BOULDER, COLORADO: 13th International Symposium on Genital Autonomy this week

PRWeb
July 19, 2014

13th International Symposium on Genital Autonomy, Children's Rights, and Infant Circumcision

The 13th International Symposium on Genital Autonomy and Children's Rights, "Whole Bodies, Whole Selves: Activating Social Change," will be hosted by the University of Colorado at Boulder on July 24-26, 2014.

The symposium will promote interdisciplinary dialogue about the often controversial topic of genital cutting practices of male, female, and intersex children, and on strategies for protecting children from unnecessary genital alteration.

The conference features speakers from around the world, including the US, Canada, Australia, United Kingdom, Israel, Germany, Belgium, Denmark, Liberia, and Finland. Included are experts in healthcare law, ethics, urology, midwifery, anthropology, pediatrics, medicine, psychology, foreskin repair and restoration, and children's rights. See the program for presentation details.

Several conference presenters are Jewish; some will be speaking specifically about the problems inherent in Jewish ritual circumcision. Jewish presenters include: psychologist Ronald Goldman, who will be speaking about the psychology of circumcision; award-winning journalist Jennifer Margulis will be speaking about the business of circumcision in connection with her recent book The Business of Baby (Scribner 2013); Berkeley, California novelist Lisa Braver Moss will be speaking about non-circumcising families in the Jewish community; social activist Eran Sedah will be speaking (via Skype) about the anti-circumcision movement in Israel; psychiatrist Richard Schwartzman will be speaking about unconscious cruelty--the emotions behind genital cutting; writer/publisher Rebecca Wald will be speaking about the Beyond the Bris website; and documentary filmmaker Francelle Wax will be screening an excerpt from her forthcoming film.

In addition to three days of presentations, three films will be screened in the evenings including: Intersexion by Grant Lahood, John Keir, and Mani Bruce Mitchell; The Hidden Trauma: Circumcision in America (excerpt) by Brendon Marotta; and American Secret: The Circumcision Agenda (excerpt) by Francelle Wax.

These Symposia have taken place every other year since 1989, alternating between the United States and a location abroad. They are an important forum for advancing knowledge and thought on these issues, and for connecting people in the Genital Autonomy Movement from all over the world.

The 13th International Symposium on Genital Autonomy and Children's Rights is sponsored by The National Organization of Circumcision Information Resource Centers (USA), Intact America (USA), Genital Autonomy (UK and Australia), and the Sexpo Foundation (Finland). It is locally organized by NOCIRC of Colorado.

Press passes for the symposium are available - please contact Gillian Longley.

Program and registration information is available at: www.GenitalAutonomy2014.com

You can read more about previous nocirc.org/symposia/

Read the full story at www.prweb.com/releases/2014/07/prweb12028739.htm

HELSINKI: Symposium issues Declaration of Genital Autonomy

October 3, 2012

Syposium issues Declaration of the Right to Genital Autonomy

A symposium in Helsinki has issued a Declaration that Genital Autonomy is a human right.

The Twelfth International Symposium on Law, Genital Autonomy and Human Rights, was held jointly by the Sexpo Foundation, Genital Autonomy and the National Organization of Circumcision Information Resource Centers (NOCIRC). It included speakers from Australia, Denmark, Finland, Indonesia, Sweden, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and the United States.

The declaration asserts, inter alia:

the existence of a fundamental right of each human being[,] a Right of Genital Autonomy, that is the right to:

• personal control of their own genital and reproductive organs; and
• protection from medically unnecessary genital modification and other irreversible reproductive interventions.

the fundamental right of parents and guardians to freedom of thought, conscience and religion ... not absolute, [but] limited by the same fundamental human rights of others, in particular their children.
healthy genital and reproductive organs are natural, normal, functional parts of the human body.

And it calls on all states that have signed the Convention on the Rights of the Child (every country in the world except Romania and the USA) to honour their commitments under that convention.

Also at the symposium, a Finnish mother with a Ghanaian husband told of her unsuccessful attempt to protect her son from circumcision. The Finnish Children's Ombusman spoke of moves in that country age-restrict circumcision. Other topics included the role of law in Islamic and Jewish genital cutting, growing interest in Brit Shalom, the CIA's secret studies into the psychological effects of circumcision, ancient Egyptical penile modification customs, and transgender and intersex issues with genital surgery.