Saving Our Sons

Genital Autonomy Filter for Profile Photos: Awareness Raising in Social Media

After countless requests for an easy overlay filter for profile photos on Facebook, the collaborative efforts of several leaders have resulted in an easy-to-use "Twibbon" to show support of genital autonomy.

The idea surfaced when Leanna Kirch had the idea of raising awareness of genital autonomy in this fashion after seeing pride event filters. Kirch says, "Something clicked in my mind; this could be a great way to get [intact] information out there, even to those who may not agree or accept the information. When I posted my own profile picture with the overlay, several people were very excited and wanted one as well. They thought it was great and wanted to take part in it."

Kirch had used the International Genital Autonomy Symbol (signed into the public domain for free use by all advocates), paired with the SavingSons.org site so that curious onlookers would have some place to go for more. The requests started rolling in to Saving Our Sons from people wanting an overlay of their own, and the demand was tough to keep up with.

Rally photos courtesy of Intact Michigan

We altered the overlay slightly - in both blue and red filters - so that it would fit well over any profile image - light or dark in background. Anthony Webster, Director of Intact Massachusetts, (above) volunteered to add the filter for anyone who desired to have one of their own, but the requests were coming into SOS by the hundreds (too many for any one person to handle). Instead, he found a quick and easy way that anyone can make a genital autonomy Twibbon (Facebook profile photo overlay) for their own profile, and has shared these with the community at large:

Blue Filter GA Symbol - http://twibbon.com/support/savingsonsorg

"With the strength of social media, showing your support for genital autonomy couldn’t be easier than with the help of a Twibbon," says Webster. "It only takes a second and a few clicks. It’s a great conversation starter that will open doors for you to help enlighten others."

With his creation, Webster paved the way for every advocate to take part in Kirch's desire for the GA filter. She writes, "I really hope the genital autonomy overlays will help to spread the message, and maybe even be a big contributing factor in the fight to end routine infant circumcision. As more and more people decide to use the overlay, it shows increased support for the cause, and hopefully information will spread rapidly."

State #i2 Filters

Photo from Melanie at Intact New Hampshire

Photo from Angela at Intact Kentucky

SOS 'Sunflower' Filter (light background)
Photo from Danelle at Intact Virginia

Photo from Nancy at Intact Kentucky

Photo from Missy at Intact Michigan

Photo from Sarah at Intact Idaho

Photo from Brian at Intact Connecticut

Photo from Missy at Intact Michigan

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10 Circumcision Myths: Let's Get the Facts Straight

By Joel Edwards for Organic Lifestyle Magazine
Full Text

In an effort to sell you medical services that are not needed, hospitals have continued a practice that was adopted as a preventative measure against masturbation. Instead of abandoning the practice once Americans became more sexually liberated, doctors and nurses have begun spreading a number of falsehoods and half-truths in order to justify the amputation a fully functioning organ immediately upon birth. Yes the foreskin is an organ, it has known immunological, sexual and protective functions.

Read about the realities of these 10 myths at Organic Lifestyle Magazine:

*Easier to Clean [Intact Care Resource Page]
*Prevents HIV [HIV Resource Page]
*Prevents Cancer [Penile Cancer facts]
*Babies Don’t Feel [Effectiveness of Anesthesia]
*Women Find it More Attractive [Intact Celebs]
*Prevents Urinary Tract Infections [UTI Resource Page]
*Doesn’t Affect Your Sex Life [Many ways it does]
*Useless Piece of Skin [It's not 'just skin']
*FGM is Different and/or Worse [All genital cutting harms]
*Phimosis is a Common Affliction that Must be Corrected with Circumcision [Phony Phimosis Diagnosis]

Happy Holidays!

☃ In years past we have loved hearing from families who have found Saving Our Sons and had their lives positively impacted in one fashion or another. It has been a blessing to correspond with many of you, to work in unison together in a genital autonomy effort, and we always look forward to hearing from you.

