Jun)1994:16.]

"[C]onstitutional rights...including freedom of religion, are
inadequate to
prevent the states from using their authority to treat circumcision
as
child
abuse...The most obvious way to proceed with enforcement...is through
criminal prosecution under existing state laws." [Brigman WE:
Circumcision
as child abuse: the legal and Constitutional issues. Journal of
Family
Law,
1984;23(3):337-57]

SOME JEWISH AUTHORITIES DON'T THINK JUDAISM REQUIRES CIRCUMCISION...

Jewish authorities (vigorously contested by other Jewish authorities)
offer Jewish parents an ideological basis not to
circumcise:

1) "[Circumcision] is not a sacrament which inducts the infant into
Judaism: his birth does that" [Rabbi MN Kertner. What is a Jew? New
York: Macmillan, 1973,1993]  (Note:  Adult Jews who wish to remain
uncircumcised are accepted under Israel's Law of Return - and are
allowed to remain uncircumcised.  This suggests that "religious"
circumcision is a CHOICE which may legitimately be postponed until
adulthood and beyond.  It makes sense for adults to be able to choose
which religion to embrace, and to choose whether or not to surgically
alter their bodies for religious reasons.)

2) Modern rabbis are advocating the amputation of FAR MORE infant
foreskin than God originally/allegedly intended.  Quoting Wallerstein
(cited above),  "Originally, the surgery involved only cutting the
tip
of the foreskin.  This was changed in the Hellenic Period to prevent
[Jews from] elongat[ing] the foreskin stump in order to appear
uncircumcised." [Wallerstein E. Humanistic
Judaism 1983;11(4):46.  (Wallerstein, a Jew, had previously won the
American Medical Writers Award for his 1980 book, "Circumcision: An
American Health Fallacy.)

3) "The infliction of unnecessary pain is precisely what Judaism is
designed to fight against, so it makes little sense for us to be the
perpetrators on our children." [Rabbi Michael Lerner. Jewish Renewal
NY:
G.P. Putnam's Sons 1994:387])

Thanks for reading everyone.

Sincerely,

Todd

Dr. Gastaldo
Hillsboro, Oregon
USA
todd@chiromotion.com

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