Circumcision: Should it be Illegal for Under 18’s?
“All truth goes through three stages. First it is ridiculed. Then it is violently opposed. Finally, it is accepted as self-evident.”
Arthur Schoepenhauer.
Following my recent article, ‘Circumcision, AIDS and Human Rights‘ questioning the legitimacy of circumcision, I posted this question on an official White House discussion board;
‘Is it time to make circumcision illegal for under 18’s?
My aim was to help facilitate discussion and debate regarding this subject.
I asked….
What about the rights of newborn babies and children?
Don’t they need protection?
As a Manager at United States Department of Defense put it;
“the arguments flew from irrational, to emotional, to religious, to parental rights!”
Part of my opening arguments were as follows:
Human rights as listed by the U.N.
* Article 3: “No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”.
* Article 5(1): “Everyone has the right to liberty and security of the person”.
* Article 8: “Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life” except for the “protection of health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others”.
* Article 9(1): “Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion”.
* Article 9(2): “Freedom to manifest one’s religion or beliefs shall be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the protection of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others”.(III)
And the relationship within these rights and the pain endured by the infant.
Because according to a comprehensive study, newborn responses to pain are ’similar to, but greater than, those observed in adult subjects.’
Some infants do not cry because they go into traumatic shock from the overwhelming pain of the surgery. No experimental anesthetic has been found to be safe and effective in preventing circumcision pain in infants.
The procedure for circumcision in America involves the baby being strapped spread-eagle to a plastic board, with his arms and legs immobilized by Velcro straps. A nurse scrubs his genitals with an antiseptic solution and places a surgical drape – with a hole in it to expose his penis – across his body.
The doctor grasps the tip of the foreskin with one hemostat and inserts another hemostat between the foreskin and the glans. In 96% of newborns, these two structures are attached to one another by a continuous layer of epithelium, which protects the sensitive glans from urine and feces in infancy and childhood.
The foreskin is then torn from the glans. The hemostat is used to crush an area of the foreskin lengthwise, which prevents bleeding when the doctor cuts through the tissue to enlarge the foreskin opening. This allows insertion of the circumcision instrument. The foreskin is crushed against this device and amputated.
Currently, some doctors use a dorsal penile nerve block to numb the penis during infant circumcision. While not always effective, this anesthesia may afford some pain relief during the surgery, although it offers no pain relief during the recovery period (which can last up to 14 days) when the baby urinates and defecates into the raw wound.
Does this enforced practice, inflicted without approval from the subject, constitute infringement of human (child ) rights and a call for an age of consent?
Someone put forward this argument…..
“Judaism and other religions, routinely remove the foreskin for religious purposes. Health benefits follow. Perhaps those who began this practice, ‘God’?, knew something that contemporary humans refute”.
If it was God, how come he installed the foreskin with 20,000 specialized nerve endings (sexual receptors) only to say ‘tear it off’, depriving the owner “a symphony of sensation” during sexual activity?
Is he saying he made a mistake?
It is not healthy for a child to have their foreskin removed. The foreskin is normal, healthy tissue, and its adherence to the glans (head of the penis) serves the important function of protecting the glans penis from urine and feces in infancy and early childhood.
Another response…..
“I was circumcised. I’m protestant, but was done anyway. Don’t remember it. No harm, no foul. Newborns have to have a blood draw for a test almost immediately after birth. It hurts, and they don’t consent. Should we stop that, too?”
You would never get much support for this “cause.”
and…..
“I was circumcised too. I’ve never seen such an absurd topic discussed in my 54 year life. Don’t see what the fuss is all about.”
I put forward that there was another harmless cultural practice that folk used to think was acceptable and didn’t see what the fuss was about…
Chinese foot binding…..
An ancient tradition of beauty and torture. Passed from mother to daughter, generation to generation, that lasted for almost 1,000 years, foot binding was seen as a sign of beauty and attractiveness.
Once a girl was of marriageable age, prospective mother-in-laws would come around and pick a wife for her son by the appearance of the girl’s feet. Foot binding was the act of wrapping a three- to five-year old girl’s feet with binding so as to bend the toes under, break the bones and force the back of the foot together.
The bound foot was also a symbol of identity and virtue. A bound foot signified that a woman had achieved womanhood, and served as a mark of her gendered identity. Foot binding was not considered mutilation but a form of adornment, an embellishment to the human body.