If you are sending greetings at this time of year, we would love to meet your family and hear of the ways in which SOS has intersected with your life. ❤

We invite you to write to:

Saving Our Sons

P.O. Box 1302

Virginia Beach, VA 23451

We will write back. :)

❄ Have a blessed holiday season. ❄

~~~~

Tiffany's Story: Circumcision and its Impact on My Son

I am a regret mom.

I allowed my doctor to torture my son so that he could make a profit, and I will never forgive myself.

I 'researched' circumcision when I was pregnant. I saw the claims that it was cleaner, prevented urinary tract infections (UTIs) and cancer, and I believed them. I thought, "I don't know any men who are intact. I don't know any men that get UTIs or have penile cancer, so this must work. And doctors take an oath to do no harm so if my doctor is this adamant that it's necessary, it must be..."

My mom has been a nurse for 40 years and has assisted on dozens of circumcision surgeries. She says it's necessary and isn't so bad. My husband wants to prevent cancer/UTIs and doesn't want our son teased in the locker room. My babysitter wouldn't watch him if he was intact because she's heard it's 'dirty,' and there are zero other daycare openings for newborns in our area.

My gut said no but everyone and everything else said yes.

My son was born and we had to stay more than 24 hours because he was born at 10 pm. When he was almost 24 hours old my husband asked when they would circumcise him, and they said not until right before we were discharged. I asked why. No one gave me an answer and my stomach churned.

The next day as they were preparing our discharge paperwork, my doctor came to get my son. I felt panic and looked around the room to tell my husband I couldn't do it, but he was gone to eat lunch.

My doctor told me again how necessary it was to do, and I reluctantly let him take my son away.

When he was brought back he was an entirely different baby. The light in his eyes was gone. 15 minutes later they came in to say that they forgot to weigh him while he was naked so I needed to undress him and remove his diaper so they could weigh him now. I did and the gauze came off, too. It was a horrific sight. His penis was purple, swollen, raw and bleeding. It was bleeding so much. I was already crying and at that point it turned into sobbing. I was devastated at what I had allowed them to do to my baby.

He was screaming an awful, distressed scream. In fact, the word 'scream' doesn't even describe the noise coming out of my son's mouth. It was a sound of pure agony.

The nurse said all the blood was normal. I asked what I could do to help him and she said nothing. NOTHING! This was insanity. Horror. Surely I was just having a nightmare. I am a good mom. I am a crunchy, gentle attachment parent. I breastfeed, I don't allow my children to cry unnecessarily. I protect my children. I spend every moment possible with my children. I put them before my needs. Always. Surely I couldn't have signed papers and let them do this to my baby.

He stopped breastfeeding.

He was agitated.

His sleep was restless and broken.

They sent us home with my son in shock and distress and told us we could do nothing to help him. 18 hours later he still wasn't breastfeeding. He hadn't peed or pooped, and he was now so jaundiced. We ended up in the emergency room. The nurse looked at me like I was crazy, said he was fine and asked, "Do you really want me to call the doctor in for this?"

My newborn baby hadn't eaten, peed or pooped in 18 hours and she acted like I was crazy for being so concerned. I was shocked and disgusted. I knew we had made the wrong decision and nobody would help my child.

A few weeks later the daycare lady who had told me she wouldn't watch an intact baby boy called me to say she was closing her daycare.

A year later I found out that nursing school had not taught my mom, a practicing nurse for 40 years, anything about the intact penis and its care. She had no idea that the foreskin was fused to the head of the penis at birth. I had to find reputable resources just for her to believe me.

Then I found Saving Our Sons and my world came crashing down.

I found that the reasons my doctor and husband said I needed to circumcise my son were all lies.

How had I let this happen? How was I bullied into not protecting my brand new son? Everything I knew, except my gut, said this was the right thing to do -- and I found out that every last shred of that information was wrong.

Fast forwarding to a few days ago: I ripped a TINY piece of my nail off the nail bed. It is raw, swollen and so, so excruciating every time the tiniest thing touches it. The foreskin is fused to the glans (head) of the penis the same way my fingernail was fused to my finger. This pain is a tiny fraction of what my son experienced. I bumped my finger on the corner of the counter and nearly blacked out. Yet I was instructed to pull the remaining skin back from my son's circumcised penis and scrub poop and urine off his raw wound. Oh. My. God. I nearly can't handle this pain and it doesn't begin to compare to what my brand new baby experienced.

HOW DID I LET THAT HAPPEN TO HIM?!

I signed the papers and handed him over. I know I can't take this back. I will feel guilty for the rest of my life. Hands down, this was the worst mistake I have made as a parent. This will never happen to another of my children, and I hope I can help prevent it from happening to other children.

I wish someone had told me the truth. I wish someone had educated me beyond the lies that I found and was fed. I wish someone had done more to help me save my son.

♥

Read more from parents who circumcised their son and will be keeping future sons intact: Drmomma.org/2010/05/i-circumcised-my-son-healing-from.html

Know an expecting family? Always speak up. Here is one good resource list to share: Savingsons.org/2014/12/should-i-circumcise-pros-and-cons-of.html

If you'd like to get materials into the hands of your friends/family, but don't feel comfortable doing so yourself, we will mail a small anonymous Expecting Pack filled with information directly to them, and connect them with local leaders who can further answer questions or dialog. You may also include a personalized note if you wish. Find details at: Savingsons.org/p/info-pack.html There are also breastfeeding packs with intact information for mothers who plan to nurse their babies; and full info packs to use as lending resources with clients (or those who'd watch videos and read full articles).

