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Nov. 19, 2016 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
24:01
3504 Anti-Male Cognitive Dissonance | Brendon Marotta and Stefan Molyneux
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Hi everybody, Stefan Molyneux from Free Domain Radio.
I hope you're doing well.
Yes, it's time to grab your eyes back and cross your legs.
We're talking with Brandon Morata.
He is an award-winning filmmaker and the director of American Circumcision.
This is a feature-length documentary about the most common surgery in America and, of course, it references the growing intactivist movement against circumcision.
You can find out more information about the movie coming up at circumcisionmovie.com.
Brandon, thanks so much for taking the time today.
Thank you for speaking with me.
So it's been a five-year journey for you with this movie.
What got you interested in the topic to begin with, and how has your thinking changed over the last half decade?
You know, there's a saying among all the people who I've interviewed, which is that no one finds this issue on purpose.
The issue sort of finds you.
Most of them have a moment where they have an obsessive epiphany where this thing that they thought was normal in their culture suddenly doesn't look so normal.
And they realize there's more to the story.
And I definitely had that too.
I went through a period where I was sort of letting go of all sorts of things and beliefs that I was taught growing up that didn't serve me anymore.
And one of the things that came up in my mind was circumcision.
Because that is a choice that parents make that you can't really change later.
So it bothered me that there were all these other things I was letting go of and changing and shifting.
And this one, you couldn't change.
Most people, I just figured I'm not going to think about it because if you can't change it, why think about it and let that issue go and just out of sight, out of mind?
Then I started practicing meditation.
In meditation, you don't really get to choose what you think about and what you don't.
This topic entered my mind again when I was in meditation.
For me, meditation is not any sort of mystical thing.
It's just being present with whatever's there.
And I pay attention to what comes up there.
And so, after that experience of having this come into my mind during meditation, I started researching.
And having, you know, what my interview subjects have called the obsessive epiphany.
And there's so much more to this subject than people realize.
And I think that when I started working on the film, I had this idea that I would just share the information that I was learning.
And then people would, you know, change their minds.
That's a very rational thing to do.
You get new information, you change your opinion, right?
And of course it doesn't work that way.
Hey, if you've got incontrovertible facts, surely you will flow, you know, like a kite following the wind.
We're all supposed to follow reason and evidence, but boy, it doesn't take you long to realize that mostly you're not making progress.
You're stepping on landmines.
At least that's what it feels like for a while.
Oh, huge landmines.
I mean, this issue involves sex and politics and religion all in the most personal way possible.
And so it's all these like huge identity level issues.
And so you think you're talking about this one individual thing.
And really, when you talk with people about it, it's all of the ripples around that.
It's all of these huge, you know, identity level things, the things that define who we are as people.
And so Just trying to change this one belief, you bring up all sorts of crazy things that people have going on.
And that, I think, is how the documentary's evolved.
Initially, I thought, well, I'll just present this information.
And now, it's almost like a character study of what is it that makes people react the way that they do to this subject.
There's this thing in American culture that We don't talk about, but it's actually incredibly common, and everyone has some sort of personal, you know, experience with, on a very, in most cases, a very intimate level.
And we don't talk about it, and when people do try to talk about it, all of that stuff comes up.
And so that's sort of the thing that, or one of the things that the film focuses on, and that really interests me about this issue.
American exceptionalism is usually meant in a positive way, but in America, as far as I understand it, it's the only country in the world where circumcision is routinely practiced for non-religious reasons.
And of course the medical justifications have always seemed to me, and we've had some other experts on the show about this topic, shaky at best and certainly overwhelmed by the negative emotional and physical experiences and results of circumcision.
How on earth did it come to the point in America Where, I guess, a Jewish practice, a Muslim practice to some degree, ended up being the norm in America.
The saying I've heard from many of my interview subjects is that circumcision is a cure in search of a disease.
It's this thing that we're doing it, so there's got to be a reason we're doing it, and so people are just sort of trying to find that reason.
Initially, it began in America in the Victorian era as a cure for masturbation.
They believed that masturbation was the cause of many ills, both social and physiological.
And if you remove the most pleasurable part of the penis, the gliding mechanism that makes masturbation much easier, then you would stop this very dangerous practice.
So similar to hobbling slaves or similar to the genital mutilation that occurs for girls in an attempt to control their sexuality various places around the world.
So it was very much was a repression of animal instinct.
And of course the Victorians, known for some positive things, but emotional openness to sexual experience, not really high on that list.
Right.
And so then when birth moved from home to hospital, this was something hospitals could charge for.
And whatever the disease of the decade was, that was what circumcision cured.