So is circumcision mutilation?
“Mutilation … implies the cutting off or removal of a part essential to completeness, not only of a person but also of a thing, and to his or its perfection, beauty, entirety, or fulfillment of function.” (Webster’s Dictionary of SynonymsSpringfield,)
Which initiated this response….
“Circumcision does not affect any functional part of the body, and does not affect either sexual or urinary function. It is a choice of the parents. It does no harm. Get a life”.
and…
“I guess Ann is a symptom of a wider disease. She is merely acting out a desire to inflict her opinion on others. It’s a disease that seems to infect mostly the radical left [let's face it Ann, your a lefty, aren't you?]. If you don’t agree with the radicals they launch into their verbose little diatribe which quotes all sorts of facts and figures from other lefties. They throw this up as some sort of proof that they’re right.
Let’s be frank Ann, can we? You’re not a man. Circumcision doesn’t affect you. You saw a vacancy in the Circumcision Advocates Weekly and went for it. As a man, I resent having you as my representative. Men don’t need you looking after their penises. Little boys have done fine for thousands of years without Ann Margrain and we will continue to do so”.
and…
“Ann, making circumcision illegal is unconstitutional. It violates the right to religious freedom. What right of yours do you want taken away or for me to try to make illegal?
And, as the representative of the Department of Defense pointed out…
“Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence. There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, etc… This means that none of the articles you stipulate validate (or apply) to your question against circumcision”.
I replied…
I agree, circumcision is a big constitutional issue, with parental rights and religious issues involved.
People have tried to impose U.S law on religious groups before. For example, the Supreme Court invalidated statutes requiring Jehovah’s Witness children to salute the flag in public schools. The Court found that the flag salute statute violated the religious establishment and free exercise clauses of the first amendment and emphasized that the refusal to salute would have no effect on others.
Whether circumcision has an effect, mentally or physically, on others namely the infant is open to debate.
And we could debate all day and night about rights and freedom. As people state, it’s about religious freedom and rights of the family to do what they want.
All right. Let’s throw my opening case of rights for the child out of the window.
Let’s take a different direction.
Would a child be afforded protection under Civil Law?
Because there are “no medical indications for routine circumcision,” the doctrine of informed consent requires that parents be told that such surgery is not required, that is is painful and that there are significant rates of surgical complications. Failure to give a complete explanation warrants a suit by parents, by the child or by a friend acting on the child’s behalf.
However, does authorizing surgery on an infant after such a warning, conceivably open the door to a subsequent suit by the child against his parents?
Okay, maybe the courts would be reluctant to take this route.
Would it be possible for a class action suit against hospitals because competent surgeons are aware that routine neonatal circumcision is not good medical practice?
Would this avoid the constitutional issues of parental rights, as well as religious issues, since the Orthodox Jewish circumcision ceremony is not normally performed in medical centers by medical personnel?
As William E. Brigman, Professor of Law, points out in his paper, ‘Circumcision as Child Abuse‘, the Legal and Constitutional Issues suits for damages against surgeons, hospitals, and conceivably parents, are possible because;
“Malice in the sense of ill will or a desire to cause injury is not essential to sustain a recovery for intentional wrongdoing. It is enough for the plaintiff to show that the defendant knowingly and intentionally did the act which caused the damage and that damage was substantially certain to follow.”
This may be the only solution because at the end of the day, as John Geishker DOC Seattle, pointed out to me…
“With all due respect and admiration for your efforts on behalf of children:
I rarely miss a chance to express my firm opposition to non-therapeutic cultural surgeries upon children such as circumcision.
However, Obama is no fool. He knows that even though Jews make up only 2% of the US population, they are overwhelmingly liberal and form a strong and influential base of his urban support. As they would be
offended (even the atheists among them, and there are many, would be, always a mystery) he would not touch this issue with a 12-mile pole, let alone lend it any support.
It’s a ‘third-rail,’ a PR death-wish, like suggesting the races have differences in intelligence, or women are too emotional for politics.
All hell would break lose and he and his advisers, esp. Rahm Emanuel, David Axelrod, Dan Shapiro, Mara Rudman, and Dennis Ross, (all Jews by heritage), would all likely go apoplectic.
That’s true even though it is very likely that Obama is himself intact. The Luo, his father’s tribe, do not circumcise, and his mother was a free-thinker hippie type.
