Sacrificing a Blog Post to the God of Reasoned Argument

Over at The League of Ordinary Gentlemen, Freddie evicerates a post by Matt Steinglass, which supposedly takes up the debate about a CDC report on circumcision (warning: salty language in both posts, and the excerpt beolow).  Freddie's post is an absolute How To on the subject of taking apart a blog post, point by point.

When I first read Steinglass's post, I thought it seemed like ignorable tripe.  Some reasonable points, but a bit of a rambling mess.  Well, Freddie read closer than I and shows that it was ignorant ignorable tripe.  Here's a taste:

6. Assert! Assert as if your life depended on it!
Steinglass: “But the main point is that if the guy who wrote the email were circumcised, he wouldn’t have written the email.”

Oh! Well then! You’re right, nothing to see here. I’m sure “my dick” guy will be pleased to know that. If he asks what evidence you offer for that wild claim, I’ll tell him to put a sock in it.
Steinglass: “There may be some vanishingly small number of guys who are upset about the fact that their parents circumcised them.”

I’m gonna go ahead and guess that Matt Steinglass has not been out in the field taking some sort of foreskin census.

Seriously, read the whole thing; it's great (and bonus points for the use of the term "foreskin census").  I certainly hope Freddie never finds fault with anything I write.

By the way, there seems to be alot of buzz around the circumcision debate.  This is a good thing; this is a debate that the West should have had a long time ago.  I may comment on it later, but in the meantime here are some links:

David Harsanyi at Reason on "Circumcision Panels".

Hannah Rossin, sitting in at The Daily Dish at The Atlantic, supports the snip.

Again at The Daily Dish, Chris Boedner writes about circumcision and sensitivity.

Freddie, again, with a pretty great post on circumcision and the CDC report.