~~~~~~~

Much of today's scientific literature 'untrue' says Lancet Editor-in-Chief, Dr. Richard Horton

Editor's Preface

This observation is one that applies to a fair amount of 'research' that has been twisted to support unnecessary and detrimental genital cutting - especially HIV studies conducted in Africa and the resulting push to circumcise "as a vaccine against AIDS."

By F. William Engdahl
for NSNBC International: http://nsnbc.me/2015/06/19/shocking-report-from-medical-insiders/

A shocking admission by the editor of the world’s most respected medical journal, The Lancet, has been virtually ignored by the mainstream media. Dr. Richard Horton, Editor-in-chief of The Lancet recently published a statement declaring that a shocking amount of published research is unreliable at best, if not completely false, as in, fraudulent.

Horton declared, “Much of the scientific literature, perhaps half, may simply be untrue. Afflicted by studies with small sample sizes, tiny effects, invalid exploratory analyses, and flagrant conflicts of interest, together with an obsession for pursuing fashionable trends of dubious importance, science has taken a turn towards darkness.”

To state the point in other words, Horton states bluntly that major pharmaceutical companies falsify or manipulate tests on the health, safety and effectiveness of their various drugs by taking samples too small to be statistically meaningful or hiring test labs or scientists where the lab or scientist has blatant conflicts of interest such as pleasing the drug company to get further grants. At least half of all such tests are worthless or worse he claims. As the drugs have a major effect on the health of millions of consumers, the manipulation amounts to criminal dereliction and malfeasance.

The drug industry-sponsored studies Horton refers to develop commercial drugs or vaccines to supposedly help people, used to train medical staff, to educate medical students and more.

Horton wrote his shocking comments after attending a symposium on the reproducibility and reliability of biomedical research at the Wellcome Trust in London. He noted the confidentiality or “Chatham House” rules where attendees are forbidden to name names: “’A lot of what is published is incorrect.’ I’m not allowed to say who made this remark because we were asked to observe Chatham House rules. We were also asked not to take photographs of slides.”

Other voices

Dr. Marcia Angell is a physician and was longtime Editor-in-Chief of the New England Medical Journal (NEMJ), considered to be another one of the most prestigious peer-reviewed medical journals in the world. Angell stated, “It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of the New England Journal of Medicine.”

