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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:
The history of circumcision is interesting. I've heard a theory that suggests that it was originally done on Jewish slaves in the Roman Empire. Because of how obsessed the Romans were with man-hood, that was an act of reducing the humanity of the slave, and they also believed it made them more infertile.

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What do you mean "not just Europe"? I wasn't aware Europe was a hotbed of circumcision?
ETA: Since the earliest recorded cases are from ancient Egypt, you could surmise Africa to be the origin of this practice, really.

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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:

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What do you mean "not just Europe"? I wasn't aware Europe was a hotbed of circumcision?
ETA: Since the earliest recorded cases are from ancient Egypt, you could surmise Africa to be the origin of this practice, really.

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Well, they're not now. And Christian dominated Europe wasn't either really. But the religious idea was often associated with the Jewish people, and got the most attention from European Christians. So Europe was the one to make a big deal out of it.

Some tribes in Africa have their own traditions that appear unrelated, but circumcision is most commonly associated with Europe and the Mediterranean and the Middle East - at least, by people of European descent, but also by much of the rest of the world that does not circumcize.

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imply that it's really not a European thing?

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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:
Because it came up.

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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:

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imply that it's really not a European thing?

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Most people don't automatically think of the Middle East or Africa first when they think of circumcision. And when people talk about the "Western world" and "western civilization" and the religions that established the social mores that lead to widespread practices in Europe and America, they think of Europe as an originator of that culture.

You just said that people in Germany complained about a ruling against circumcision, so they passed a law that allows for non-medical circumcision. It's a part of European culture and therefore western culture, even if it's not as common in Europe as in America, and even if it's more common in Muslims than either.

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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:
It's a western civilization thing, which means Europe - even the places in Europe where it wasn't so prevalent still had more incidence of it than say the far east or most of Africa (as only a select few tribes of Africa do this). Only Muslims do more circumcisions, but Muslims weren't around as long as Jewish folk in Europe have been.

But all right then, England, if you insist.

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Male circumcision is most prevalent in the Muslim world (near-universal), parts of Southeast Asia and of Africa, the United States, the Philippines, Israel, and South Korea. In contrast, it is rare in Europe, parts of Southern Africa, and most of Asia and Oceania.[5] In Latin America, prevalence is universally low.[6] The WHO states that "there is generally little non-religious circumcision in Asia, with the exceptions of the Republic of Korea and the Philippines".[5]

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Originally posted by BYTEMITE:I think we're arguing two different though valid interpretations of the same basic facts.

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