That said, I doubt there is much to lose by trying; I just think it is quixotic”.
There you have it.
Perhaps the idea of age of consent for circumcision is impracticable in the U.S.A.
Maybe we should stay out of other people’s business and let things run their course. After all, 30 years ago the circumcision rate in the USA was 85-95% and, today, we’re down to around 52.3% nationally, and less than 25% in the West.
However, by discussing and debating the issue, it is bringing awareness to the situation - that this tradition is not a necessity.
Related article, ‘Circumcision, AIDS and Human Rights‘
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Links
Full White House discussion http://www.linkedin.com/groupAnswers?viewQuestionAndAnswers=&gid=2199632&discussionID=10671738&split_page=1
If you are opposed to circumcision or require information the below websites may be of use
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) is developing public health recommendations for the U.S. on male circumcision – ignoring the serious risks such as hemorrhage, infection, surgical mishap, and death – in favor of highly debatable and inconclusive research.
The CDC is the foremost expert on public health in our country and, as such, has a responsibility to share the truth about circumcision.
Sign a petition to the CDC, demanding the organization release a truthful statement on the harms and risks of circumcision.
If you believe as I do, that we should protect newborn babies from harmful and unnecessary surgery, then join me by clicking the link below:
MGMbill.org is a private non-profit organization based in San Diego, California, seeking to pass a law that will end the practice of male genital mutilation (circumcision) in the United States of America. Currently, girls are protected from genital mutilation by U.S. federal law, but boys are not.
Although legal protection of only girls from circumcision would seem to violate the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the fact remains that it is still widely considered to be legal in this country to mutilate a boy’s genitals in the name of social custom, hygiene, religion, or any other reason.
http://www.cirp.org/ – The Circumcision Information and Resource Pages are an Internet resource that provide you with information about all aspects of the genital surgery known as circumcision
http://www.circumcisionandhiv.com/ – Male circumcision and HIV
http://www.circumcision.org/ The Circumcision Resource Center is a nonprofit educational organization with the purpose of informing the public and professionals about the practice of circumcision.
http://www.mothersagainstcirc.org/ - The Circumcision Decision: An Overview
http://www.circumstitions.com/index.html – The struggle for genital integrity and against the involuntary genital modification of children of any sex:
December 30th, 2009 at 5:33 pm
Interesting topic, never gave it a second’s thought before now. It is an invasive surgical procedure on an unsuspecting baby, that’s for sure.
And…it brought some of the right wing-nuts out of the woodwork…
You know, the anti-abortion crowd that says (in effect) “They chopped the tip of my dick off but I don’t remember feeling a thing”.
To them I say: Too bad the doctor was in such a *curt* mood the day he did your circumcision!
December 30th, 2009 at 8:29 pm
I wish my parents had waited until I was 18 before they even thought of having me circumcised. It would have been nice to spend the first 50years or so of my life with what I was born with. Instead, I am restoring my foreskin and finding out that having a foreskin feels pretty good to me and my wife. With my restored foreskin, we don’t need to use lube and she does not get sore when we have extended sex sessions.
If men knew how good a foreskin feels, infant circumcision would stop immediately. If women knew how much better sex feels with an intact man, infant circumcision would stop immediately. Unfortunately, far too many have no idea what a foreskin does or how it feels, so the circumcision culture continues.
December 30th, 2009 at 8:30 pm
I find this article really interesting.
Circumcision is a strange american obsession. Other English countries have given up this disturbing practice. Circumcision has a long reputation for being “a cure in search of a disease”. I don’t know why so many parents support this barbaric surgery and are still buying all these pseudo “health” benefits of circumcision when evidence shows there isn’t any advantage to cut babies.
December 30th, 2009 at 9:01 pm
Is circumcision medically necessary? NO It is done to appease a very small minority with a religious argument. What are the onions of the doctors? This is the interesting part I think, doctors do it because of reason and one reason only MONEY.
December 31st, 2009 at 1:00 pm
I just went through the LinkedIn discussion you started. Wow. The responses you received do not speak well for the LinkedIn community. There is a lot of bigotry and many ad hominem attacks, much more so than I’ve encountered in other discussion groups. I guess the White House discussion group attracts more politically vocal persons. I’ve noticed that politically vocal people are very polarized and prefer to tell others what they think rather than critically examine and discuss issues.