Harvey Marcovitch, who has studied and written about the corruption of medical tests and publication in medical journals, writes, “studies showing positive outcomes for a drug or device under consideration are more likely to be published than ‘negative’ studies; editors are partly to blame for this but so are commercial sponsors, whose methodologically well-conducted studies with unfavorable results tended not to see the light of day…”

At the University of British Columbia’s Neural Dynamics Research Group in the Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, Dr Lucija Tomljenovic obtained documents that showed that, “vaccine manufacturers, pharmaceutical companies, and health authorities have known about multiple dangers associated with vaccines but chose to withhold them from the public. This is scientific fraud, and their complicity suggests that this practice continues to this day.”

Lancet’s Dr. Horton concludes, “Those who have the power to act seem to think somebody else should act first. And every positive action (eg, funding well-powered replications) has a counter-argument (science will become less creative). The good news is that science is beginning to take some of its worst failings very seriously. The bad news is that nobody is ready to take the first step to clean up the system.

Corruption of the medical industry worldwide is a huge issue, perhaps more dangerous than the threat of all wars combined. Do we have such hypnosis and blind faith in our doctors simply because of their white coats that we believe they are infallible? And, in turn, do they have such blind faith in the medical journals recommending a given new wonder medicine or vaccine that they rush to give the drugs or vaccines without considering these deeper issues?

F. William Engdahl is strategic risk consultant and lecturer, he holds a degree in politics from Princeton University and is a best-selling author on oil and geopolitics, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.”

U.S. Hospital Circumcision Rates By State

The above map, created by Jonathon Conte of the Bay Area Intactivists, and Danelle Day, of Saving Our Sons, depicts the varying rates of infant circumcision state-by-state in the U.S. today. Rates are from 2009-2010 hospital statistics obtained at MGMBill.org, where readers can find references to original statistic sources.

The state with the highest rate of forced infant circumcision during the 2009-2010 year was West Virginia (86%) followed closely by Michigan and Kentucky (both 85%). The state with the lowest rate of infant circumcision during the same period was Nevada (11%) followed by Washington (14%).

Medicaid continues to use tax dollars to fund unnecessary infant circumcision in the majority of states each year. If you live in a Medicaid-funded state, please get involved in letter-writing efforts to encourage Medicaid to stop channeling money into this destructive practice. No matter your location, we encourage you to get involved in local awareness-raising efforts in whatever manner fits your personal style. Speak up and connect with others doing the same.

State / Circumcision Rate

* Indicates a state where Medicaid covers infant circumcision

Alabama* - No Data

Alaska* - No Data

Arizona - 20%

Arkansas* - 67%

California - 22%

Colorado - 65%

Connecticut* - 71%

Delaware* - No Data

Florida - 34%

Georgia* - 72%

Hawaii* - 79%

Idaho - No Data

Illinois* - 64%

Indiana* - 82%

Iowa* - 82%

Kansas* - 75%

Kentucky* - 85%

Louisiana - 42%

Maine - 68%

Maryland* - 72%

Massachusetts* - 66%

Michigan* - 85%

Minnesota - 62%

Mississippi - No Data

Missouri - 76%

Montana - 50%

Nebraska* - 83%

Nevada - 11%

New Hampshire* - 76%

New Jersey* - 66%

New Mexico* - 49%

New York* - 59%

North Carolina - 52%

North Dakota - No Data

Ohio* - 84%

Oklahoma* - 76%

Oregon - 20%

Pennsylvania* - 80%

Rhode Island* - 76%

South Carolina - 81%

South Dakota* - 77%

Tennessee* - 76%

Texas* - 50%

Utah - 39%

Vermont* - 65%

Virginia* - 74%

Washington - 14%

Washington DC* - No Data

West Virginia* - 86%

Wisconsin* - 82%

Wyoming* - 77%

*******

Saving Our Sons Community

Intact: Healthy, Happy, Whole

IntactHealth.org

Circumcision: Please Don't Fail Your Son

I am in tears as I write this. It is going to be one of the hardest things I have ever done, but I think it is necessary.

