Laws
The legality of tongue splitting will vary greatly depending on the country and within those countries, individual states or territories. Some examples are given below, but do not encompass all the laws regarding this subject.
Some branches of the U.S. military ban body modifications that detract from a professional military image and explicitly include tongue splitting or forking as examples.
Illinois was the first state in the U.S. to make tongue splitting illegal in 2003. Since then New York, Delaware, and Texas have enacted laws that either ban the practice, ban the procedure on minors without parental consent or restricted it to being performed by only doctors and/or dentists.
In 2009, the Australian state of Victoria enacted a ban on splitting the tongues of minors.
Read more about this topic: Tongue Splitting
Famous quotes containing the word laws:
“The tide which, after our former relaxed government, took a violent course towards the opposite extreme, and seemed ready to hang every thing round with the tassils and baubles of monarchy, is now getting back as we hope to a just mean, a government of laws addressed to the reason of the people, and not to their weaknesses.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“The members of a body-politic call it “the state” when it is passive, “the sovereign” when it is active, and a “power” when they compare it with others of its kind. Collectively they use the title “people,” and they refer to one another individually as “citizens” when speaking of their participation in the authority of the sovereign, and as “subjects” when speaking of their subordination to the laws of the state.”
—Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778)
“The laws of Caesar are one thing, those of Christ, another. Papinianus judges one way, our Paul another.”
—Jerome (c. 340–420)