Fortunately, there are other discussion groups where the community is capable of critical thinking. Maybe your question would be better asked in a forum that is not politically charged.
December 31st, 2009 at 2:00 pm
It’s worth remembering that no-one except for Jewish people and Muslims would even be having this discussion if it weren’t for the fact that 19th century doctors thought that :
a) masturbation caused various physical and mental problems (including epilepsy, convulsions, paralysis, tuberculosis etc), and
b) circumcision stopped masturbation.
Both of those sound ridiculous today I know, but how that’s how they thought back then, and that’s how non-religious circumcision got started. If you don’t believe me, then check out this link: http://www.noharmm.org/docswords.htm
Heck, they even passed laws against “self-pollution” as it was called.
Over a hundred years later, circumcised men keep looking for new ways to defend the practice.
December 31st, 2009 at 2:08 pm
Wow, Kudos to you for trying to bring this up on a White House discussion board. I think you acted entirely appropriately, suggesting that it should be illegal for minors. I hope you are not too discouraged. One day, it will happen. Thanks for your efforts.
January 1st, 2010 at 6:00 am
I was, my son was not. Before his 4th birthday it became medically necessary and he remembers that it was done. Had it been done at birth he would not have lived through a wee of pain. I asked for it to be done, but I live n France and it is only done for people that have religious reason. I asked my family doctor, who is Jewish, to do it. He refused because I was asking for non-religious reasons.
Here in France they consider it mutilation and people can not be mutilated. Men can not have a vasectomy because that is self-mutilation as well.
I’m for the clip, many people have problems later who are not circumcised, but you never hear of people having a problem later in life because they are circumcised.
January 1st, 2010 at 9:36 pm
Those who support infant and child male circumcisions as a religious freedom need to address the lack of logic inherent in their rationalization of this horrendous and shaming practice. They espouse religious freedom for themselves so that they may take away the freedom to choose religion from the helpless male child who has no religious choice. Choice implies understanding and consent.
It is n the very grounds of religious freedom that “religious” circumcision should be disallowed, because children cannot rationally make a well reasoned choice until adulthood when they are fully independent of parental pressure and interference.
One thing is sure. God did not tell Abraham or Mohammed to practice circumcision as a sign of distinction and of a covenant with Him when older cultures and religions in the region , such as the polytheistic Egyptians and Canaanites had long been practicing circumcision already.
January 2nd, 2010 at 4:07 am
To my knowledge, in the US, there are no strong medical reasons to circumcise a healthy person at any age. There are certain risks associated with doing it or not doing it, amounting to very little difference all told. In effect, this is irreversible sexual cosmetic surgery. So I wonder: would we find it acceptable for parents to tattoo infants’ genitals in a highly visible way, and for what reasons? What about headsplitting (this is exactly what it sounds like)? Isn’t there something at least slightly warped about an adult imposing some form of sexual expression upon a child?
In fact, the situation is mildly worse, because the foreskin is in fact a useful organ with many purposes. The fact that many men live happily without one does not contradict this fact; they have always done without, and it makes little difference to them. Nonetheless, it shouldn’t be hard to believe that there are benefits to being intact that some men really do care about. I suspect, however, that extolling the virtues of the prepuce puts many circumcised men on the defensive. By implication they feel that their own sexual ability is being criticized, which is more of a personal offense than anything, and that makes it quite difficult to reach such people. Their response will tend to be flat denial that a foreskin can ever be an asset, even if that possibility is actually rather irrelevant to their personal lives either way.
I think it’s appropriate to point out a few things. Some men do feel strongly about what happened to them in those first few days of life, including both circumcised men who wish they were not, and uncircumcised men who are grateful for that fact. That in and of itself should give people pause about asserting that it is a purely traditional matter or an issue of parental rights alone. In many cases, the adult man that the child grows up to be will care about this facet of his penis’s function and appearance, and while an uncircumcised man can always have the procedure done later in life, the reverse is not true. And again: should we allow penile subincision or genital bisection to be done on minors, not only for medical or religious reasons, but on the whim of a parent? (For those who may scoff at this phrase, “the whim of a parent”, I have to say that to my knowledge many parents do not, in fact, make this decision more than a day in advance, and in some cases they decide on the spur of the moment, when asked by a doctor.)