Nearly 7 years and 2 months ago I was sitting in a bed listening to the music of the hospital. The humming of the blood pressure monitor, the tweeting of the machines, and the shuffles of nurses' feet. I was terrified and excited. I would soon be bringing my first child into this world. I would finally get to hold my sweet precious baby boy, kiss his little toes, stroke his perfect face, and change his diapers.

I labored without medication for hours. I finally caved and got an epidural to ease the pain as I was transitioning. Not much longer I thought. Who will he look like? I wonder if he will have any hair! So many thoughts raced through my head.

"It's time to push! Your baby is coming!"

No more terrifying words had ever been spoken to me. I pushed and pushed and once I had passed his shoulders, I reached down and pulled my perfect, beautiful, sweet 7lb 7oz boy to my chest just after 1:00am. I held onto him and knew in that moment that I was changed forever.

This tiny little human who I had grown inside my body meant more to me now than anything else in this world. They cleaned him, weighed him, I nursed him, and stared at his precious face in awe.

Then they took him from me.

They told me he would be fine. They said it was best. It's cleaner, it looks better, it's just what everyone does. He won't feel it.

These were just a fraction of the things people, including my own family, had told me that played on repeat in my head - they lied.

After what seemed like forever they brought my baby back to me so that I could nurse him. I sat up in my bed anxious to hold him and take in his sweet smell again. "He slept right through it," the nurse said - she lied.

When she handed him to me my heart dropped. He didn't have the same sweet expression on his face anymore. No, now he was red -- he looked exhausted and sad. What did they do to him? What did I do to him?

I tried to nurse him but he couldn't. He had fought too hard. He was too tired. So I went to change his tiny newborn diaper for the very first time and nothing could have ever prepared me for what followed.

As soon as I opened the little Pampers Swaddler he let out the most horrific scream I've ever heard. I will never forget it. The sound of excruciating pain. Then tears began to stream down my face as I looked at the bloody stump and open wound that was now my baby's penis.

I removed the saturated gauze and placed it in the little pool of blood inside the diaper, and as he screamed in pain I cleaned him the best I could, replaced some new Vaseline laden gauze, and a white diaper that would soon be as crimson as the last. I wrapped him in my arms and I wept. "I'm so sorry," I cried.

But they told me this is normal. They said it would be better this way. They lied to me.

He hadn't slept through the slicing and the crushing, he had gone into shock and passed out from the pain because there is no amount of safe anesthetic that can be used on a baby to numb the pain, but they didn't tell me this.

It's cleaner this way, right? They lied to me again. How could I think that an open bloody wound in a urine and feces filled diaper could possibly be cleaner?

It looks better. How did they know what my boy would want his penis to look like? This wasn't their decision. It wasn't MY decision. That wasn't my body. What right did I have to let them mutilate my son?!

They took him from the safety of my arms and strapped his arms and legs to a board. He cried. He cried because it was cold, he cried because he needed me, he cried as they forced a blunt metal tool into his body to destroy the tissue that held his foreskin to the glans much like a fingernail is attached to a finger, he cried when they crushed his foreskin, and he cried when they began slicing at his body until he finally passed out. He cried for me and I wasn't there. He needed me and I slept. He bled out and I had been the one to hand them the knife.

I didn't do my research, I just trusted what everyone told me. They were wrong.

In less than 12 hours after I brought my perfect baby into this world, I had failed him. I failed my son.

Please don't fail yours.

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Research circumcision: SavingSons.org/2014/12/should-i-circumcise-pros-and-cons-of.html

Additional stories from parents who are keeping future sons intact: DrMomma.org/2010/05/i-circumcised-my-son-healing-from.html

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