So initially people said, oh, it's going to cure cancer, you know, penile cancer.
You know, the American Cancer Society says that's not really the case.
And, you know, again, like, era to era, there's a particular benefit that it supposedly caused.
And now, you know, I interview a member of the American Academy of Pediatric Circumcision Task Force, and there are members of that task force who will say that, well, it's the cultural aspect, that's why we do it.
It's not, you know, they acknowledge now that the medical benefits Are not overwhelming enough to recommend it, but, well, parents have all these reasons they want it, so we should give them that choice.
It's a sociological argument from a medical organization.
It's very bizarre.
And would be equally applicable to female genital mutilation as well.
I mean, if there are cultures where that's the norm, surely then doctors should provide it, but of course...
I guess it's all that male privilege accumulating that people would find it horrifying for little girls to be genitally mutilated, but for little boys, it's, well, you know, it's culture and it's fine.
Right, and we get into that in the film.
We interview more than one generally cut woman.
And they'll all say that they're very similar and that there's obvious similarities between the practice.
Whereas when you talk to American physicians, they say, well, oh, female circumcision is always done To control and harm women's sexuality, and male circumcision is always done for the man's benefit.
But when you talk to women from cultures where female circumcision is practiced, they'll say, in our culture, we're taught the body part has no value, and that this is better for us, it's somehow cleaner and preferable, and men won't want you unless you have this happen, and it feels better, and all the sort of same things that American culture tells men.
And they'll get, you know, I even interview in the film one woman who chose to have female circumcision done and she says that she prefers, you know, she doesn't feel mutilated, it's circumcision, chose to have that done as an adult and that she thinks it's better.
And it's like, you know, what do American physicians say to that?
They've sort of given away all of the moral high ground about human rights and the idea of Children, you know, having the right to their own bodies and consent mattering and all of that stuff to continue this practice which is in their culture.
And in fact there was a statement released by them that was very quickly retracted where they said that because male circumcision is so much more an invasive procedure and more invasive than many forms of female circumcision Then American doctors should be able to do a ritual nick on little girls' genitals to satisfy parents who come from cultures that practice female circumcision.
And of course, the moment they released this statement, there was a huge uproar because we have federal laws against any kind of female genital cutting.
And that sort of revealed how this practice has influenced American thinking on other issues.
People think of it as this decision that's made one time that happens in this particular context, but actually it's rippling out into all other forms of culture.
Right.
Now, of course, the idea put forward is that there are medical benefits, and the medical benefits are not immediate.
And they're preventive as far as I understand it in general.
But this is nothing that happens anywhere else.
We don't sort of cut off little girls' breasts because they might get breast cancer in the future.
We don't do these kinds of preventive measures with others.
And is there not a sort of Hippocratic oath that says, do no harm?
I mean, this is healthy tissue.
There's nothing wrong with it.
It is evolved evolutionary for very particular reasons.
It's a third of the skin of the penis.
It has significant negative consequences in terms of erectile dysfunction and other things later on in life.
So to me, if you're a doctor and you're cornered into its tradition, I mean, good Lord!
I mean, at what point do we look at other things and say, well, these are brutal, barbaric practices?
I mean, wasn't it tradition at some point to have frontal lobotomies for people who had mental illnesses?
I mean, don't you change these things based on new information?
Well, they will push back on much of the information you just shared.
And the interesting thing about The AAP's position and the position of many American doctors is it sort of shifts over time and even depending on the context they're talking.
So, yes, the argument that you're making is one that's being made by thousands of people now in the intactivist movement who say, you know, we This does not fit with our other beliefs about human rights, about sexual freedom, personal freedom, human autonomy.
But that's the nature, I mean, like we talked about at the beginning, it isn't rational.
That's the nature of culture, is that once there's a tradition or belief in there, cognitive dissonance will make people find new reasons for it.
And that's the thing that interests me about this, too, is that You can present people with all the same information, and our film goes really deeply into all that information, but ultimately their decision isn't rational.
I mean, even among parents who choose circumcision, it's not like they are really reading through the academic and medical literature about particular studies.
They're making a decision based on, well, what did my parents do?
And what does my culture say?
And what does my religion say?
It's a totally non-rational decision.
And it's sort of terrifying that we have this very common decision in our culture that affects someone's sexuality for the rest of their life and is being made totally non-rationally and based on mixed or misinformation.
Well, I mean, okay, so we can look at the parents' decision, but parents aren't supposed to be making decisions about their children's healthcare without being informed of the positives and negatives by physicians.
I mean, of course, I mean, you can't just say, well, there's some particular thing, I don't know, cut off a nipple, it's my tradition.
