It’s funny how things seem to come up in conversation, or in life, all of a sudden, all the time. The circumcision thing has been one of those things for me this past week. Last night in class, one of my students said she was having a boy, and we talked a bit about circumcision. She is leaving the decision up to her husband, which I think seems so much easier said than done.
It was also brought up this past weekend in a workshop I attended called “Teaching Newborn Care”, as part of my CEA/MNY requirements. I also watched a video called “Birth As We Know It” which is a documentary about birth, by a woman who developed and teaches a type of preparation for childbirth called Conscious Birthing. (Which as an aside, is one of the names I very much liked for my own birthing business) In this video, there is some footage of a circumcision on a baby in the hospital. It was pretty awful to watch…and in the video they call this procedure “penis reduction surgery”.
All this stuff being said, there seem to be two ends on a long spectrum in this debate over circumcision. One end is: It is better, cleaner, more like all the other little boys (in the US)–or it is a religious and cultural dictate as in the Jewish culture…or it is likened to genital mutilation. Yikes! Why can’t we just let these little guys decide on their own if they want to be circumcised or not?
My high school boyfriend at the age of 16 decided to be circumcised as his parents did not think this was appropriate for their child. All I remember is that it was a very conscious decision for him at the time,and it was very painful to heal from. I wonder how he feels now about his decision…I got a tattoo around the same age and really would like to have it removed these days.
Anyway, some of the things to think about that I picked up from all this talk and think are:
~These days the rate is about 50-50% for boys here in the US, the procedure is not done routinely in hospitals anymore. So your child will not be the only little boy to be uncircumcised in his class.
~Uncircumcised males have greater sexual pleasure than circumcised ones.
~A bad job-botched procedure–can cause the penis to curve to the side, or can cause painful intercourse or urination.
~Some believe that this procedure so early in life can cause baby to relate the message of pain with thier sex…although I do not even think that babies know what their penis is, they surely can know pain.
~Have a mohel (jewish man whose only job is to perform this procedure—does thousands of them) perform the circumcision, if you choose to do it. It is done super quickly–and the baby is held by loving arms–not strapped to a table. The baby is usually a week old, and has had time to learn to breastfeed properly, and gain weight–both of these things strengthing him for the surgery.
Here are some resources to look at further to aid in a decision. Please let me know if you have others to add.
NY Magazine recently had a very extensive article about circumcision.
An interesting look into the Jewish history and interpretation of circumcision.
Another website dedicated solely to circumcision.