Really what I think it comes down to is that men should have a choice here. Infant circumcision is an unequivocal denial of that choice, as if anyone really has a greater interest in a man’s penis when he is a child than that man does as an adult.
January 3rd, 2010 at 1:36 pm
Please add to your “Myths and Facts about Circumcision” on the religious red herring ploy that it is exactly for the reason that one should choose one’s own religion and not have it permanently marked upon the non-consenting male body that neonatal male circumcision should be banned. “Religious” circumcision is not only a vestige of stone age barbarism, it is also punitive, barbaric and cult enforced coercion. My baptism left no permanent scars on my body.
January 3rd, 2010 at 7:18 pm
What a silly waste of life. Find something like starving human beings to spend your time on. Maybe something like the Make a Wish Foundation so the last days of a child’s life will be happier. Circumcision tho? Really…..?
January 4th, 2010 at 1:46 am
@McLaughlin: “many people have problems later who are not circumcised” Yes,
having a living body means it is heir to the possibility of problems (which can
usually be treated non-surgically), but this is the only normal, healthy,
functional, erogenous, non-renewable body part that gets cut off on the off
chance.
“…but you never hear of people having a problem later in life because they
are circumcised.” No, some have no problems later in life because they die of
it. Or Google “David Reimer”. Born Bruce, his penis was burnt off in a botched
circumcision and they tried to raise him as a girl (Brenda). It never took and
at puberty he reverted to being male (David). Luckily he met a woman with
children, deserted by all their fathers, who’d had it with penises, and had
some happiness for a while, but eventually he committed suicide. Or the many
men with smaller problems that nonetheless screw up their lives.
January 8th, 2010 at 9:42 pm
Oy, gevalt. We have a British lass telling Americans that, ” He (Obama) knows that even though Jews make up only 2% of the US population, they are overwhelmingly liberal and form a strong and influential base of his urban support.”
Would that were still true! While I am a proud Jew and a proud liberal, our BlogHostess is out of touch with current American politics, especially from an Orthodox Jewish standpoint. Orthodox Jewish-Americans have become largely conservative (politically, not a reference to Conservative Judaism) and very much Republican. They fear that liberal (or progressive) Democrats will not support Israel as staunchly as a conservative Republican.
Living in an Orthodox part of town, the yard signs in my neighborhood were overwhelmingly supportive of Senator McCain, just as they were for George (Cowboy) Bush, because my neighbors felt that Obama, Kerry, and Gore would not support Israel to their satisfaction. The issues that mattered to socially conscious American Jews have fallen by the wayside noticeably since 2000, or so. At least among the Orthodox Jews. And among Orthodox Jews, the brit milah is part of the Covenant between G-d and His chosen people. Even many of us non-Orthodox Jews believe that we are obligated to keep our part of the “contract”. It’s a non-issue. It’s a fact of life with us, that has existed long before Ms. Margrain or myself … and will continue long after our Souls have departed from their Earthly bodies. I have no complaint with it, nor does my son.
My parents and my grandparents fled from a Europe where Jews were told what they could practice and what was verboten. Even under the former U.S.S.R., circumcision of Jewish males was forbidden. I’m grateful to live in a country that allows us the freedom to practice our religion, as we wish … and free from government interference.
You are certainly free to voice your opinions, but please take a course in American Political Science … or come visit an American Jewish community, before you mistake the 1960’s with the 21st Century.
I only wish there were more liberal Democrats in the Jewish community.
January 9th, 2010 at 1:54 am
Ken thanks for taking the time to read the story and comment. However if you had read it thoroughly you would have noted it was not me who made the statement you refer to but quote “John Geishker DOC Seattle, pointed out to me…”
Here`s his correspondence if you want to tell him he needs to live in the present.
John V Geisheker, JD, LL.M., Admitted to the Washington State Bar Association, #32033
Verifiable at: http://www.wsba.org/public/default.htm
by entering attorney license: #3203
John V. Geisheker, J.D., LL.M.