I mean, the doctors have a moral responsibility not to destroy and remove healthy tissue from a human being.
And so it is up to the doctors, I would argue, to give the correct information and it seems that the doctors are not giving very consistent information in that publicly it seems that they say well there's no real reduction in sensation and so on it's like That's a third of the skin of the penis.
You remove that and you say there's no reduction in sensation.
Yes, that's right.
You can cut off two fingers of my hand and it doesn't affect my grip at all.
I mean, this is like not even close to sane in terms of what people are saying.
So the doctors have a responsibility to provide the correct information so that people can make the decision.
The other question is, is it even legitimate for the parents to make a decision about the bodily functions and skin and nerve endings, particularly with sexual pleasure, for a child for the rest of his life?
If the child really, really wants to do it, hey, you can go in when you're an adult and you can make your own choice as an adult, but I don't see how this is anywhere close to moral or ethical. - Yeah, I mean, this is the discussion that intactivists have been having with the medical establishment for 30 years.
And for 30 years, they've been saying that.
And, you know, initially, Marilyn Malos, who's the head of NoCerc, the National Organization of Circumcision Resource Centers, when she started, she had a booth inside the AAP conference, and now they won't even let anyone from that group in.
So I think that, you know, while these arguments make sense, The medical establishment is kind of frightened of what it would mean to say that this thing that they've done for close to a hundred years now is harmful, and that they've harmed that many people on that large a scale.
I mean, like, that's terrifying for them.
And then the legal liabilities that that opens, to admit that, you know.
Well, but aren't they admitting, if I remember, there was an article from 2013 where privately some doctors were saying, well, yeah, it does remove sensation, it reduces sensation considerably, circumcision, but that's advantageous to men because it means they'll climax later and get more, and it's like, oh my lord, are you really at that place where you're saying, no, no, no, it does reduce sensation, sexual sensation for men, but it allows them to last longer with their erections, so that's fine.
Who on earth are you people to make decisions like that for others?
And that's what I mean by the shifting position, is that, you know, if they're talking to one group and they'll reach for the cultural benefits, if they're talking to another, they'll say it's medical.
And, you know, like, it just, it shifts.
Even now, like, one of the people I interview has a paper saying, well, it's the cultural, like, the cultural reason is why we do it.
A cure in search of a disease.
And you sort of have to...
It's almost like playing whack-a-mole to try to go after all these particular rationalizations.
Because the moment you disprove one, then they'll cite the opposite belief as a reason to do it.
Because it's not rational.
There's all of these other cultural factors at play.
So yeah, I mean, you are...
Speaking rationally to something that isn't rational.
And that's what's interesting about it, is that when you start getting into the reason, and when you start getting into all the data and the facts, there's a saying again among activists that the more you learn, the worse it gets.
Like, it just gets stranger.
Okay, but let's say that there are cultural elements involved, and let's sort of jump out of the Medical, in my view, immorality of the entire lack of consent or the entire operation or the mutilation of a boy's healthy genitals.
Surely, at least we can agree that it's a private decision and therefore should not be funded by the state.
It is not medically necessary in almost all situations.
So it should not be funded by the state.
I would take that as a step forward.
There's no liability to solve it.
If you want to mutilate your boy's genitals, God help you.
I have no sympathy.
But at least don't force other people to pay for it.
And in a study that we looked at with regards to circumcision, when a state removed, public funding of circumcision rates dropped enormously.
So let's at least look at that.
It's not necessary.
It drives up the cost of healthcare.
It's a big waste of time and resources, not to mention, in my view, entirely immoral, a violation of the non-aggression principle.
Let's at least get it out of public funding.
That has been a strategy that's been hugely successful for activists, and it reveals so much about This cultural decision that if you tell people it's going to cost like $300, then all of a sudden they're like, oh, well now I have to think about it.
That's the level of thought that goes into it.
And so I completely agree.
I don't know that, you know, there's no reason to fund unnecessary surgeries on babies.
I mean, that's the level of sort of strangeness that this has brought about in culture.
I mean, would governments fund a nose job for somebody who had a perfectly functioning nose?
Right, yeah.
I mean, and again, this is where the arguments shift.
They'll say, well, the medical benefits make it worthwhile.
And it's like, wait a minute, you also acknowledge that the medical benefits are not enough to recommend it.
So there's this, like, you know, there's that weird doublespeak again there.
So it's, you know, it's very strange.
And it only gets stranger the more that you learn about it.
I mean, that's what his...
What kept me going interviewing people for this long and working on this film is that there is so much information there.
You don't even have to accept all of the science and arguments saying that it reduces sexual sensation or that it's traumatic or that parents aren't being given proper informed consent on it or even just that it's a human being and if you change something about someone's body they're going to have feelings about it and maybe later they don't want that or maybe later they don't like that that was done.
