Andrew Gross
July 27, 2022
We first reported about Ulf Dunkel and his IntactiWiki website two years ago. We described the articles on the Wikipedia-style website as "false, misleading, incomplete, trivial, extremely biased, or otherwise deficient." Dunkel, a salesman in Germany, made no attempt to respond to our accusations. Instead he merely claimed that our article 'proves that [Circumcision Choice] are bulling intactivists."
Then last year I reported that Dunkel had created a page about me. I showed that virtually everything he posted about me was false, misleading, defamatory, or ad hominem and irrelevant. He made false statements about the purpose of this website, my role, and my own personal opinions. Although he's never met me and we've barely interacted on social media, Dunkel attempted to psychoanalyze me; he claimed that I suffer cognitive dissonance and that my positive, healthy relationship with my parents prevents me from swallowing numerous intactomyths for which he refuses to provide evidence.
In responding to the second article, Dunkel again failed to address any of the criticisms. Instead, he added additional false and misleading statements. In response to his meritless accusation that our Mental Disorder article mocks unhappy circumcised men, I offered to donate $100 to an intactivist organization if he could identify one false statement in the article. So far he's been silent.
Late last month Dunkel updated his IntactiWiki article about me. He hasn't corrected any of his numerous false and defamatory statements about me. He hasn't removed any of his ad hominen and irrelevant statements about me. Instead, he accused me - gratuitously - of trying to inflict trauma on others, presumably newborn boys. He wrote about me: "One suspects that he is trying to encourage repeating the trauma of circumcision on others." Apparently he claims that circumcision is trauma and that I personally encourage parents to circumcise their sons in order for the newborns to suffer psychological trauma.
To support his defamatory accusation, Dunkel cited The Compulsion to Repeat the Trauma - a 1989 paper by Boston University psychiatry professor Bessel van der Kolk. The author reported that "Many traumatized people expose themselves, seemingly compulsively, to situations reminiscent of the original trauma." One of several reenactment methods is to inflict the trauma on others. The author cited criminals who were "physically or sexually abused as children," including 12 juveniles who were found guilty of murder and sentenced to death in 1987.
The words circumcision and circumcised do not appear in the paper. Any attempt to take seriously a comparison between circumcision and homicide strains the brain. Even if such a comparison were considered reasonable, Dunkel provides no evidence that my newborn circumcision affects my contemporary thoughts, opinions, emotions, or behavior.
Nor has the IntactiWiki owner provided any evidence that circumcision constitutes trauma generally, or that I am traumatized by my own circumcision. In the article he cited, the adult victims of childhood trauma exhibited numerous signs of trauma, including stress, depression, helplessness, painful memories, nightmares, an inability to deal with challenges, difficulty bonding with others, alcoholism, substance abuse, and self-harm. Dunkel failed to provide any evidence that my life includes any of these maladies. He can't - because circumcision doesn't cause trauma. Intactivism causes trauma.
Dunkel is wrong about everything. I don't encourage circumcision; I provide information about the procedure. I am not pro circumcision; I am pro parents choice. I support a parent's choice for circumcision, and I also support a parent's choice against circumcision.
Unfortunately I'm all too familiar with actual trauma and grief. More than ten years ago my younger brother died suddenly and unexpectedly. Thinking about him elicits many memories - many happy memories, but also intensely painful ones. I have several friends who have lost loved ones tragically and prematurely. Intact America Executive Director Georganne Chapin has expressed her own grief upon the death of her brother. Five years later she wrote, "I will never stop missing him." - a sentiment with which I can identify intimately. If we were to meet, I would offer Chapin sincere condolences on her loss. I wouldn't want anyone to suffer this kind of pain.
If my circumcision had actually traumatized me, it would never occur to me to inflict that same pain on anyone else, especially a newborn boy. If circumcision actually were harmful, then I would be standing with Ulf Dunkel against the procedure. I find the notion that a person would want others to suffer trauma - because the person himself had suffered trauma - unfathomable.
Ulf Dunkel has maliciously attacked me and continues to attack me for one simple reason: he is utterly unable to refute the facts and information that this website provides. He is utterly unable to defend the intactomyths that he's posted on IntactiWiki, statements that we've exposed as false and misleading. He hates that the information Circumcision Choice provides is true and reliable and available to anyone with internet access. Ironically, the result of his ad hominem attacks is to reinforce even further my confidence in the accuracy of every Circumcision Choice article.
INTACTIWIKI SERIES
IntactiWiki accuses me of inflicting trauma on babies
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