Executive Director,
General Counsel,
Doctors Opposing Circumcision
DoctorsOpposingCircumcision.org
2040 Westlake Ave. N., Suite #420
Seattle, WA 98109
Advocating Genital Integrity for All Children Everywhere
January 9th, 2010 at 10:37 pm
Anne…
Apologies for my mis-attribution of the statement which attracted my attention. I’ll gladly redirect my comment to my fellow member of the Bar. He’s very out of touch with Jewish-American politics, if he believes that most of us are still liberal, in the traditional Democratic Party sense of the word. Most of the Orthodox Jewish community have switched Parties. Personally, I am saddened to see the shift to the conservative right, because it also puts them in with those who want to see the United States officially declare itself to be a Christian nation. (And also with those wackos who claim President Obama is a Muslim.) As the Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison noted, ” A lot of black people believe that Jews in this country have become white. They behave like white people rather than Jewish people.”
But I stand by my comments when it comes to my PERSONAL feelings when it comes to our Constitutional protections, which set us apart from so many other nations.
As one of our Founding Fathers, John Adams wrote, “The Hebrews have done more to civilize men than any other nation. If I were an atheist, and believed blind eternal fate, I should still believe that fate had ordained the Jews to be the most essential instrument for civilizing the nations.”
I believe our ancient customs to be civilized, and deserving of respect and protection. As I said earlier, my parents and grandparents fled from a Europe where they were not allowed to practice their religion and where six million Jews perished because of their religion. Are we now to be told again that we are not allowed to practice our Faith?
Heaven (and the Constitution) forbid.
I trust that Mr. Geisheker studied the same Constitution that I did in Law School. Please don’t take this to be an ad-hominem attack. I’m sure he’s a fine person. It’s only his grasp of contemporary American political science that I question.
January 10th, 2010 at 12:12 am
I don’t think it’s okay to hurt babies.
January 10th, 2010 at 3:37 am
Ken apologies accepted.
John Adams sounds a sensible man but if he was around today, he may not have drawn the same conclusions as you wrote.
Perhaps he would have been a member of the Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI); an independent human rights organization, which was founded in 1990 in reaction to the years-long policy of the Israeli government, which permitted the systematic use of torture and ill treatment of Palestinians in Shin Bet, or Israel’s General Security Service interrogations.
Yes, most folks know about past atrocities carried out on your people. However, role reversal may be seen to be in application now with Israel becoming the aggressor. Israel may now be coming very close to, or is, adapting similar systematic genocidal tactics against other peoples, under the banner of democratic freedom.
However, the topic at question is circumcision, not atrocities against other peoples. That is another debate. Let’s discuss who needs protection the most – the religious act or the defenseless child. It’s not the faith in question, rather the act in the name of that faith or appeasement of a God.
Similar acts under discussion in the past have also questioned that of human sacrifice.
For example, Nachmanides (in his Torah commentary on Leviticus 1:9) contended that sacrifices are an ideal in Judaism, completely central.
The teachings of the Torah and Tanakh reveal the Israelites’s familiarity with human sacrifices, as exemplified by the near-sacrifice of Isaac by his father Abraham (Genesis 22:1-24) and the actual sacrifice of Jephthah’s daughter (Judges 11:31-40).
However, abhorrence of the practice of child sacrifice is emphasized by Jeremiah. See Jeremiah 7:30-32.
So Ken, while you will always get the Nachmanides of this world in any religion, it’s hoped the Jeremiahs of this world will come through, and common sense prevails.
January 11th, 2010 at 9:50 am
Rape victims that were raped with the use of a drug often do not remember their rape but that doesn’t make ok! Just because you can’t remember an abuse happening to you doesn’t make it ok! Jewish circumcision was not in olden days a complete amputation! it consisted of merely snipping a small piece off the overhang of the foreskin! They did not have the capability to completely amputate w/o death or severe infection leading to death (remember they didn’t have antibiotics back then).
You can not give a nerve block to an infant that’s just how they do it; besides they all think, “well he won’t remember it anyway” and adult has that option as well as hydrocodone for the pain after! Circumcision advocates are not playing with a full dick! How can you know what you are missing if you never had the whole penis to compare?
January 11th, 2010 at 11:56 pm
@french guy- yes you do in fact top of the list is desensitisation, when boys become sexually active they have no control over when they cum like their intact counterparts that can ride the wave of orgasm along with a female. later in life it leads to ED and then impotance. Why do you think America is the #1 seller of Viagra? Maybe because men here need it and not just because they wanted to see what it was like?Iis it any strange coincidence that we are also the #1 circers? I think not! your son actually felt less pain than an infant would as infants have a heightened sensitivity to pain! Once again this goes back to not that he wouldn’t have felt it but that he wouldn’t have remembered it! It doesn’t matter if he remembers it or not its still abuse and mutilation!