That's almost second to the idea that We don't necessarily have the right to change other people's bodies without their consent.
Sorry to interrupt, but what if the parents wanted a girl and got a boy?
Do they get to do gender reassignment surgery as infants?
Of course not.
Well, that's my preference.
So what?
It's wrong.
Right.
This is the argument people have been having for 30 years.
It's like a brick wall when you say that to members of the medical establishment.
And I don't know that they're going to be the first to change.
I think that culture has to change first.
I mean, it's not like when foot binding stopped, there was a big medical argument about foot binding.
It was just that, oh, this is not helpful, and there was a cultural shift.
And that's been true of almost every human rights issue or medical abuse.
So it's going to take a bit of effort.
It's not something that I think that will go away.
There's not one argument you can make that will make people go, oh, okay, now I'm a logical person and I'm going to just shift my...
For some people, that's true.
Some people, you give them the information and they're willing to receive that and have a shift in perspective.
But others, there's some change work that needs to happen.
And there's some cultural change work that needs to happen.
Yeah.
My particular approach, and I've got this with spanking, is another one of these arguments that people have All kinds of crazy non-rational or anti-rational responses to.
If people don't want to learn by ethics, then they have to learn through negative consequences.
And it's fine to have problems with people who allowed half a third of your penis to get cut off.
That's my particular perspective.
So, Brendan, let's talk about what you need.
I mean, I know you've got a Kickstarter going.
You've met that goal.
But the movie, where is it relative to release?
What do you need from people to be able to get this thing finished and out there and begin to really help and save kids?
You know, it's really traumatic for kids.
You know, six months after kids, boys are circumcised, They still have elevated levels of cortisol in their blood.
It's a deep shock to the system and this is your first basic taste of being outside of your mother's womb is having a third of your penis skin soared off basically, usually without anesthesia or with some nonsense local anesthesia that no adult would be completely immoral, would be a violation of all medical ethics to perform an adult circumcision with local anesthetic.
It's unbelievable.
But so you really want to go out and help the world make better decisions about this.
What do you need from people to get the job done?
We really just need people to share the message and contribute in the way that they can.
The film right now, it's shot.
I have an edit.
I'm working to bring that edit down to its final runtime.
We're running a Kickstarter that's raising funds for all of the final post-production stuff, all the sound and color correction and music and things like that.
And we're actually now aiming for stretch goals that allow us to do things like a tour and put more media out there that's going to hopefully influence the culture on this issue and make it something that people are aware of.
I really think, though, that the best thing that people can do Is have a conversation about it with someone who is in a position to make a better decision.
That's sort of the base level, is being willing to talk about it.
Because this issue is so taboo, and it touches on so many different things, that just having the conversation is an act of bravery.
We are creating media, we're doing things that will give people what they need to start that conversation, because I think it's a very different Conversation of like, let me talk to you for, you know, two hours about circumcision versus like, oh, here, here, there's a movie I saw that you can watch and it's really good.
Like that's sort of a way to start that conversation much easier.
But I think that's the biggest thing.
Well, and I just want to help people to sort of understand Brendan needs resources and needs money to be able to finish the movie and get out and provide it to people.
I also want to make sure if people can say no to me, but I never want them to misunderstand what people are asking for.
We have a Kickstarter.
Please go contribute.
Yeah, go contribute, kick over some cash, and this will really help do some good.
So circumcisionmovie.com.
I assume that there's a link to the Kickstarter there, Brendan.
Is that right?
Really big on the front page.
Really big.
Okay, that's good.
We're front and center.
That's where we want it.
Thanks so much.
Do you have a time estimate?
I know it's a little dependent on funding.
Do you have a time estimate for when this might be done?
So we're saying a year from now, right now.
It could be a little sooner.
It could be a little bit after that.
But I'm putting it very far in the future so that if we over-deliver, we can over-deliver if it's sooner.
But about a year from now is what I'm thinking.
Alright, so everyone keep your eyes on that, circumcisionmovie.com.
Please go and help out Brendan if you can, and share the information, even if you just share the promo piece, the sort of the coming soon, the preview, that's helpful enough to get a conversation going.
We of course have done work on circumcision on this channel, which we'll link to below.
You can find that at youtube.com slash freedomainradio.
Brendan, thanks so much for your time.
I'm sure we'll talk again closer to release, but I really appreciate the work that you're doing out there in the world.
Thank you.
I appreciate the work you're doing as well.
I've been a fan of your show a long time, so it's nice to finally talk to you.
Appreciate it.
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