There is no NEED for circumcision unless its cancer, gangreen or frostbite! Doctors in other countries know that! It’s only doctors in America that give the WRONG information for the proper care of an intact penis in the hopes that it will swell up and they can reccomend circumcision to an unknowing parent! They do it so they can grow that skin in petry dishes and sell it to cosmetics companies, do more research on the abundance of Langerhans cells that are the bodies natural fighting system against HIV so they can manifest it into a vacciene and so they can use the grown foreskin now the size of a football field in skin grafts! Quit pretending to be from another country that would know better than to amputate parts of the body willy nilly on a child still under the mean average for natural retraction witch by the way is age 5! until then NO attempt should be made to retract the foreskin and it should always be the child himself to first retract and until puberty no soap should be used inside his foreskin! you dont see us putting soap in a girls vagina or forcing a 4 year old girl to dousch do you? the foreskin should be given the same respect as a girls vagina! So that’s the only “reason he HAD to be circumcised” is improper care! I guarntee it! A french doctor would have known to leave him alone!
January 12th, 2010 at 1:34 am
Ken I directed your comments to John he asked me to post this comment in reply……
I am puzzled by a posting of one who appears to be a fellow member of
the bar, taking issue with my characterization of Jews as mostly
liberal, in which I mentioned that President Obama, being rational,
would take pains not to offend this constituency. I may be entirely
out-of-date in that regard. Perhaps legions of Jews are wandering to
the right, and I failed to note that shift. But I doubt it is huge.
And like my colleague at the bar, I derive no joy from any
‘christianization’ of the USA, if that is what is occurring. In my
native New Zealand, religious belief is irrelevant to public
discourse, as it should be in my adopted USA.
But as to circumcision, neither politics nor religion makes any
difference to the bioethical analysis. The simple fact is that the
only way to justify the suffering of a Jewish child at his Bris on his
eighth day of life is with reference to myth, legend, and the
supernatural. The only way to justify medical circumcision of goyim
(non-Jews) is by demonstrating an immediate and pressing medical
necessity which cannot be obtained by more conservative means.
Here are some simple considerations we all do well to note as regards
the rights of children to the intact body of their birth:
1) We have no way to know, at eight days’ of age, what the child’s
beliefs will be, and we should not try to guess. We have no right to
impose our beliefs on a child, much less mark his flesh with any
particular religion. The late philosopher Joel Feinberg said that
children are entitled to an ‘open future,‘ that is, with no
irrevocable decision made for the child that could not wait for his
assent as an adult. (Richard Dawkins has argued that raising a child
in ANY religion is child abuse since the child cannot escape or think
for him or herself.) Circumcision makes perfect sense as a religious
sacrifice elected by an adult after much reflection and study, like
the celibacy vow of a Catholic priest. As in imposition on an infant
whose beliefs cannot be determined in advance, circumcision is
illogical and unethical. (But I recognize the political realities of
mentioning this.)
2) Most U.S. Jewish boys have been circumcised by a physician at 48
hours, because most Jews are secular. A bris is actually a
statistically rare event compared to the medical occurrences. For one
thing, Jews make up barely 2% of the US population. For another, many
Jews are married to non-Jews and many would not ‘throw’ a bris. NO
circumcision in a hospital by a doctor at 48 hours of life has even
the slightest significance in Jewish law, the Halacha. None. Zero. (In
fact, the legal history of ‘informed consent’ comes partly from the
objection of orthodox Jews in the 1950’s to the OB preempting the
mohel without their consent.)
3) A growing minority of Jews, observant and secular both, are
electing ‘Brit Shalom,’ a non-cutting, covenantal welcome and naming
ceremony for boys which even many progressive rabbis recognize. They
acknowledge that while Brit Milah (“covenant of cutting”) may be
ancient, it is only one of the 613 mitzvol, (‘good deeds’) and not one
necessary to preserve Jewishness, which passes down the maternal line.
If your mother was Jewish, you are Jewish, full stop. No amputation
needed.
4) Finally, I remind my learned colleague that ancientness is no
standard by which to judge or justify a cultural practice, no matter
how many have died it its defense. Slavery, infanticide, child labor,
wife beating, throwing oneself on a husband’s funeral pyre, are all
ancient practices, often justified by religious belief. Mercifully,
these and others have slid into disfavor. I think Jews are smart
enough to adopt Brit Shalom universally, but it will take a while, the
way the emancipation of slaves came to the West rather late.
My sorrow comes from the fact that medical circumcision, an inarguable
barbarity, appears to be sustained (at least in the US) from the
continued perception that any circumcision is somehow ‘holy.’ It is
not. It is merely a human contrivance, like FGM, with a tawdry,
dishonest, puritanical, and venal history, easily Googled.
I grapple with that zombie ‘meme’ all day, every day.
John V. Geisheker, J.D., LL.M.
Executive Director,
General Counsel,
Doctors Opposing Circumcision
DoctorsOpposingCircumcision.org
Seattle
January 12th, 2010 at 4:51 pm
I have 4 sons, now all adults. When they were born, I refused circumcision for them and was barraged with complaints from doctors, saying that I was jeopardizing my son’s health, their partner’s sexual health, etc. I viewed it as barbaric.
On the same note, there has been a topical anesthetic on the market since 1975 to block the pain of needle insertion in babies (EMLA). It is not in use. My youngest son has needed numerous surgeries, never offered or advised of EMLA. Found it after my son was 12. Was told that babies and young children don’t feel pain.
January 13th, 2010 at 1:58 am
Everyone can feel pain, including infants. Babies feel pain when their brains send out special signals to their bodies. These signals induce reaction such as: increased blood pressure, increased heart rate, decreased oxygen in the blood, and a surge of stress hormones. These signs are all present when a baby is circumcised. Usually, they are sick or injured when their brains send these signals. Feeling pain is a signal that something is wrong.
Measuring pain in babies is difficult. Changes in vital signs (heart rate, breathing rate, and blood pressure), the amount of oxygen in the blood, and the baby’s facial expression and behavior are most widely used to rate infants’ pain. The doctors and nurses caring for your baby should take regular measurements of your baby’s pain, and record the results in the medical chart.
* There are different pain rating scales used for infants, such as the FLACC Scale (FLACC stands for face, legs, activity, cry, consolability), and theRiley Infant Pain Scale. These pain rating systems look at the baby’s behavior to determine the level of pain.
University of Michigan Health System
January 26th, 2010 at 12:10 pm
in my opinion the biggest hurtle to overcome would be the younger generation’s girls… they all think its gross. its pretty difficult to start a relationship when there disgusted by your privates. ive overheard people talking about it, and saying the most ignorant crap. one person thought you had to clean it with a Q-tip. and then the other more obvious stuff, some people think its less sensitive. some people think its unhygienic. i would imagine your mouth is alot dirtier but, your trusted to brush your teeth arnt you?
May 20th, 2010 at 4:48 am
Great post!
May 27th, 2010 at 10:24 pm
arch1design.com’s done it again. Superb article!
July 29th, 2010 at 9:40 am
I have honestly never come across such a lot of moaners. To get things into perspective; what dose a woman know about a penis? They don’t really have a clue, as for a circumcised one or an uncircumcised, which one feels better to live with; they have even less of a clew.
So let’s rule their opinion’s out.
Secondly the opinions of the uncircumcised, he has to live with what he’s got because he knows no better, the same applies to the guy that was circumcised at birth he can’t comment ether as he also only knows what it’s like on his side if the wall.
The only guys that can make any true comment are the guys that have lived both with & without a foreskin. Most that have the skin removed are usually “over the moon” with relief of loosing it, sex feels better, easier to clean, looks good, I could go on & on. The other thing they say is, “no kids of mine will suffer like I had to, and their foreskins are coming off as soon as they have been borne.”
I was cut at 26, reason, because I couldn’t afford it sooner. If I could have had it done at age 6 or 7 all the better, I would still have preferred to have been done at birth. My son was and he is most thankful, no memory of it.
Most of this intact argument is a lot of bull, what’s the first thing an uncircumcised guy dose when he ester’s a woman….pull his foreskin back and hope it stays there as if it slips forward at the wrong time he will be loosing all the fun of contact on the bare glans, so much for all those thousands of nerves receptors that do so little.
Next time try it with the skin pulled out of the way & see what I mean!